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2019 election

OPINION BY ADEDAPO ADENIRUJU : WHAT EXACTLY IS FELA DUROTOYE’S CRIME?

By: Bhodemarz on March 01, 2018 / comment : 0 , , ,

Mid-2017, media waves trailed behind Diane Rwigara as her campaign to become the president of Rwanda grabbed national attention as well as criticism. True, the odds were against Rwigara: single, 35, running independently, plus being a she in a typical African society. She was running against regular opposition candidate Frank Habineza, journalist Phillipe Mpayimana and Paul Kagame — who has been the country's president since 2000.
So, when news about Mr. Fela Durotoye's #RunningforANewNigeria began filtering through my timeline, I greeted it with mindless excitement:New blood. Fresh thinking. Visionary leadership. Thoughts about Rwigara filtered in and I saw Fela Durotoye ticking similar boxes as Rwigara, save for slight differences: Fela is 47, male, and running under a political party — Alliance for New Nigeria.
In the last two months, FD's campaign has met with increasing criticism across Social Media platforms, so much that I probed myself: What has FD done to deserve this barrage of invectives? What exactly is his crime?
In over a decade of active following, I've found his passion compelling and his leadership, astute. This is why I think those who are attempting to reduce him to a mere motivational speaker are either untutored or incorrigibly denigrating.
One does not have to be boot-licking to think that Fela Durotoye has demonstrated competent leadership: for building one of Nigeria's leading business consulting and human resource management companies, and for grooming thousands of young leaders through Gemstone and Eden Nigeria; a faith-based organization spread across ten institutions and three cities.
A lot of people say Durotoye should have considered vying for an easily attainable office, while some insist that, for supporting Buhari in 2015, he deserves a greater misfortune than what the Buhari administration has brought on Nigerians.
A criticism I consider absolutely valid and difficult for Fela Durotoye to wish away is his history of political apathy.
As far as I know, FD has not much — if at all — engaged social conversations around public policies. On how many occasions has he pushed idea-based debates on issues related to education, security, electioneering, or health? Yes, I know of vigils and Nigeria-centered online prayer feasts. But I'm yet to learn how to pray away Nigeria's heterogeneity and diversity — in ethnic sentiments, religious affiliation, and political ideologies. How do we pray ideas into execution? Against what backdrops will FD's biases be adjudged if he never made an impression about ASUU Strike, restructuring, subsidy removal, Ebola crisis, national confab or even issues as seemingly trifling as the forgotten Olympic jersey?
The introductory connection drawn between Rwigara and Durotoye comes with steadfast deliberateness: Ms. Rwigara was known to publicly engage the political scene, calling out President Kagame on issues mostly associated with human rights violation, while Durotoye's age-old silence continues to trail after him. This difference becomes more pitiful when one realizes how much Kagame's administration dwarfs the overall economic performances of all Nigeria's president under these 19 years of undemocratic democracy.
So, let's interpolate: Rwigara spoke out relentlessly against one of the most remarkable administrations in recent Africa, while Durotoye remained inexhaustibly mute under some of the most overbearing, injudicious and corruption-laden administrations in the collective history of post-colonial Africa.
Such disservice to nationhood is what most of his critics have adjudged to be caused by a fear of conflict, rather than political correctness. Sadly, these years of accumulated silences surprisingly often catch up with aspirants who wish to surprise the public with their political ambition. It is interpreted as hiding from public scrutiny. If there exists other crimes bearing Durotoye's name, their roots can be traced to his longstanding refusal to overcome political inertia.
I do not dispute that Nigeria's political system needs charismatic men like Durotoye. What I find disturbing is that his entrance clearly indicates that not much has been learnt from the pitfalls of yesteryear's technocrats who pursued political revolutions, ignoring its complementary evolution.
On January 11, FD made a release in which he declared that he wants a party "with a clear ideology" but when you read ANN coordinator's responseto a question on ideology, you doubt if the party is not already sitting on a keg of gunpowder. He said: "Our own ideology is that Nigeria is one of the greatest countries created by God but we have not been blessed by good leaders. So we came about with the ideology can be great again."
Infant ANN doesn't have much time to grow before 2019. Yet, FD's campaign hinges on another fragile link: young and strong. When reactionary fanatics of #NotTooYoungToRun insist that young people must be given a chancelike Emmanuel Macron or Justin Trudeau, I feel choked by the smell of ignorance.
Two reasons:
One. Of the 36 that emerged governors in 1999, 61.1% (22) of them were younger than — or mates with — Fela Durotoye. Nobody gave them a chance. They took it. And as Oo Nwoye noted, there isn't any strong correlation between the youngest governors in '99 and the better governed states.
Two. FD's approach is neither Macronicnor Trudean. Macron got into active politics in 2001. He was 24. Trudeau was in high school when he began engaging public debates about Canadian federalism. In all fairness, the Macrons we should be talking about are the young Nigerians debating policies, participating in parties and engaging advocacy. They are the real barrier breakers.
History is old enough to teach us that when it comes down to winning political seats in Nigeria, our knowledge of leadership is never a worthy substitute for understanding politics. But as long as technocrats stick to this entitlement mentality, Nigeria's current political dynamics continues to prove less penetrable for newcomers running under newcomer-parties formed by newcomers.
When FD said his team will embark on grassroots mobilization within twelve months, I wondered if he meant it. Since the days of John the Baptist — pardon me — the man Atiku Abubakar, the habitual contender for the hot seat, has been caught again and again within grassroots communities; doing some of the smartest and unthinkable things to demonstrate his connection with the locals. But playing to the gallery of elite youths who support hashtags and chicken out when they're most needed, is a recurring error among technocrats attempting to navigate through Nigeria's lumpy, muddy waters.
I imagine that all these protruding deficiencies are redeemable if FD commits to remediation. But will twelve months deliver what twelve years could have done? Yet, I often think about Peter Thiel's four ways humans approach the future: definite optimism, definite pessimism, indefinite optimism and indefinite pessimism.
Here, I struggle to convince myself that, somehow, FD — the Fela Durotoye I know — has a grander plan than surrendering to the noise of cheerers; that he has a consciousness of history and would not build such a sophisticated mission upon indefinite optimism.
No matter which angle we choose to see it from, Fela Durotoye's active participation in politics is a good, courageous, even significant move. It will define a lot of things for youth engagement in the years to come.

