ABUJA (Reuters) - The chairman of Nigeria's ruling People's Democratic Party (PDP) said on Thursday President Goodluck Jonathan had the right to contest elections due next January but stopped short of giving him outright backing.
Jonathan would need the support of his party if he is to be sure of success in the polls because of a "zoning" agreement within the PDP which says presidential terms should rotate between the Muslim north and Christian south every two terms.
Jonathan, from the southern Niger Delta, inherited the presidency when northern President Umaru Yar'Adua died earlier this year part way through his first term.
"We did not envisage that our dear president (Yar'Adua) would die in office," PDP chairman Okwesilieze Nwodo told reporters ahead of a closed-door meeting of senior party officials with Jonathan in the capital Abuja.
"The party believes that Dr Goodluck Jonathan as part and parcel of the joint ticket has the right to contest the presidential primaries for the 2010 elections, but this would not preclude anyone in the party from contesting," Nwodo said.
A bid by Jonathan could lead to protests from some factions in the north, but his failure to stand could cause unrest in the Niger Delta, the heartland of Africa's biggest oil and gas industry, and threaten a year-old amnesty for militants.
Sources close to Jonathan say he is concerned about the implications of abandoning zoning and about his own credibility as a candidate in polls he has pledged to make free and fair.
He has support from state governors -- who form a powerful caucus in the PDP -- in the south and the central Middle Belt, where the backbone of the army are from. But northern Muslim governors have acknowledged his right to stand while stopping short of endorsing him.
