Recent reports bordering on the 2015 presidency suggest that the ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) may implode in its power game. GEORGE AGBA, in this report examines the situation within the backdrop of the body language of key players.
A mild drama acted by state governors last week Thursday at the presidential villa may have trivialized certain political ambitions being insinuated ahead of the 2015 presidential poll; but it suggests the enormity of the issue on the minds of key players in the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). Although President Goodluck Jonathan, who himself is said to be constitutionally fit to seek for a second term in the said election, has warned severally that political fireworks for 2015 should cease for now to enable him concentrate on his transformation agenda and the deliverables he promised Nigerians in the last presidential election, keen observers of goings-on within the domain of the ruling party say they are afraid that the concordance, even in the face of internal discord, which usually characterises the selection and nomination process of PDP candidates at its national convention, may not turn out in 2015.
The scene of the governors’ farcical play was at the First Lady wing of the presidential villa. The president was going to hold a meeting with governors of the 19 states of the North to deliberate on security and other bedeviling issues in that part of the country. As they throng in that night, the governors were being ushered to take seats reserved for them at the conference table. Not quite long, after a good number of them were already seated and waiting anxiously for the president, Governor Gabriel Suswam of Benue State walked into the meeting room.
As he got set to start exchanging pleasantries and banters with his colleagues, Governor Suswam sighted his Jigawa State counterpart, Sule Lamido sitting at the far middle of the table. Jokingly, he paused and then shouted in a mellow tune, “Mr President”, as he ignored other persons seated at the upper side of the conference table and walked briskly towards where Lamido was seating. In a manner which is typical of greeting the president, Suswam took a slight bow, while shaking Lamido.? Thrown into a frenzy of excitement by the governor’s comic relief, all other governors present, including some Aides to the president burst into uncontrollable laughter, except Lamido himself, who only smiled mildly while trying to explain how he felt when he first saw the report linking him and his Rivers State counterpart, Rotimi Amaechi to the 2015 presidency. As Chinua Achebe puts it in Arrow of God an old woman is always uneasy when dry bones are mentioned in proverbs.
Governors Sule Lamido and Chibuike Rotimi Ameachi of Jigawa and Rivers states were in the news recently over their purported endorsement by some groups and individuals as presidential and vice presidential candidates of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) in the 2015 election.
Suswan was apparently reacting comically to report in the media on the 20th of last month that former President Olusegun Obasanjo had endorsed Governors Lamido and Amaechi as a pair for the PDP presidential ticket. According to the report, while Obasanjo was drumming support for a power shift to the North on the grounds that the region deserved the highest position in the land, 2nd Republic Senate President, Chief Joseph Wayas was also reported to have urged Lamido to accept Obasanjo’s proposed Lamido/Amechi presidential ticket in 2015. But the former president has since denied ever proposing Lamido/Amaechi presidency.
Wayas reportedly said this when he led The Albinos Foundation (TAF) on a courtesy visit to Governor Sule Lamido at the Government House in Dutse. “No matter what, don’t dare reject the people and statesmen like Obasanjo who proposed the Lamido /Amechi ticket. You are not only a Jigawa State material but national material. You need to answer the people’s call to serve Nigeria”, he was quoted to have said. Northerners Caucus in the South-West geo-political zone also took a cue from what had been reported when they rose from a meeting in Ibadan, Oyo state capital, only to declare its support for calls on Lamido to declare his intention for 2015.
After the meeting between President Jonathan and the Northern governors which ended at about 11:00pm last Thursday night, Governor Lamido told newsmen that he had nothing to do with the rumour. He described the said report as a mere expression of feelings or opinions by people. He added that, although he was not bothered about what had been widely reported, he must be grateful to God that, at least, people have started mentioning his name out of a population of 167 million people.
Lamido said, “I feel highly flattered. You see, in a country of 167 million people, if your name is mentioned, you should be flattered. You should thank God. People are free to speculate, to make whatever comments they like. That is their own business.? But certainly, to me, I am not bothered when people are expressing their opinion or feeling. I just feel flattered. You know. So it is true that people can now see me? You see, if I was the one saying all that and you ask me, I will say yes. But what I am saying is that it is something that I am hearing just as you are hearing it. So what I can say is I don’t know whether it is fortune or misfortune of being fingered. But frankly speaking, I don’t think we should waste our time and energy talking about 2015 now. The man there is very healthy, he is doing very well as far as I am concerned and power comes from God”.
By this pronouncement by Governor Lamido himself and the comic drama put up by Governor Suswam, it is becoming unclear whether the two governors said to have been tipped for the job actually are nursing any presidential ambition or, worse still, whether PDP governors are really interested in fielding a presidential candidate for the job from among themselves. Besides, some pundits believe strongly that, with news filtering in at the weekend that the governors stayed away from a book launch of the National Chairman of the PDP, Alhaji Bamanga Tukur, there was the possibility of a deep-seated infighting within the party.
Majority of the governors elected on the platform of the party were conspicuously absent at a book presentation ceremony packaged to mark the 77th birthday anniversary of party Chairman Bamanga Tukur. The governors who were in Abuja for a scheduled meeting with President Goodluck Jonathan, were said to have boycotted the book launch last Saturday, save Governors Theodore Orji of Abia, Isa Yuguda of Bauchi and Patrick Yakowa of Kaduna.
Governors Jonah Jang of Plateau and Ibrahim Shemaof Katsina also sent their deputies to the event. Political commentators say this development has fuelled speculation that all was not well between Tukur and the governors, who felt slighted that the PDP chairman was imposed on the party by President Goodluck Jonathan. In the past, the governors had ganged up to enthrone successive chairmen of the party.
Political observers at Aso Rock presidential villa, however, share a different opinion in the matter. They wonder why those peddling report in this direction are after the president’s job. The thinking is that, while the party has declared categorically that the party’s ticket for the 2015 general elections will be issued based on merit, President Jonathan has consistently appealed that they should allow him time to do his job which, he believes, will speak for him beginning from mid next year.
As it is, issues concerning the 2015 presidency are still cloudy with key actors describing whatever the media report on it as mere speculations grinded by the country’s rumour mill. While Nigerians are watching with ecclesiastic passion, the president has maintained his ground that there was nothing to talk about 2015. It is still a game of suspense in the country’s political scenery you may say.
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