The tenure of the present National Working Committee (NWC) of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) will continue till December 9, even as the national convention holds on Saturday, the party official has said.

The Chairman of the party National Convention Organising Committee, Governor Ahmadu Fintiri of Adamawa, disclosed this on Friday, while briefing newsmen on the party preparations for the convention in Abuja.

He said though the party wanted early convention holding on Saturday; it was not planning to truncate the tenure of the incumbent NWC members ending December 9.

“There will be no any vacuum because we are not truncating anybody’s tenure.

“We only call for an early convention, which is also in the provision of Constitution.

“But that does not mean that because we are having early convention we are terminating the tenure of the present NWC. They will still be asked to serve their term until December 9.

“If not for anything it will give better chance for them to interface and have a smooth transition,” he said.

Fintiri, who said that the party in as much as the party expected vibrant new NWC members, it also appreciated the present national leaders of the party.

“They were able to galvanise support, plan and work for this party in 2019 to move from about 10 governors to almost 18, with more House of Representatives members than the previous election.”

Speaking on the Saturday convention, Fintiri said that the Screening Appeal Committee upheld the disqualification of the three aspirants.

He clarified that Okey Muo-Aroh, contesting National Secretary was disqualified for not respecting the zoning arrangement of the party.

He said that the position of national secretary was zoned to the South, which micro zoned to the South-East.

He added that the South-East caucus met and zoned it to Abia and Imo states while the Office of the Auditor was zoned to Enugu and Anambra.

He said that instead of Muo-Aroh from Anambra to contest the office of auditor zoned to his state, he went to purchase form for position zoned to Imo and Abia states.

“I think every institution and organization must have a way of discipline its members.”

With regards petitions against some of the cleared candidates, Fintiri said: “The appeal panel has found most of petitions as baseless and frivolous and the petitions have been displaced.”

He added that 3,600 delegates were being expected in the convention.