Adedapo can be reached on Twitter via @adedapotreasure

Buhari dividing Nigeria along ethnic, religious line – Atiku

By: Bhodemarz on November 27, 2017 / comment : 0 , , ,

Former Vice President, Atiku Abubakar, has written the ruling All Progressives Congress APC intimating the party of his decision to quit. 
Though the letter was dated October 18, 2017, the national leadership of the party had last Friday denied receiving any such notice from the former vice president. 
In the letter, Atiku said his decision to quit the ruling party was not about him but about the future of the country as a democratic entity. 
“I am unable to reconcile myself with the dismal performance of the party in government, especially in relation to the continued polarization of our people along ethnic and religious lines, which is threatening our unity more than any other time in the recent past and the unbeatable hardship that our people are currently undergoing”, he stated. 
Addressed to the party’s ward chairman in his Jada 1 Ward, Jada Local Government, Adamawa State, Atiku in the letter said he was disturbed by the dismal performance of the APC, describing the President Muhammadu Buhari-led administration as a threat to Nigeria’s unity due to its penchant for polarizing Nigerians along ethnic and religious lines. 
In the resignation letter acknowledged by Usman Muazu, a copy of which was obtained by Vanguard, the Wazirin Adamawa said; “I wish to inform you of my decision to resign my membership of the All Progressives Congress APC in this ward with effect from the date of this letter.” 
Atiku said there has to be a country first before politicians can aspire to lead it. 
“I am resigning from a party we formed and worked so hard, with fellow compatriots across the country, to place in government. I had hope that the APC government will make improvements to the lives of our people and the continued existence and development of Nigeria as one indivisible nation. This hope has now been dashed. 
“As I said in 2006, it is the struggle for democracy, constitutionalism and service to my country and my people that are driving my choice. Let me emphasize again that this is not about me. We have to have a country before people can aspire to lead it,” he said. 
He expressed optimism that APC followers in the state would soon join him in the bid to “defeat impunity and restore vision and purpose” to Nigeria’s politics. 
“While wishing you well, let me express the hope that in the near future, a substantial number of you will join forces with us to once again defeat impunity and restore vision and purpose to the politics of our great country. Please accept the assurances of my highest regard.” 
Atiku had on Friday resigned from the APC citing the pervading undemocratic atmosphere in the party among other issues as reasons for his decision.


