APC and PDP are wobbling parties, says Obasanjo

Former President Olusegun Obasanjo says both the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and the All Progressives Congress (APC) need to be rejuvenated for Nigeria’s democracy to be strong.

Obasanjo made the observation when he received one of the PDP national chairmanship aspirants, Raymond Dokpesi, at the Olusegun Obasanjo Presidential Library, on Saturday in Abeokuta, Ogun state.

The former president said the ruling and opposition parties need to be strengthened for the country’s democracy to be salient and strong.

“I have also said that the two parties that are there, the one in government and the one in opposition are both wobbling parties.

“I still believe that the two wobbling parties can still be made strong. They can,” Obasanjo said.

He re-emphasised that he was no longer interested in partisan politics in Nigeria. He said he left PDP when he discovered that the party had been destroyed beyond what he could be associated with at that point.

Obasanjo said there was no reason PDP should not have ruled Nigeria for 50 years as believed by some people, but that the party caused its own problem.

“That has happened in some other countries like Germany, where a party runs the affairs of the county for decades, but of course, that is not the history in our own case.”

Obasanjo said those who destroyed the PDP were still in it and that they would not leave until the running of the party was taken over by determined, selfless, upright, and honest people.

“If we are just saying PDP has a crisis, which is self-made and that the supreme court had resolved the crisis for us, we are just deceiving ourselves.

“The supreme court has taken a right decision as an apex court should, but as a party, only that cannot help you to do it all.”

He prayed for PDP to get its national convention right, saying the chairmanship of the party was very important.

“I had four PDP chairmen under in eight years. So, I know what it takes to have a good or bad chairman for a party,” he said.

He advised Dokpesi to use his media assets well for the interest of the country to avoid and correct past mistakes.