Coup foiled moment el-Rufai spoke on TV – Party chieftains
Buhari denies endorsing Adamu
Jonathan’s rumoured ambition unsettles party in S’West, S’East
BY BENEDICT NWACHUKWU, TIMOTHY AGBOR AND BRIGHT JACOB
With just 12 days to the March 26 National Convention of the All Progressives Congress, a battle for the soul of the party is still raging among the blocs that formed the party in 2013 as well as Governors who are currently divided into about three main cliques.
The raging battle is one of the reasons the party is finding it difficult to either zone its presidential ticket, National Working Committee and National Executive Committee positions or leave the race open to qualified contenders.
President Muhammadu Buhari, on Saturday, waded into what was already turning into a messy face-off between power blocs in the ruling party, warning Governors to stop name-calling and back-stabbing ahead of the 2023 general elections. Apparently, the President was referring to some Governors’ usage of the term ‘Yahoo Yahoo’ governors to describe their colleagues.
A former Governor of a South-West state, who spoke to The Point in confidence, said Governors who thought they had more experience than others had been exposed to be infants in the game of today’s politics.
“They did not plan their strategies well even if we think that they have a right to their kind of politics. All that everyone wants is to be on top of the game at every point. But there were a lot of lies, which they felt could pass because the President would normally not rock the boat if anything is done in his absence.
“What saved Buni was that they chose a wrong spokesperson. Even the closest of el-Rufai’s friends don’t trust him. Going on air to say he would run if the President tells him to was not a smart one after stating falsely, or otherwise, that the President told them to go and remove the Chairman.
“I can tell you categorically that the people who planned with him turned back the next day to join those who think the worst of Buni would be better than the best of a regime where el-Rufai is made so important. The rest is history today. I believe Buni, with what the President has said, would take the party to Convention.”
The President has, however, reliably said Buni will lead the APC to the convention, slated for March 26.
Buhari also reportedly denied backing former Governor of Nasarawa State, Abdullahi Adamu, for the APC national chairmanship.
“The President said he was not aware of such endorsement, that he had told leaders of the party to get ready for a smooth and fair contest,” the source said.
“What saved Buni was that they chose a wrong spokesperson. Even the closest of el-Rufai’s friends don’t trust him. Going on air to say he would run if the President tells him to was not a smart one after stating falsely, or otherwise, that the President told them to go and remove the Chairman”
CLASH OF LEGACY PARTIES
The new Peoples Democratic Party, which broke off from the PDP; All Nigerian Peoples Party, a faction of the All Progressives Grand Alliance, the Action Congress of Nigeria and Congress for Progressive Change, formed a granite coalition of legacy parties that morphed into the APC in 2013.
The coalition went on to wrestle power from the PDP in 2015, the first time an incumbent party lost power at the centre in the history of electioneering in Nigeria.
Upon getting power, the spoils of electoral victory were shared among the legacy parties. While the CPC got the presidency (Muhammadu Buhari), ACN got vice presidency (Yemi Osinbajo), n-PDP got Senate Presidency (Bukola Saraki).
In 2019, following the exit of a host of n-PDP members, who returned to the PDP, the dominance of the CPC and ACN blocs was entrenched further in the APC.
Now, the battle for the top positions in the APC is being waged along the foundation blocs.
The Point gathered that the CPC bloc wants to produce the next chairman of the APC because the ACN and ANPP blocs had produced chairmen.
In a counter, the ACN bloc wants to produce the President that will be vacated by the CPC in 2023.
Also, amid rumours that former President Goodluck Jonathan is being prepped to explore the possibility of being the Presidential flag bearer of the APC, party chieftains insist it would take a miracle of the century for it to happen.
FAILED COUP
The covert fight for who clinches the crown ahead of the June 23 deadline has been fingered as being behind the crisis rocking the APC. And the last three weeks have been the most difficult for the ruling party.
The party had, for whatever reason, been tethered too close to a dangerous cliff as different tendencies assailed it in a fight to the finish as the 2023 general elections came into full view.
The failed coup, last week, was greatly helped by the Independent National Electoral Commission, which halted the progress of those behind the move, forcing them to backtrack severally.