OPINION: The Return Of Toll Gates In Nigeria By Abiodun Ladepo

By: Bhodemarz on November 25, 2017 / comment : 0 , , ,

When he was governor of Lagos State, Raji Fashola was notorious for collecting tolls. The joke used to be that if he constructed one foot of road, he would charge you for using it. So, when the news broke recently that he announced the return of tolls on Federal roads, some in my political orbit started to grumble. “Oh, this man will make us lose the election in 2019.” “Why do we want to add to the suffering of the common man now that we are getting ready for elections?” And so on and so forth.
But I am glad that we have someone who is not thinking about instantaneous, palliative measures that give us the sugar-effect of temporary joy and excitement which, in the long run, is inimical to our overall growth. We have someone who has not put dubious electoral victory ahead of service…functional and enlightened service…to the country.  
When Obasanjo was about to leave office as military Head of State, he cut the tape to flag off the use of the Lagos-Ibadan expressway in 1978. Boy! Were Nigerians happy about that road! If you were going to any part of Nigeria from Lagos, you had to go through that expressway. Those going to the Middle Belt, the East and the South-South (we didn’t use the word “South-South” in 1978) would use the road up to Shagamu, take the right turn and continue their journey. Those going to the North would continue on to Ibadan until the expressway terminated at Ojoo. Prior to the construction of that expressway, the alternatives were to take the dangerously winding Shagamu – Ijebu-Ode-Lagos or the Abeokuta-Sango-Ota-Lagos routes. Either of these routes added three to four hours to your trip. But once Obasanjo opened the 115 kilometers Lagos-Ibadan express, it only took on average one hour to get from Ibadan to Lagos. It was not only faster, it was safer too. And it was good for your overall health and the health of your vehicle.
To pay for that road, Obasanjo’s regime did what was done in all civilized countries. It installed three toll gates – one at the Lagos end; one at the Shagamu interchange; and one at the Ibadan end. Certainly, a stretch of road that busy, that important to the economic well-being of the country should be able to pay for itself and have more than enough left for routine maintenance, given the high volume of traffic on it. I mean…every merchandized shipped into Nigeria by sea landed in Lagos. And if the merchandise was going to Nguru or Maiduguri or Port Harcourt, it went over that expressway. It was imperative that we maintained that road properly and expanded it as our population and economy grew. That was the natural order of planning followed by every forward-looking society where institutions exist as a continuum even when governments change.
But within a few years, the Lagos-Ibadan expressway fell apart. Small potholes that were not quickly fixed grew into manholes. A journey that normally took one hour now took three if you are lucky and four or five if you traveled when the churches along the route held their crusades. Rather than doing 100 km/hr., you are forced to slow down to a crawl, making you vulnerable to armed robbery attacks on the expressway. The beautiful road of 1978 had become a complete death trap and eyesore by 1995.
The government couldn’t do anything about it apart from the occasional patching of some of the gullies in the middle of it. Most of the funds collected as tolls never made it to government coffers because the toll collectors stole them. It was an open secret that every toll collector on that road owned a couple of houses built with proceeds of those toll booths. I heard of an Inspector in the police who quit the force to become a toll collector! It was that lucrative. Collectors, collaborating with their supervisors, of course, printed their own receipts and issued those to commuters. It was sad. You cannot understand how sad it was unless you knew one or two people who were killed on that road due to accidents caused, in part, by the terrible road condition.
Nigerians love the sound of free things. Everybody loves free things – free education; free electricity; free water; free TV and free transportation. We want good things in life but we don’t want to pay for it. But we all know that these things don’t come cheap and they have to be paid for. In countries where citizens have gotten used to paying for these services, the services have gotten better. Take education for example: Nowhere in the United States is tertiary education free. In some of the countries in the West (Britain and Germany for example) where you may get university education without paying out-of-pocket fees, there are all sorts of charges, levies, and taxes that the citizens have to pay. These things don’t come free at all.
