PDP paying price for abandoning zoning agreement, says Tajudeen Yusuf

Tajudeen Yusuf, a former member of the house of representatives, says the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) is facing the consequences of neglecting its zoning arrangement during the 2022 presidential primaries.

Yusuf, who represented the Kabba/Bunu/Ijumu federal constituency, spoke on Thursday when he appeared on Sunrise Daily, a programme on Channels Television.

In the build up to the 2023 presidential election, some PDP chieftains called for the zoning of the party’s presidential ticket to the south.

However, Atiku Abubakar, former vice-president, who is from the north, won the PDP presidential primary — a development that created division in the party.

There has been a recent wave of defection from the PDP to the All Progressives Congress (APC) ahead of the 2027 elections, including Sheriff Oborevwori, the Delta state governor.

Speaking on the show, the ex-Kogi lawmaker said the collapse of the zoning arrangement marked a turning point for the PDP.

Yusuf said a similar debate over the party’s zoning agreement emerged in 2014, when former President Goodluck Jonathan took over after Umar Musa Yar’Adua’s passing.

He said that most party members from the north felt short-changed by Jonathan’s emergence as the party’s candidate in 2011.

“A lot has changed in PDP, but the most fundamental shift came in 2023 when we abandoned our core principle of zoning the presidency,” Yusuf said.

“If you recall, in 2014, the agitation was that Yar’Adua didn’t finish his term and Jonathan took over, which many believed ate into the North’s turn.

“That led five governors — led by prominent figures like Atiku Abubakar — to walk out of the convention at Eagle Square, marking the start of PDP’s internal crisis.

“By 2019, most of them, including Atiku and Tambuwal, returned to the party, in line with our principle, the party zoned the presidency to the North to avoid a repeat of past issues.

“By 2023, naturally, it should have rotated back to the South, but because of certain vested interests — people who felt they could influence the process — zoning was deliberately blocked.

“I was at the meeting, and I remember saying, ‘If we don’t zone, we will regret this’; because in Nigeria today, politics is still very much tied to religion and ethnicity — maybe one day that will change, but not now.”

Yusuf said those who derailed zoning in 2023 are now regrouping ahead of the next general election.

He noted that although PDP governors now meet regularly, they are not supporting the party financially.

“This is the first time in about ten years of PDP being in opposition that governors are not actually funding the party,” he said.

The lawmaker added that the PDP is going through “one of the toughest political periods” in its history since losing power in 2015.