But the biggest relief came for the party on Saturday, as President Buhari, who had hitherto refused to dabble into the goings on in the party, spoke from his London medical holiday base, calming frayed nerves and showing direction out of the sundry crises that had buffeted the party.
“Today is a great day for our party. Everybody must fall in line now. We have waited endlessly for this moment. Now that Baba has spoken, let me see who will continue the silly pranks again,” a top chieftain of the party from Delta State told The Point on condition of anonymity.
Buhari’s speech has undoubtedly doused tension in the party and buoyed the spirit of many APC faithful as it instilled direction, calmness and hope in it.
Buhari, in a statement signed by his Senior Special Assistant (Media & Publicity), Garba Shehu, called for orderliness in the party, warning members to “desist from name-calling and backstabbing ahead of the oncoming March 26 Convention, remain steadfast and maintain its unity if the party is to continue in the path of victory and its dominance at all levels throughout the country.”
“You can see that some people were out to finish the party by riding roughshod over others before. And Baba has warned them now.
Convention must go on. APC is here to stay,” the apparently happy party chieftain added.
The source revealed that the supremacy battle between members of the legacy parties was at the heart of the crisis that rocked the party.
He explained that “of the five or let’s say four and a half legacy parties that formed the APC, only two are active and viable in the scheme of things as the powers that be have made it difficult for the rest three to grow and flower. The CPC and ACN are the two dominant legacy parties remaining and they are the ones causing the katakata in the party.”
“nPDP is gone. In fact, those ones saw the writing on the wall very early and checked out voluntarily and became opposition to the APC in the first tenure. I can say only Rotimi Amaechi is left there now who is still visible. ANPP has only Dr. Ogbonanya Onu and APGA has only Senator Rochas Okorocha. Who else? So the fight is between the Tinubu group and the CPC group. But the CPC has sympathizers in the Tinubu group. The CPC people are working to ensure that if the South is to produce the President, it doesn’t go into the hands of a rival. That’s the problem. So they think of Jonathan, they think of Amaechi, they think of Osinbajo and Tinubu knows all these things.
“I only hope Baba’s intervention will bring peace even though politicians hardly step back from their positions,” he explained.
JONATHAN AND 2023
The rumour about former President Goodluck Jonathan defecting to the APC to fly its Presidential flag has been undying and it is said to have unsettled some major camps in the South West and South East of the party.
However, some stalwarts of the ruling APC have explained that it may be difficult, if not impossible, for the former President to get the ticket of the party, if he eventually dumps the PDP.
According to them, if Jonathan should defect to the APC, contest for the ticket and fail to clinch it, that may bring about his political downfall.
They, however, stressed that the doors of the party were open for the former president to join and that he had the fundamental right to vie for presidency under any political party since he had only served a term in office.
In an exclusive interview with The Point, Taiwo Akeju, Commissioner for Political Affairs and Inter-governmental Relations in Osun State, said it would take divine intervention and intense prayers for the party to cede the party’s presidential ticket to the former president.
Akeju said, “It’s still within the realm of speculation and he hasn’t indicated that he is coming to the party, but, if he is coming to the party, the more the merrier. We have a lot of people who are potential presidential candidates of the party. According to the Electoral Act and INEC guideline, the presidential candidate of APC must emerge between now and June 3rd. So, for Jonathan, who is a PDP member to come and say he wants to wrestle the ticket from members will be a tall order. He has to seek divine intervention and pray to God very well.”
Former APC spokesman, Yakeen Nabena, frowned at the moves by some politicians to subtly force Jonathan on the party as its 2023 Presidential candidate. He explained why Jonathan was not and should not be the choice of the South if the party zoned the presidency to the region. He asked, “What did he forget in the Aso Rock Villa that he wants to come and collect now?”
Nabena told The Point in a telephone interview that the news of APC luring Jonathan to join it and pick the presidential ticket had remained rumours that were being spread since none of the parties had made any official statement on that.
“Well I am not aware of any moves but I have also been reading it online and all that. I think it’s the right time for Goodluck Ebele Jonathan to also come out and confirm or refute that because it has also been everywhere which we are not aware of,” the former Acting National Publicity Secretary said.
The Bayelsa State born politician wondered what the former President was looking for in the Villa, saying he had served the country as President for six years and wondered what he could not do for the country in six years that he thought he could now do in four years.
