Buhari’s Aide, Onnochie Congratulates Sheriff

The personal Assistant to President Muhammadu Buhari on Social Media, Lauretta Onochie, has described factional Chairman of the peoples Democratic Party, PDP, Ali Modu Sheriff as the authentic Chairman of the party.

Onochie, who took to her twitter handle congratulated Sheriff and hoped that his leadership “will bring back a civilised form of opposition in Nigeria”.

She wrote: “Congrats to Alh. Modu Sheriff, d authentic Chairman of PDP. Hoping your leadership will bring back a civilised form of opposition in Nigeria.”

This is coming at a time when an Appeal Court sitting in Port Harcourt, Rivers State, had on Friday affirmed the former Borno State Governor as the authentic Chairman of the PDP.

Following the ruling, the Senator Ahmed Makarfi’s faction of the party, rejected the judgement saying it would immediately head to the Supreme Court to contest the judgement.

Some members of the former ruling party had recently accused the ruling All Progressives Congress, APC, of been responsible for the crisis currently rocking the PDP.

Makarfi’s faction which took to the party’s twitter handle had said, “The Judgment has finally shown that the ruling Party, the APC is out to create a one party state in the country.”

PDP has been enmeshed in leadership crisis following the inauguration of the Sen Ahmed Makarfi-led National Caretaker Committee in May 2016.

 The party had inaugurated the committee following the alleged expiration of the tenure of its embattled factional National Chairman, Sen Ali Modu Sheriff.

 Despite the existence of the Makarfi-led Committee, Sheriff has continued to maintain that he remained the authentic leader of the party.

However, Makarfi’s claim to the party’s leadership stool was strengthened by a favourable judgment obtained at the Federal High Court, Port-Harcourt in which Justice Mohammed Liman ordered that he be duly recognised.

 Justice Liman also ordered Sheriff to stop parading himself as the National Chairman of the party