Anxiety as PDP disqualifies two presidential aspirants, clears 15

There was disquiet in the camp of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) over the disqualifications of two presidential aspirants during the party’s screening exercise.

According to the news reported by Punch, the aspirants were disqualified on Friday, April 29, in Abuja, the nation’s capital by Senator David Mark led committee.

Telescope.ng reports that the committee, therefore cleared 15 other aspirants including former vice president Atiku Abubakar and an ex-Senate president, Bukola Saraki.

Speaking with journalists in Abuja after the exercise, the chairman of the screening committee, Senator David Mark, said the exercise was free and fair.

Mark, however, declined to reveal the identities of the disqualified aspirants or the reasons for their disqualification, saying that the aspirants did not meet the requirements set by the panel.

The yardstick used to weed out the two aspirants might not be far from the requirements of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) which had the power to disqualify candidates on grounds of non-compliance with extant electoral laws.

The former senator said that the report of Friday’s screening would be transmitted to the PDP National Working Committee for consideration on the same day.

He noted: “The exercise, as far as we’re concerned, went on very well. We’ve been here since morning, and I’m sure you people have been here since morning also.

“We’ve been very thorough this time. See how much time we’ve taken to screen each individual who has been here. We screened 17 aspirants, which is quite a number. We cleared 15 and two have not been cleared.

“Now, don’t ask me those who have been cleared and those who have not been cleared, because I won’t tell you. We haven’t released the result to them. So, if you ask a question in that direction, you’re wasting time.

“I think on the whole, that’s what we’ve done. And we’re quite satisfied with the standard of the aspirants by and large. And we think that any one of them, who gets the ticket, will win the election in 2023.”