Financial crunch is staring Muhammadu Buhari’s campaign in the face, the flip side of the life of a General whose integrity and conscience do not allow him to amass wealth by hook or crook, despite connections dating back to his days as military Head of State.
TheNiche learnt that worst hit in the All Progressives Congress Presidential Campaign Organisation (APCPCO) are Directorates such as Media and Publicity, headed by Garba Shehu; and Administration and Finance, led by Sokonte Davies.
Other Directorates include Contact and Mobilisation, led by Boss Mustapha; Election Planning and Monitoring (T. O. E Ekechi); Policy Research and Strategy (Kayode Fayemi); Security (Abdulrahman Dambazau); Legal (Chukwuma Ume); Youth Mobilisation (Dasuki Jalo); Women Mobilisation (Ramatu Tijani); and Fund Raising (Babatunde Fashola).
They are reportedly groaning under the dearth of funds to effectively discharge their duties.
The situation raises concern in the party because it finds it difficult to compete with the PDP, which has billions of naira to play with.
A few moneybags
The APC is said to be relying heavily on the goodwill of a few moneybags in the party.
“Buhari’s party, the APC does not have the war chest which the PDP, the government in power, has and this has always been a big issue among party supporters.
“Most of the directorates set up to handle the election are lagging behind; they don’t have the resources to challenge the PDP and are only relying on the people’s goodwill,” the source disclosed.
But a ray of hope emerged last week after former Vice President, Atiku Abubakar, returned from a trip abroad and participated in a meeting of APC chieftains which discussed the cash crunch.
“I will let you know if cash is released any moment soon, but for now, we are operating with zero allocation,” a directorate leader told TheNiche.
The few campaign advertisements in newspapers and on television are said to be individually motivated and are the work of APC National Publicity Secretary, Lai Mohammed.
The funds scarcity may also have resulted from the shutting down of APC’s text message fund raising platform by the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC).
Mohammed alleged in Lagos last week that the NCC shut down the service to give the PDP an edge over the APC.
He said many government-controlled media have equally clipped the wings of APC promotional advertisements.
But an ally of Buhari, former Petroleum Minister, Tam David-West, insisted that the cash situation will not impact negatively on the campaign because support for the APC comes directly from the people.
He said unlike the PDP which is funding its campaign with N21 billion public money, the APC relies on public goodwill.
NCC Executive Vice Chairman, Eugene Juwah, explained that the platform was banned because it violated the rules.
“You are allowed to raise money, but you must conform to the rules of the NCC. We didn’t make these rules looking at elections. We made these rules in the interest of the development of telecommunications in Nigeria and we would keep those rules whether there are elections or not,” he said.
N118m war chest
A total N118,792,265 had been donated towards Buhari campaign by Nigerians at the end of January 2015.
About N64 million was raised through a crowd funding project, according to former Kaduna State Military Administrator, Hamid Ali, who made the disclosure while addressing about 87 APC support groups of Buhari in Abuja.
He denied reports that Buhari received funds from an unnamed Arab nation for his campaign and insisted that he is getting money from Nigerians.
According to him, between December 24, 2014, when Buhari said N54 million was raised through the crowd fund project, and January 7, 2015, an additional N64,702,265.35 was raised. The total, N118,792,265.
Buhari “launched the funding to get money purposely from the lower people, because he wants the commitment of the people and to remember when he gets to office that it is the sweat of the people that got him there.
“And by that, he will be more committed to serve them,” Ali said.
He confirmed that the campaign team is also getting money from other sources, who may not necessarily buy telephone recharge cards but donate through the bank account opened by the APC.
In contrast, less than two weeks after the PDP convention on December 8, 2014, it garnered over N21 billion at a fund raising dinner in Abuja.
