Olusegun Obasanjo Speaks On Why He Tore His PDP Membership Card At Last

Former President Olusegun Obasanjo in a phone interview with
Premium Times has explained why he ‘tore’ his PDP membership card. I wanted to
summarize it before, but then you might miss some certain interesting part, luckily
for you, it’s not a long report. I kinda like this man, don’t know why. Lol.  Find the interview after the cut.

As criticisms and commendations continue to trail his
dramatic exit from the Peoples Democratic Party, former President Olusegun
Obasanjo has explained how he arrived at the decision to dump the party to
which he belonged for 16 years.

The former president had Monday announced his resignation as
a member of the party on whose platform he ruled the country between 1999 and
2007.

Mr. Obasanjo renounced his membership of the PDP when some
leaders of the party led by Surajudeen Oladunjoye, the chairman of the ward
around his former residence in Ita Eko, visited him at his Presidential Hilltop
mansion in Abeokuta home.

The former president directed Mr. Oladunjoye to tear his
membership card at a press conference organised during the visit.

About two hours later, the PDP leadership in Ogun State
announced the expulsion of the former president from the party.

However, in a telephone interview with PREMIUM TIMES
Tuesday, Mr. Obasanjo explained that the PDP members visited him to express
their genuine concern about his refusal to be active in the party.

“They were concerned that I had only one leg in the party,
and worried that since I’m their leader in the ward, they need to hear from
me,” the former President said.

According to him, when the party members arrived his
residence, they were singing a song in Yoruba language – “Nigeria yi ti gbobgo
wa ni, Ko ma gbodo ba je. Eje ka sowopo kajo gbega (Meaning – Nigeria belongs
to all of us, we must not allow it to be destroyed and we must join hands to
make it great).

Mr. Obasanjo said when they settled down he sought to know
why they came and that it was at that point that Mr. Oladunjoye told him that
since he (Obasanjo) as their leader became angry with the PDP and remained
inactive in the party, they had not only lost sense of direction but also
worried about their political future.

He also said the party members informed him that the
leadership in the state was planning to expel him and that they wondered what
would happen to them if he was expelled because they would become rudderless.

“You are our leader and it is you we are following. You have
remained a card-carrying member of the the party. But since you became angry
with the party we have lost sense of direction and now we are hearing that they
want to expel you. If they expel you, where do we go? What do we do?” Mr.
Obasanjo quoted the ward chairman as saying.

The former president explained that it was at that point
that he gave them his PDP membership card and told them that they could do
whatever they want with it.

He said, “In my response, I said when you people came you
were singing a song and I agreed that Nigeria is our own. If the issue is the
party, I will not choose the party at the detriment of Nigeria and I will fight
for Nigeria even at the detriment of the party. I will rather surrender my
membership of the party so you people can move on politically,” Mr. Obasanjo
explained to Premium Times.

“If you people’s worry is that I’m a card-carrying member of
the party and I’m not showing you people direction and you are worried that I’m
neither here nor there, this is the card; you can keep it, you can burn it or
you can tear it, do whatever you want to do with it.”

The former president said he then handed over his membership
card to Mr. Oladunjoye, who immediately decided on his own to shred it.

Mr. Obasanjo said he had no regrets for his action despite
the criticisms that have greeted it.