Comrade Lekan Badmus is a Columnist with Oduduwa News and Public Opinion Analyst.
Politics to a lay man, is a game of number. The lay man may not be wrong by virtue of his level of understanding of the word politics. To him, the party with the highest number of votes during an election wins the race and whatever that is cast at the polling booth is all that matters. This is a myopic view. In politics, the more you look, the less you see !
Elections in Nigeria is much more than voting. Rather, it is filed with pre-primary intrigues, manipulation, maneuvering, betrayals, compromise and sacrifice. I was once a full-term staff of the moribund National Electoral Commission, NEC, Lagos Island. That puts me at a vantage position and an ample knowledge of the scenes beneath the masquerade garb.
The recent announcement by PDP NEC that the party has ceded her Chairmanship position to the north was received with so much elation by party faithfuls in the south. The ecstasy is understandable.
In retrospect, there have been several calls for the party to zone her national chairmanship slot to the north with the belief that; by so doing, the presidential ticket would be sorted out by party men from the south. This is in line with the principle of rotation within the party. Although, this is not grounded in the nation’s constitition but it is not a misnomer. After all, democracy could be defined in tandem with the peculiarity of each sovereign nation.
I have read few reports and opinions about the so-called zoning; many of which agreed with the decision, with a particular emphasis and harping on the technical knock-out on Alhaji Atiku. In the views of some of these erudite opinionists, Alhaji Atiku stands no chance to clinch the presidential ticket again. The submissions of these opinions stem from the fact that, once the national Chairman comes from a region, the presidential candidate would not be picked from the same region.
Periscoping the zoning proposal by the NEC of the party, I can smell a rat. I have a reservation for that resolution. The decision to me; was warped in deceit.
Of truth, the southern governors recently met and requested that the next president should be a southern extraction but their northern brothers have insisted that the electorates should decide. Therefore, the decision as agreed upon at NEC level was a victory for the southern presidential candidate agitators.
However, the resolution of the governors is only a suggestion to the zoning committee of the national convention. The main convention where a replacement would be picked for Uche Secondus, would hold on October 30 and 31 in Abuja. Therefore, the Southern governors need to hold their popping of champagne at least till the end of the convention. Or succinctly put, till the selection of the presidential flagbearer. How do I mean !
The body language of the the north across the two major political parties is not suggestive of their readiness to allow power shift. Really, power is intoxicating but at the same time, transcient.
In an interview granted by
Professor Umar who is the National Secretary of Fulani Development Association of Nigeria, FDAN, the erudite scholar posited that power could only be won and not derived through blackmail or intimidation. This is a figment of my apprehension to the pyrrhic victory of the southern governors. The statement of the professor is a representation of the general stance of the north.
The position of the party chairman is crucial to the nomination of the presidential flagbearer. To say that the north has willingly succumbed to the agitation of the south in ceding national Chairman to the north needs a second thought. In my opinion, the north might want to use the occupant of the position of chairman to install the presidential candidate of northern origin with the plan that the chairman would relinquish his position for the south in a bid to balance the equation. This is not impossible. The zoning, as agreed upon by the governors may be a decoy and a bait.
The communique that emanated from the meeting of the substantive zoning committee under the chairmanship of
Governor Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi of Enugu State was highly pregnated with secrecy, deceit and decoy which confirmed my apprehension especially with regards to the first three statements of the communique as presented hereunder:
- The National Zoning Committee of the PDP was given the mandate to zone National offices to be contested by all PDP Members of the Party at the PDP National Convention of the Party scheduled for October by the National Executive Committee of the Party.
- That the mandate of the Committee does not include Zoning of the offices of the President, Vice President and other Executive and Legislative offices of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
And the decision of the Committee to zone the Party offices does not in any way affect the executive and legislative offices in Nigeria. - That zoning of offices on PDP has traditionally been between the North and South of Nigeria.
From the above, there is nothing suggestive of any blanket ban on Alhaji Atiku or any other northern politician to vie for the presidential ticket of the party. The zoning is limited to party offices. There is a line of demarcation between Party Officials and Presidential or Legislative Representatives.
As it is, the zoning holds no water and the ticket is open. The party flagbearer might come from any region depending on the pedigree, astuteness, doggedness and above all, cash at disposal.
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