Former PDP National Chairman, Alhaji Kawu Baraje, has revealed the real reason why he and other key members left the PDP and later helped form the APC. Baraje said their group had nine demands for President Goodluck Jonathan but later reduced them to just one. Still, Jonathan refused to listen. “We told Jonathan to do just one thing for us and we would come back, He refused.” According to him, that single act of rejection triggered the historic defection that gave birth to the APC.
Baraje, who played a central role in the formation of the new PDP, said the group initially presented a list of nine demands to the president, hoping to resolve the deepening cracks within the ruling party at the time. Those demands, he explained, were rooted in a desire for fairness, justice, and a return to internal democracy.
However, after intense negotiations and pressure from various quarters, the group made what Baraje described as an enormous concession. They reduced their expectations to just one demand—a gesture of goodwill that they believed would signal Jonathan’s willingness to mend broken bridges.
“We told President Jonathan that if he could do this one thing, we would all come back,” Baraje recounted. “Just one thing. And he still refused.”
That refusal, he said, was the final blow. For Baraje and his colleagues, it was clear that reconciliation was no longer possible. What followed was the dramatic walkout at the PDP convention and the eventual formation of the APC—a move that would eventually end Jonathan’s presidency.
Baraje’s account not only sheds light on the internal tensions that plagued the PDP but also underscores how a single decision can alter the course of a nation’s history.
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