By Emeka Alex Duru
Even with an emphatic victory over the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in 2015 general elections, critics of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), had always insinuated that it was a matter of time for the party to go into shreds.
For these critics, though APC had accessed power on the crest of blistering media hype and exaggerated claim to progressive politics, leaders of the party were mere power-seeking politicians, interested more in office than service delivery.
Managers of the APC, had however, put a lie to this charge, arguing that their coming to office, was necessitated by the urge to put a halt to the drift which PDP had subjected Nigeria to in its 16 years of being in the saddle (1999-2015).
With this mantra of fixing the country, the party had its way among the voters, winning the presidency for its candidate, Muhammadu Buhari, picking more seats in the National Assembly, taking control of more states and local assemblies, in many parts of the country.
Victory mismanaged
But hardly had the party settled down for business of leadership, when the different and conflicting tendencies within its fold began to rear their heads.
It all began when NASS members on the ticket of the party defied the leadership and selected leaders that were not those proposed by APC.
Contrary to Senator Ahmed Lawan and Femi Gbajabiamila, respectively, who the party leadership had anointed as Senate President and Speaker of the House of Representatives respectively, the legislators elected Senator Bukola Saraki and Yakubu Dogara respectively.
Ever since, APC has been stumbling from one crisis to another.
Drawing the battle line
But two developments, appearing in quick succession lately, are seen by many as further exposing the underbelly of the party, more. One was the statement credited to former Vice President, Atiku Abubakar, where he was quoted as lamenting his exclusion from the affairs of the party since the inauguration of Buhari administration in 2015.
Related to this, was the declaration by Minister of Women Affairs, Aisha Alhassan, where she had allegedly stated that even if Buhari would go for a second term in 2019, she would pitch tents with Atiku.
Atiku who spoke in Hausa service of the Voice of America (VOA), was quoted to have remarked that having volunteered his resources and contacts to Buhari’s campaign, he has not been accorded commensurate recognition, thereafter.
“I was part of all the processes, including campaigns until success was achieved.
“But sadly, soon after the formation of government, I was side-lined. I have no any relationship with the government. I’ve not been contacted even once to comment on anything. And in turn, I maintained my distance. They used our money and influence to get to where they’re but three years down the lane, this is where we are”, he was quoted as saying.
The dust generated by the outburst from the former Vice President was yet to die down, when Alhassan came up with a declaration that amounted to preference for him to Buhari over 2019.
Speaking in an interview with the BBC Hausa, Alhassan had described Abubakar as her godfather, saying she would not mind losing her job for supporting him.
“Atiku is my godfather even before I joined politics. And again, Baba Buhari did not tell us that he is going to run in 2019.
“Let me tell you today that if Baba says he is going to contest in 2019, I swear to Allah, I will go before him and kneel and tell him that ‘Baba I am grateful for the opportunity you gave me to serve your government as a minister but Baba just like you know, I will support only Atiku because he is my godfather. If Atiku says he is going to contest”, she had said.
Weathering the North East challenge
The two developments coming almost at the same time, caused considerable concern in Aso Rock and the APC leadership, TheNiche learnt. Atiku is from Adamawa, while the Minister is from Taraba. Both are from the North East – a zone in the North that has not been comparatively lucky with any of its citizens occupying leadership position in the country since the demise of Tafawa Balewa (Bauchi State) in the First Republic.
Aside the North Central which had had its shot at the apex level largely through military interventions (Yakubu Gowon, Ibrahim Babangida, Abdulusalami Abubakar), most of the country’s leaders from the North, had emerged from the North West.
They included, Murtala Muhammad (Kano), Shehu Shagari (Sokoto), Umaru Yar’Adua (Katsina), Buhari (Katsina). Against this backdrop, there have been muted insinuations that the North East, just as the South East, has not been having its fair share in leadership equation in the country.
There is thus the fear that if the trend is allowed to continue with Buhari, even with his obvious falling health, going for a second term, power will at the end of his tenure, return to the South.
That would mean the North East being in the lurch for another uncertain eight years.
Atiku draws blood
For Atiku, who would be 71 in November this year, that would be waiting too long for an office he has openly shown interest in, since the ill-fated Babangida transition programme in 1993.
In the build-up to the 2015 presidential primaries of APC, he and the former Kano State governor, Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso, had appeared as front runners. But due to high wire intrigues which saw former Lagos state governor, Bola Tinubu rallying support for Buhari, Atiku’s dream of emerging the flag bearer of the party, was put on hold.
Close watchers of the utterances and actions of the former Vice President, ever since, readily agree that he is yet to take off his mind from the office. When therefore he openly complained of how he was being marginalised by the Buhari administration, analysts instantly drew the conclusion that the Turakin Adamawa, had subtly thrown his hat into the ring for 2019 politics.
Until Atiku and former President Olusegun Obasanjo got entangled in a suffocating feud in the build up to the 2003 general election, his clout in the country, loomed quite large.
