PDP reacts to Fubara’s defection, describes move ‘self-inflicted injury’

The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has reacted to the defection of Rivers State Governor Siminalayi Fubara to the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), describing the move as “a self-inflicted injury” and an outcome the governor willingly orchestrated.

The PDP, in a statement issued on Tuesday by its National Publicity Secretary, Ini Ememobong, said it received news of the governor’s formal exit with “pity,” noting that his defection was in line with the legal maxim volenti non fit injuria — “to one who is willing, no harm is done.”

Ememobong said Nigerians who have followed the unfolding political crisis in Rivers State would recall that Fubara “willingly travelled the path that took him to this destination.”

Ememobong stressed that the governor cannot now accuse the party or any individual of failing to protect him.

He added that although people facing “existential threats” may suffer temporary memory loss caused by trauma, Fubara should acknowledge the role played by the PDP, civil society organisations, and Nigerians who stood by him throughout his political ordeal until what the party described as his eventual capitulation.

Fubara dumps PDP for APC

“It is our prayer that the governor should not suffer from Stockholm Syndrome, where a victim falls in love with his captor,” the PDP spokesman said, adding that despite the situation, the party “pities the governor and wishes him well.”

Ememobong added: Furthermore, the Rivers situation is a testament to the dysfunctional nature of our democracy, where individuals are bigger and stronger than institutions and can use the apparatus of the Federal Government to obfuscate political life out of their opponents and bring them to their knees.

“Democracy is terribly threatened by acts of this kind, and all well-meaning people should unify in condemning this progressive decline of democratic norms.

“We reiterate to Nigerians and the global community that with the unrelenting disposition of the ruling party towards the attainment of a one-party state, and the constriction of the political space, democracy is under severe attack in Nigeria. Everyone must rise together to oppose this ignoble trip toward electoral authoritarianism.”

The Star