Take electricity for another example: I don’t care how poor you are in Britain, America or Germany; you will pay your electricity bill. If you are late for five days or more in California, there is a punishing late-fee that comes with it. If you are late for more than one month in Maryland, your electricity supply will be disconnected. Of course, if you pay your bill on time, you may never experience electricity outage unless there is a natural disaster like an earthquake or a tornado.  But in Nigeria, we want an uninterrupted supply of electricity, but we don’t want to pay for it. We watch our neighbor illegally tap electricity and we beg him to hook us up. We sabotage our own country. Then we complain about lack of electricity.
Our attitude of not wanting to pay for services is directly related to the ingrained corruption in our polity. Every Nigerian knows that the fees you pay at the passport office are stolen by Immigration officials. The ones you pay at the airports are stolen by airport officials. The fines you pay the FRSC officials don’t get to government purse. The money you pay the electricity company doesn’t get there. School authorities embezzle funds meant for the upkeep of the schools. Governors shave off huge chunks of the revenues accruing to the states, some of which are direct taxes citizens that have paid. So, people have (rightfully) lost confidence in the workability of the Nigerian system.
Nonetheless, I join all rational Nigerians in welcoming the re-introduction of tolls on our highways. In fact, we can start charging tolls on our bridges too. But I do so on the condition that government should first build great roads. By that, I mean roads wide enough for vehicles to ply safely, with lane markings that reflect at night and help keep drivers in their lanes; with effective road signs for all hazards, including dips, bends, steep hills, dangerous slopes, cattle and so on. I like to see speed limit signs appropriate for every section of the roads. I like to see FRSC officials patrol in automobiles and high-speed motorcycles and some static with speed traps. I like to see these FRSC officials equipped with Point of Sale (PoS) machines that can aid in their collection of fines on the spot. I like to see roving towing trucks for all sizes of vehicles so that we can quickly remove broken down vehicles before they cause accidents. I like to see rest stops where commuters can rest if they so wish. I like to see ambulance and firefighter locations. And I like to see police stations at critical locations.
If you put these things in place, and you plug all the potential loopholes that toll collectors can use to steal, Nigerians will pay your toll fees. And they will do so with smiles. We are not animals. We love good things too. We may complain at first. But if we can see where our money is going, we will pay. Look at Ghana and its electricity problem. In 2013 and 2014, the entire country rationed electricity on a 12-on/12-off basis. One half of the country got electricity for 12 hours while the other went into darkness for 12 hours. They switched after 12 hours. But today, electricity is 99.9% stable across the country. I have not heard my generator in almost a year, save for when the maintenance guy services it. Yes, the cost of electricity went up by 400% and people cried. Some workers’ union even threatened demonstrations. But government embarked on an extensive sensitization campaign which helped douse tensions. Now nobody complains about the high cost of electricity because they know stable electricity costs money.
Ever since I started using the Ft. McHenry and Inner Harbor underwater tunnels in Baltimore, Maryland (in the U.S.) some 30 years ago, there had always been a fee. Nobody complains about it. If you are south of Baltimore and you want to go northward on your way to New York, your best bet is to use one of those tunnels. Pay the fee and save yourself about one-hour wahala. If you are taking the I-95 from Baltimore to New York, you will pay tolls like five times. And the trip is just about four hours. If your flight lands at Dulles Airport in Virginia and you really want to get to Washington DC in less than one hour, your best bet is to get on RT 267. No other alternative gets you to DC in less than three hours.
In France, the use of most of the highways comes with tolls. Last summer, my wife and I hit no fewer than seven (7) toll booths on the French section (A4 HWY) of the four-hour drive from Kaiserslautern in Germany to Paris. In Austria, you are required to purchase Vignette/Sticker which must be affixed to the front of your vehicle in order to use their Autobahns (highways). We didn’t get one because we didn’t know and we were slapped with a 200 Euros fine.
So, you can see that Fashola is not pulling toll charges out of his buttocks. These are necessary charges if we want to pay for the roads and bridges we are building and maintain them to last forever. Remember that the Federal government invited some private entities to invest in partnerships for the purpose of raising funds to construct these new roads. Those private entities have to be paid somehow. Nigerians will pay. They don’t mind paying. But Nigerians know themselves and they know their leaders. They know their roguish leaders will steal the proceeds from these toll booths…unless government invests in foolproof measures to block them.