The APC Chieftain argued that the South was looking for a candidate, who would be at the Villa for eight years of two terms, not a man that would only preside over the country for four years if elected.
“For me, if he eventually comes out to say he wants to contest, it would amount to shortchanging the South because for us in the South, we want a President that will serve for eight years, that will give us two terms, so why are we taking one term? Moreover, what kind of development is he going to bring to the country and even the South for just one term?
“If he is having such ambition, he should go back and think and re-examine himself before coming out to tell us that kind of story,” he said.
Also reacting to the unconfirmed news making the rounds about Jonathan, Ezra Enwere said it would be unfortunate for the former President who was also a former vice president, former deputy governor and governor, all under the umbrella of the PDP, to begin to give such a thought even if he was being lured.
“It is unthinkable to hear that GEJ is considering jumping over to APC to contest for President in 2023. What! It’s most unfortunate though that a man who has gotten everything he needed to get in politics on the platter of gold, using the PDP platform, will now be thinking of dumping the party to join APC to contest for the President.
“Anyway, I don’t want to believe it until he makes a public declaration on that or the APC declares that the former president is now a member of the party and its flag bearer come 2023. But anything goes with Nigerian politicians.”
The lawyer and political analyst maintained that the problem facing Nigerian democracy was the non-existence of party ideology, adding that Nigerian politicians had ridiculed the game of politics.
“It’s only in this clime one hears stories like this and before you know it, what was rumoured becomes real. Defection doesn’t mean anything again in Nigeria. When serving governors, lawmakers and even party chairmen dump their parties that gave them the platform for the mandate at a slightest opening without recourse to the people that gave them the mandate because of their party membership, is it a former president who will find it difficult to jump over? Anyway, let’s wait and see.
“We all know that the former president is a global personality. Since he handed over power peacefully to the opposition party in 2015, his word has weight in global politics. If he succumbs to this temptation, he may live with the regrets for life. If he has bosom friends and good advisers, this is the time to advise him.”
A PDP Chieftain who wouldn’t want his name in print told The Point that the party was seriously following the issue as it unfolds but insists that the former president is wiser than those trying to lure him to destroy his hard earned reputations.
“We are on top of it. I will not tell you that what you heard is true or not true but I want to assure you that we are on top of the matter as it unfolds. Former president Jonathan is an intellectual. He is wiser than those purportedly luring him to the other party.
“One thing you must know is that he has made friends globally since handing over the ruling party to the opposition party in 2015. He discusses various issues with his global friends, so I don’t see him make a mistake he will later regret.
“When we said APC was not a party, Nigerians did not believe us. Imagine, just after eight years of Buhari, the party has nobody again to present. Let’s see how it pans out. Before June the truth will come out, that’s all I can say.”
An Imo State based politician, Nzewunwa Eze said, “This is a ploy to deny the Igbo people the well-deserved ample opportunity to produce the next President of Nigeria.”
Eze argued that rather than give the ticket to the Igbo of South East extraction, those who had insisted that an Igbo man could never be President of Nigeria were the ones pushing for a Jonathan ticket, not that they loved him.
“Do they love him? The answer is no. They did everything to scuttle his ambition of re-election in 2015, called him different names, abused him at a slightest opening. So, now they have seen his quality or what do you want me to say? The game they are playing is simple; let’s give it to Jonathan, the Igbo people will support him. But they will be disappointed.”
Eze also noted that former president Jonathan’s administration was regarded as Igbo government which, according to him, is a major factor why the Igbo man is marginalised in this administration.
Diasporan Nigeria in the United States of America, Cecil Amechi, while reacting, said, “Goodluck Jonathan was the president of Nigeria from 2010 to 2015, he was a PDP member, he lost his bid for a second term as president to an APC member General Buhari in 2015.
“Recently, we have heard rumours of the APC trying to lure him to the party as their candidate for the 2023 presidential elections. This is an indication that the North is desperate to regain power via the fastest way possible, because Goodluck can only serve a single four-year term.
“It is clear that if Goodluck accepts this proposal and go ahead to win in 2023, the North will have a strong case to demand that power returns to the north.
“Another reason why the APC wants Goodluck as their candidate for the 2023 election is the fact that the APC as a political party has failed woefully with the General Buhari presidency.”
