Plateau State Governor Caleb Mutfwang has declared that he has no intention of defecting from the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) to the All Progressives Congress (APC), dismissing recent speculation as baseless.
His comment comes amid a wave of defections from the PDP, including those of Delta State Governor Sheriff Oborevwori and Akwa Ibom State Governor Umo Eno, both of whom recently joined the APC with the full party structure in their respective states.
There have also been calls from a group within the APC urging Mutfwang to join the ruling party, a move that has sparked heated exchanges between the two dominant parties in Plateau.
But addressing the rumours during a media chat, Mutfwang insisted that Plateau remains a traditional PDP state and that abandoning the party would amount to a betrayal of the people.
“I haven’t had that conversation [of leaving PDP for APC] with anyone. The media has speculated a lot, but nothing has happened.
“There are two or three groups peddling that rumour. One group is well-intentioned. They know the APC has never really existed on the Plateau—I say that with every sense of responsibility. They’ve been in government by fraud for the past eight years.
“In 2015, they didn’t win that election. There was a wave of anger in the PDP that led to anti-party activities, but even then, the APC did not win. I was a local government chairman at the time. We adjourned the coalition at 8 p.m. to resume the next morning. But by 2 a.m., when I woke up to urinate, I found that the results had already been declared,” he said.
He said he remains convinced that the PDP’s late candidate, General Jeremiah Usaini, won the 2019 election, “but the shenanigans in the system saw someone else declared.”
Mutfwang said, “The majority of those who have led APC in Plateau carry a trust deficit. There are genuine APC members who wish we could lend our credibility to them. But Plateau politics doesn’t work like that.
“The majority of Plateau people have always been PDP—and they remain PDP. Even during the last eight years, some local governments couldn’t conduct elections out of fear of losing.”
The governor said it would be unconscionable to betray the people who have stood by the PDP.
“That’s why I have always said my political future will be decided by God and the people of Plateau State. Wherever Plateau people go, that’s where we go.
“For us, this isn’t even a matter for discussion. I am a bona fide member of the PDP. I remain so. And I’m very optimistic that very soon, the PDP crisis will be a thing of the past,” he added.
On the internal party wrangling that led to the loss of all PDP legislative seats to the APC through Court of Appeal judgments, Mutfwang, who is a member of the party’s national reconciliation committee, said the crisis has been resolved and the party is now united.
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