Abiodun Ladepo writes from Ibadan, Oyo State. You can reach him via Oluyole2@yahoo.com



Source: Sahara Reporters

Atiku Abubakar: Timeline of a serial defector

By: Bhodemarz on November 25, 2017 / comment : 0 , , , ,

A former Vice President, Atiku Abubakar, on Friday announced his withdrawal from the governing All Progressives Congress, APC.
In Friday’s announcement, Mr. Abubakar said he was still pondering his next political move. But if he ends up returning to the major opposition Peoples Democratic Party as he is widely expected to do, it will be the third time that Mr. Abubakar will be returning to the party after defecting to other parties.
He was a founding member of the PDP in 1998.
1999-2006.
Mr. Abubakar was elected governor of his home state, Adamawa, in 1999 on the PDP ticket.
Before he could be sworn in as governor, he was picked as running mate by Olusegun Obasanjo who secured the PDP presidential ticket. The ticket proceeded to win the presidency, with Mr. Abubakar becoming Vice President from May 29, 1999 and for a second term in 2003.
2006-2009.
Before the end of their second term, however, Mr. Abubakar left the PDP for the first time in 2006 and joined Action Congress, AC, after years of internal battle with Mr. Obasanjo.
The influence of Mr. Atiku in the PDP was systematically eroded through fresh membership registration that saw most of his supporters pushed out of the party, all in a bid by Mr. Obasanjo to ensure that he was not nominated as his successor.
Mr. Abubakar thus defected to pick the AC ticket to run for president in the 2007 election.
He was in AC from 2006 to 2009. Following disagreements with one of the leaders of the AC and former governor of Lagos State, Bola Tinubu, the former vice president dumped the AC and returned to the PDP in 2009.
2009-2013
Mr. Abubakar ran for the PDP presidential ticket in the 2011 election and lost to incumbent Goodluck Jonathan.
Following the success of the PDP in 2011 and the appointment of Bamanga Tukur as the national chairman of the PDP, the party was engulfed in a serious crisis.
Mr. Abubakar alongside seven governors eventually staged a walk out of a PDP national convention in August 2013, accusing the leadership of the party and then President Jonathan of impunity.
They eventually formed the ‘new PDP.’
2013-2017
After efforts to reconcile with the Bamanga Tukur-led PDP failed and their push to stop Mr. Jonathan from running for election also failed, Mr. Abubakar and five of the governors and others announced in November 2013 defected to the APC.
Mr. Abubakar and a former Kano State governor who was also in the ‘new PDP’, Rabiu Kwankwaso, ran for APC presidential ticket and lost to Muhammadu Buhari who eventually won the 2015 election.
Mr. Abubakar remained in the APC but has been consistently absent in many of the party’s activities at the national level.
The former vice president had complained that Mr. Buhari and the party had been side-lining him.
November 2017-???
https://ssum-sec.casalemedia.com/usermatchredir?s=183697&cb=https%3a%2f%2fdis.criteo.com%2frex%2fmatch.aspx%3fc%3d25%26uid%3d%25%25USER_ID%25%25
Mr. Abubakar eventually defected from the APC on Thursday, November 24. Reports suggest that he has done so because he has received commitment of the PDP to give him its platform to again run for president in 2019.
The former vice president has, however, not formally declared for the PDP, nor has he declared he would run for the 2019 presidency although he is expected to do both.
Whether he will remain in PDP or his new party for long remains to be seen, given that he had announced on September 2014 that “As for me, as far as I am concerned, APC is my last bus stop.”