In fact, drawing immensely from the political craftsmanship and extensive network of his mentor, late Shehu Yar’Adua, Atiku had at the onset of the current political dispensation, sent signals of his interest at occupying the highest office in the land at the appropriate time. Launching himself on the wings of the defunct Peoples Democratic movement PDM, the leadership of which he inherited following the death of Yar’Adua, Atiku clearly emerged as a strong factor in defining the tempo of PDP politics.
When eventually he left the governorship election that he had easily won in Adamawa in 1999, for a vice presidential slot, it was seen as an attempt at further marketing his intimidating credentials.
However, when his battle with Obasanjo began to take turns for the worst, enormous efforts were deployed by the highly vindictive former President to shoot down Atiku’s towering influence.
Twice, he was elbowed out of PDP. First was in the run-up to 2007 general elections and lastly in 2012, when he eventually teamed up with other individuals and groups to found APC.
What had seemed the major factor working against Atiku had been the corruption tag which Obasanjo had hung on him, which he did little to shrug off an infancy stage. But with his challenge on any person who had anything against him to come up with and no response yet, he is gradually but steadily finding his feet.
Buhari’s uncertain health and the provincial proclivities of his administration in which some sections appear sentenced to the sidelines, seem to brighten the chances for Atiku.
APC in crisis
The Atiku resurgence, our reporter learnt, is throwing up the various tendencies in APC. With his obviously veiled declaration of interest for 2019, those laying claim to supporting Buhari for a second term, are rattled and have swung into action. Or so, it appears.
Kaduna State governor, Nasiru el-Rufai, has been in the forefront of the Buhari continuity agenda.
Though critics allege that the governor is merely mouthing support for Buhari, while stealthily working behind to promote his own interest for the office, he has been making claims of readiness to even put his life on the line to actualise President’s re-election.
There is the suspicion that what El-Rufai may lean on in either promoting Buhari or silently but assiduously working for himself, is the religious card that may win him support from commoners in the North.
Informed observers are equally not dismissing the Saraki factor in APC politics in the days ahead. Hailed in some quarters as the proverbial cat with nine lives, having survived the obstacles placed on his way, allegedly by the leadership of APC, the senate president is suspected to be bidding his time before launching himself for its presidential ticket.
Though a high-ranking member of his party, Saraki enjoys fellowship of his colleagues in PDP, who still see him as one of their own.
Enter Bola Tinubu
There is also, the Tinubu wing of the party, which like Atiku, is understood to have been quietly nursing the wound of exclusion by Buhari. The first major sign of things not working well for the estranged allies, was at the launch of a book on Buhari, last year, when the author, stated that it was not the erstwhile Lagos governor that nominated Yemi Osinbajo as Buhari’s running mate. Tinubu considered that a huge slight and went a long way in putting a lie to that section of the book.
He received another cold shoulder from the President during the November, 2016 Ondo governorship election, when his preferred candidate, Segun Abraham, lost to Rotimi Akeredolu in APC primary. His efforts at making the president grant him concession, hit the rocks. To rub it in, Buhari attended Akeredolu’s rally days to the election, in which he won.
“It was at that moment that it dawned on Asiwaju (Tinubu), that he had been conned. It was then, apparent that Buhari had dumped him after using him to get South West votes and he has been waiting for the right time to pay him back”, whispered a Lagos-based Tinubu loyalist, who pleaded anonymity.
Curiously, Tinubu, has not been featuring much on the programmes and activities of the government. With the 2019 politics drawing closer, he is seen as one of the people that will determine the tenor and temperament of APC politics.
In fact, a former South-South governor, had in an encounter, told this reporter, that he had it on good authority that the former Lagos governor would try his hands for the presidency in 2019. According to him, despite his spirited efforts to dissuade Tinubu from the agenda, it seemed his mind was made for the exercise.
Our reporter gathered that the Senator representing Kaduna Central, actually may have had Tinubu in mind when he dropped for Buhari, the allegory and suggestion of the Lion King reaching out to the Lagoon Lion, to prevent him from exploding like a Hippo.
“The Lion Monarch should reach out to the aggrieved but silent Lagoon Lion so that he doesn’t explode like the hippo. The Lagoon Lion controls waters that can drown”, Sani had written on his facebook, social media page.
Danger ahead
Confronted with the unceasing crisis occasioned by the interest of leading members of the party and copious inertia by the APC leadership, there have been pronounced fears by members on the party going the way of PDP, before 2015.
PDP, while in power, at a time, got carried away by the glamour of authority that it easily yielded to the culture of impunity and arrogance in the conduct of its affairs.
What eventually brought down the party was the undemocratic nomination of former President Goodluck Jonathan as its flag bearer, amidst muffled opposition by even some founding fathers. And PDP paid for it, dearly. APC, it is feared, is toeing that line over Buhari.