By Emeka Alex Duru
On Tuesday September 17, 2019, the leading opposition political party, Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), released a statement that on a good day, would serve as a morale booster to its members on the November 16 governorship polls in Kogi and Bayelsa States. The party in its official twitter handle, claimed that it was poised for sweeping victory in the election, stressing that its grassroots structures have been activated in the two states ahead of the exercise.
Ordinarily, the assertion by the PDP should carry weight. Bayelsa, is for instance counted among the states in its stronghold. Since the commencement of the current civilian dispensation in 1999, the party has been in power in the state. In some instances, even, Bayelsa is casually described as a PDP State. The performance profile of the current governor, Seriake Dickson, should also count for it in the elections, more so, as the candidate, Senator Douye Diri, is his preferred choice.
In Kogi, the fleeting style of governance by the Yahaya Bello administration, is an opportunity for the PDP to reclaim the state it lost to the All Progressives Congress (APC), in 2015.
But side by side these windows of opportunity by the PDP in the November 16 polls, is a widening gulf within its rank and file that may even erode the relative fortunes it recorded in the February/March 2019 general elections. Incidentally, if this eventually happens, informed followers of the uncanny politics in the party, would not be entirely surprised. In what is fast becoming a tradition in the affairs of the party, there is the tendency of the PDP losing cohesion and concentration after a major outing, particularly where it had not recorded the expected returns. Since it was upstaged by the APC in the 2015 elections, PDP has stumbled from one internal crisis or another. This is not particularly new to the party, anyway.
Even while in power, PDP had not been welded together by any known ideological strand. What it had, going for it, was the geographical spread. Added to the so-called federal might – a euphemism for vote manipulation, it had carried on with certain nauseating arrogance that many at a time, had likened it to an octopus in the throes of implosion. At the heart of its undoing was absence of internal democracy. But because it had the entire state machinery to muscle its way in major elections, the cracks in the party were papered along by its leadership. Notwithstanding, it was certain to perceptive analysts that the Umbrella, with which it had managed to sell a dummy of unity among its members, had torn apart.
It therefore, did not come as a surprise when the dissention within its fold, led to its unexpected loss to the APC in 2015. The immediate result was the mass exodus of its members to the APC.
Following its unsuccessful attempt to wrest power from President Muhammadu Buhari and his APC in the last elections, signs are beginning to emerge that the PDP, may soon slip into another round of crisis. Signs of the impending impasse began to unfold, shortly after the Wednesday, September 11, 2019, verdict of the Presidential Election Petitions Tribunal had validated the election of Buhari and dismissed the petition by the party’s presidential candidate, Atiku Abubakar.
Wike dares PDP
While the PDP kicked against the judgement and signified its intention to appeal same at the Supreme Court, Rivers State governor, Nyesom Wike, fired a congratulatory message to Buhari. He went further to hail himself in being bold on the action rather than toeing the path of his unnamed fellow PDP governors who he alleged, secretly visit the president. Wike’s position on the outcome of the Tribunal, was not totally surprising. Since the December 2018 National Convention of the PDP in Port Harcourt, elected Atiku as the presidential candidate in place of Sokoto State governor, Aminu Tambuwal, Wike has not been at ease with developments in the party. It was clear that he was all out for Tambuwal. What was rather startling was his allegation of the governors on the platform of the party paying nocturnal visit to the president. The dust raised by the action was yet to die down when the governor warned the party no to toy with his state, stressing that he had all it takes to battle it to a standstill.
The governor, was reacting to a committee set up by the party to probe the emergence of Ndudi Elemelu as the Minority Leader of the House of Representatives. He specifically criticised the committee as the most tainted and corrupt in the history of the party.
He said, “We are warning the PDP to be careful not to toy with Rivers State. Rivers State has all it takes to withstand the PDP and fight the party to a standstill. The Rivers State Governor is not one of those governors that anyone can cajole. The Rivers State Governor is not one of those governors that will kowtow to their illicit activities. The committee set up by the PDP on the illegal emergence of Ndudi Elumelu is the most corrupt committee ever set up by the party.”
Indiscipline in the system
PDP is yet to make any official pronouncement on the remarks by Wike. Calls put across to the party’s National Publicity Secretary, Kola Ologbondiyan, on the matter, were not successful, as his line was out of reach. A Senior Lecturer in the Department of History and International Studies, Lagos State University (LASU), however, described the outburst by the governor as “indicative of the level of indiscipline that has pervaded Nigeria’s body politics”. Frowning at the action, he wondered if any elected official in the Second Republic, would have dared the Unity Party of Nigeria that had the like of Chief Obafemi Awolowo or the Nigerian Peoples Party (NPP), which had somebody of Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe, in such manner. “None, not even the most rascally of the officials could have done that in UPN that had Awo or NPP that had Zik. There was party discipline then. There was what we call the supremacy of the party, then. What we have now are not political parties, strictly speaking. They are what the late Chuba Okadigbo, would have referred to as “rallies”. And that is the major problem of the present political class”, he volunteered on condition of anonymity.
Defection looms
Wike’s cocky posture coincides with the apprehension of mass defection in the party. This is as a result of grouse by estranged members of the party. For example, a former Presidential Adviser on Niger Delta Affairs, Timi Alaibe, is believed to be planning to ditch the PDP following the outcome of the Bayelsa State governorship primary. He lost to Senator Diri, an ally of the outgoing governor, Seriake Dickson.
Diri, who represents Bayelsa Central at the National Assembly, beat 19 other aspirants to emerge as the PDP candidate for the November 16 governorship election in the state. He polled a total of 561 votes to win the governorship ticket while Alaibe came second with 365 votes. Both Diri and Alaibe are from the same Kolokuma/Opokuma Local Government Area. Alaibe had complained of irregularities in the conduct of the primary. He is even said to have approached the court to upturn the outcome of the exercise.
Similar note of resentment resonates in Kogi State, where the Senator representing Kogi West, Dino Melaye is also said to be angry over the outcome of the party’s governorship primary, where he emerged fourth with 70 votes. Musa Wada, a younger brother of the immediate past Governor Idris Wada, who also contested the ticket, scored 748 votes to clinch the party ticket. Melaye, who had yet to come out of the anger over the outcome of the primary, had also rejected the position of the Director-General of Wada Governorship Campaign Committee given to him by the national leadership of the party.
Melaye, via his verified social media accounts, rejected the offer. “I wish the PDP all the best. When truth is a casualty, there is chaos,” he added. Many saw his rejection of the offer as an indication of his anger against the party.
PDP not losing sleep?
The LASU Teacher, explained the various dissensions in the PDP as manifestations of trouble in its fold. He further predicted that the party may witness more crisis if it loses its appeal at the Supreme Court. Ologbondiyan, is however quoted to have said that the party was not aware of any such plans. “We are not aware of any defection plans, but I must tell you that the PDP is a big family and if we have issues, we have ways of resolving them internally,” he said.