PDP made mistakes for 16 years in power - Says Raymond Dokpesi.

One of the aspirants for the national chairmanship position of the Peoples Democratic Party, Chief Raymond Dokpesi, has said the party made a lot of mistakes during the 16 years it occupied the Presidency.

He said the original idea of the founding fathers of the PDP was to lay a foundation of a party that would serve as an umbrella for all Nigerians, not minding their tribes and class.

Dokpesi, who spoke during the week at the PDP secretariat in Umuahia, the Abia State capital, said selfish ambitions of some leaders of the party, retarded the vision, which led to the eventual loss of power to the All Progressives Congress in the 2015 general elections.

He, however, said the APC, with its one year in power, had proved that it was incompetent to rule the country.

Dokpesi said, “Today, the PDP is described as the most corrupt party in the country; they said our leaders are clueless and corrupt. That was how they described former President Goodluck Jonathan, but with the way the APC is running this country, can we say we have a country? Is the South-East not marginalised and denigrated?

“The current economic crisis in the country is also alarming; our mothers cannot afford food items to sustain their families any more. Is this the kind of Nigeria we want for our youths? Is this the kind of change we want?

“By the special grace of God, we cannot sit back and allow the country to continue to decline.

“We cannot sit back without giving the APC good opposition, we cannot sit back and not rebrand, re-energize and revitalise the PDP so that by 2019, we can give the APC a purposeful opposition and contest as a party in order to win the next presidential election.”

While canvassing for support in the forthcoming national convention of the PDP, Dokpesi said the PDP had the capacity to rebuild itself to give Nigerian youths another opportunity achieve their dreams.

He said, “I believe the youths should be given the opportunity to run this country. It is my desires for us to have leaders at all levels below 45 years, while elder statesmen will sit back and give them direction.”