Source: Premium Times

#2019Election: Join political parties, effect the change you need, VP Osinbajo urges youths

By: Bhodemarz on November 24, 2017 / comment : 0 , , ,

Vice President Yemi Osinbajo on Wednesday urged youths in the country to join political parties ahead of the 2019 elections to enable them be voted into political offices so that they can effect the change they wanted in governance. 
Osinbajo, who was represented by Sen. Babafemi Ojudu, Special Adviser to the President on Political Affairs, made the call at the Emerging Political Leaders Summit in Abuja. Vice President Yemi Osinbajo, SAN He also said that it was not enough for youths to always complain about bad leaders, but that they should break the status quo by taking the chance to be elected and create the transformation they needed for a change. “Youths have a challenge in their hands for the future of our country; so, I advice you not to sit down and fold your hands and be lamenting over bad leadership or politicians. “Get down to business, organise and do something to become elected political youths; after all, Enahoro became a leader in this country at the age of 23 and later moved a motion for the nation’s independence at the age of 27. “The leaders there today will vacate the place tomorrow so if you the youths don’t start preparing today by getting mentored and learning the ropes, there is no way you will perform very well if the mantle of leadership falls on you tomorrow. So, there is need for you to go in there and participate,’’ he said. Also speaking, the former Deputy Governor of Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Mr. Kingsley Moghalu, said that youths had the power to change their destiny to a better future by participating in politics from the grassroots. Moghalu said that what the country needed was a democratic revolution at the polling units, adding that for it to happen, the citizens should recognize that they had the power to change and improve governance. “If they don’t exercise that power, if they keep selling their votes for N2, 000 so that they will eat today, their children will have no jobs in the future. “It is high time Nigerians stopped seeking immediate gratification; they always love what they can get now and that is killing us as a nation. “If this continues, then the citizens are just as irresponsible as the leadership they condemn,’’ he said. Moghalu said that the next line of action lay with the citizens, adding that “we have talked enough, the politicians don’t listen, they keep carrying on in their old ways. “We have had enough but if that is true, then we must act like we have had enough and take up the challenge to change the status quo.’’ The convener of the summit, Mr. Wale Ajani, said the event was organsied to brainstorm ahead of the 2019 elections towards problem-solving both economically and politically for country’s development. Ajani said that the summit became imperative at this auspicious moment in the nation’s history because Nigeria had remained a country of enormous potentials for several decades but unable to perform better in human development and economic indices. “Leadership failure is largely at the heart of the current woes bedevilling Nigeria, with little being done to build a new crop of leaders. “The nation seems fixated; the citizens have come to have very low expectations of their leaders. The summit provides a platform for qualitative conversations and discourse about Nigeria.’’ He said that it was time for Nigeria to have a paradigm shift as an alternative to the current system where there already existed a disconnection between citizens’ expectations and service delivery by politicians.

Source: Vanguard

BREAKING: Atiku Dumps APC

By: Bhodemarz on November 24, 2017 / comment : 0 , , , ,

Former Vice-President Atiku has defected from the All Progressives Congress (APC), Says the Ruling Has Failed The Youth
He announced his decision in a statement he issued on Friday morning.

