•As plot against Sambo thickens

By Oguwike Nwachuku

Two Northern governors are hatching separate plots to replace Vice President Namadi Sambo as President Goodluck Jonathan’s running mate in the ballot in February 2015, although there is no known rift between Jonathan and Sambo, who is also from the North.

Jonathan is yet to declare his interest publicly. Yet Governors Ibrahim Shema (Katsina) and Sule Lamido (Jigawa) are reportedly scheming on all fronts to get Sambo off the ticket, in the belief that Jonathan is as good as going for a second term.

All the four men are members of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). But the whisper in the Northern caucus of the party is that Sambo is an electoral liability.

In 2011, Shema and Lamido both won the vote to become Governor. Sambo too won election in 2007 as Kaduna State Governor and served till May 2010. President Umaru Yar’Adua died in May 2010; Jonathan, his Deputy, became President and picked Sambo as Deputy.

However, Sambo lost in his polling unit in the presidential election in 2011. He was pelted by angry voters who wanted Muhammadu Buhari of the then Congress for Progressive Change (CPC), a Northern candidate, to win.

Northern political leaders in the PDP, with an eye on the bigger picture, want a vice president in 2015 who can succeed Jonathan when his second term ends in 2019 – someone with a cross appeal to win, first the Northern ballot, before venturing South to garner votes.

A source in the PDP confided in TheNiche that most Northern leaders have realised that it is difficult to stop Jonathan from clinching the party’s presidential ticket.

Therefore, in their view, it makes sense to get a Northerner good enough to succeed Jonathan should the PDP rotate the presidency to the north in 2019.

This fuels the adrenalin of Shema and Lamido to return to their political drawing boards.

Shema is said to be on pole position because of his loyalty to Jonathan, which Lamido cannot boast of. But as Shema is putting faith in this calculation, the supporters of Sambo interpret it as antagonism.

Sambo’s loyalists believe he has enjoyed a good relationship with Jonathan since they came to office in May 2010. Sambo, Shema and Lamido are from the North West. However, Shema is in the eye of the storm with the suspicion that he is working to undermine Sambo.

An official of the PDP told TheNiche that “Shema’s eye is already on who succeeds Jonathan by the time his tenure ends in 2019, which is allowed in politics.

“But whether Jonathan will agree to run with him is a different ball game entirely because the right to choose who to run with is solely that of the president.”

The source added, however, that some things are likely to work in Shema’s favour, such as his age and “loyal disposition to Jonathan. No other governor from the zone in PDP can boast of that for now.”

A former governor from the region also told TheNiche that Northern leaders are not happy with Sambo because of Boko Haram, the Muslim fundamentalists who have incapacitated the North.

The man said if he were Jonathan he would hold Sambo accountable for the unabating insurgency in the North, as Sambo has not pulled his weight or shown the capacity to help end the misery of Northerners at the hands of the jihadists.

“Let’s face it, and politics apart, if Sambo is putting as much effort as is required of him, the North would not have bothered much, but we cannot have someone of that status in government and our people are being killed like fowls. That cannot be acceptable,” he said.

The source, who is also from the North West, is believed to be warming himself into Jonathan’s heart to be his running mate, but he dismissed it as rumour, insisting that, “the choice is his [Jonathan’s] to make.”

According to the source, a bigger problem among Northern leaders is deciding which part of the North gets the vice presidential slot.

The North West (comprising the seven States of Kano, Jigawa, Kebbi, Zamfara, Kaduna, Katsina and Sokoto) is keen on producing Jonathan’s running mate.

Kaduna Governor, Ramalan Yero – a former Deputy Governor who became Governor after the death of his boss, Patrick Yakowa, in 2010 – is going for a first term in his own right in 2015. So, he is out of the running for Aso Rock for now.

The Governors of Jigawa (Lamido) and Kebbi (Saidu Dakingari) want the presidency rotated to the North in 2015. So, they have issues with Jonathan.

The Governors of Kano (Rabiu Kwankwaso), Zamfara (Abdulazeez Yari) and Sokoto (Aliyu Wammako) are not in PDP reckoning because they are in the All Progressives Congress (APC).

All of this, coupled with the fact that Shema is close to Jonathan, makes his chances very high on paper.

But the source maintained that “the governors from the North West, North East and North Central are all scheming for the same slot and this may make Jonathan’s choice of running mate a lot more difficult.”

North East States – Bauchi, Gombe, Adamawa, Borno and Yobe – are also interested in the vice presidency, but the insurgency in the zone and divided loyalty are threatening their collective interest.

North Central States – Nasarawa, Niger, Plateau, Kogi, Kwara and Benue – equally have their own political baggage.

Nonetheless, Governor Isa Yuguda (Bauchi, North East) and Babangida Aliyu (Niger, North Central) cannot be said to have totally given up on becoming Jonathan’s running mate.