Read the statement of resignation below:
Statement of resignation of His Excellency Atiku Abubakar (Waziri Adamawa) Vice President of Nigeria, 1999-2007 from the All Progressives Congress
On the 19th of December, 2013, I received members of the All Progressives Congress at my house in Abuja. They had come to appeal to me to join their party after my party, the Peoples Democratic Party, had become factionalized as a result of the special convention of August 31, 2013.
The fractionalization of the Peoples Democratic Party on August 31, 2013 had left me in a situation where I was, with several other loyal party members, in limbo, not knowing which of the parallel executives of the party was the legitimate leadership.
It was under this cloud that members of the APC made the appeal to me to join their party, with the promise that the injustices and failure to abide by its own constitution which had dogged the then PDP, would not be replicated in the APC and with the assurance that the vision other founding fathers and I had for the PDP could be actualized through the All Progressives Congress.
It was on the basis of this invitation and the assurances made to me that I, being party-less at that time, due to the fractionalization of my party, accepted on February 2, 2014, the hand of fellowship given to me by the All Progressives Congress.
On that day, I said “it is the struggle for democracy and constitutionalism and service to my country and my people that are driving my choice and my decision” to accept the invitation to join the All Progressives Congress.
Like you, I said that because I believed that we had finally seen the beginnings of the rebirth of the new Nigeria of our dreams which would work for all of us, old and young.
However, events of the intervening years have shown that like any other human and like many other Nigerians, I was fallible.
While other parties have purged themselves of the arbitrariness and unconstitutionality that led to fractionalization, the All Progressives Congress has adopted those same practices and even gone beyond them to institute a regime of a draconian clampdown on all forms of democracy within the party and the government it produced.
Only last year, a governor produced by the party wrote a secret memorandum to the president which ended up being leaked. In that memo, he admitted that the All Progressives Congress had “not only failed to manage expectations of a populace that expected overnight ‘change’ but has failed to deliver even mundane matters of governance”.
Of the party itself, that same governor said “Mr. President, Sir Your relationship with the national leadership of the party, both the formal (NWC) and informal (Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, Atiku Abubakar, Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso), and former Governors of ANPP, PDP (that joined us) and ACN, is perceived by most observers to be at best frosty. Many of them are aggrieved due to what they consider total absence of consultations with them on your part and those you have assigned such duties.”
Since that memorandum was written up until today, nothing has been done to reverse the treatment meted out to those of us invited to join the All Progressives Congress on the strength of a promise that has proven to be false. If anything, those behaviours have actually worsened.
But more importantly, the party we put in place has failed and continues to fail our people, especially our young people. How can we have a federal cabinet without even one single youth.
A party that does not take the youth into account is a dying party. The future belongs to young people.
I admit that I and others who accepted the invitation to join the APC were eager to make positive changes for our country that we fell for a mirage. Can you blame us for wanting to put a speedy end to the sufferings of the masses of our people?
Be that as it may be, after due consultation with my God, my family, my supporters and the Nigerian people whom I meet in all walks of life, I, Atiku Abubakar, Waziri Adamawa, hereby tender my resignation from the All Progressives Congress while I take time to ponder my future.
May God bless you and may God bless Nigeria.
Atiku Abubakar
Waziri Adamawa


#2019Election: We have not endorsed any candidate in Nigeria Presidential election -US

By: Bhodemarz on November 23, 2017 / comment : 0 , , ,

The United States of America has spoken concerning Nigeria’s 2019 presidential election saying the country has not endorsed any candidate.

According to report, this was said by John J. Sullivan who is the US Deputy Secretary of State during the closing ceremony of the US-Nigeria Bi-national Commission in Abuja.

He said the President Donald Trump administration is in support of the Nigerian people and its democracy and would therefore assist in the country getting a free and fair election.

He said: “What we want to do, is to ensure to the extent that we can assist, free and fair elections and we won’t pick those candidates.

“We won’t pick any candidate, we won’t endorse any candidate, we want to support the Nigerian people and democracy in Nigeria.”

Sullivan said the US would support the Nigerian people and not any candidate for 2019 election.

He said: “Any statement by the United States, in the events of the 2019 elections, would be in support of the Nigerian people and democracy in Nigeria and not in support of any particular candidate.

“We want free and fair elections, we are not picking candidates, the Nigerian people should pick their candidates and choose among them and make the final choice for themselves.”
Source: reubenabati.com

2019 on his mind: Buhari is no Mandela, by Ojo Maduekwe

By: Bhodemarz on November 06, 2017 / comment : 0 , , , ,

Recent overtures by President Muhammadu Buhari suggest that he’s likely to seek reelection during Nigeria’s next national election in 2019.
Buhari assumed office as president in May 2015 and now has less than two years to complete his first tenure.
Elected at 72 years, and with a failing health that was manifest upon assuming office (Buhari has been absent from Nigeria for much of 2017 due to illness), many Nigerians felt Mr. Buhari would only do one term as president.
In September, the minister for women affairs, Aisha Alhassan, in an interview with Reuters said Mr. Buhari told members of his All Progressives Congress (APC) party before he was first elected that he would only seek one term.
“In 2014/2015 he said he was going to run for only one time to clean up the mess that the (previous) PDP government did in Nigeria. And I took him for his words that he is not contesting in 2019,” Reuters reported.
But, national chairman of the APC, Mr. John Oyegun told newsmen in September, the decision whether or not to run for a second term “Is a decision only President Buhari can make, and he will make it at the proper time.”
Earlier in May, Mr. Oyegun while also speaking to newsmen in the capital Abuja said Buhari will be given the right of first refusal for the APC’s presidential ticket in the 2019 election, adding, “It is for him to decide if he wants to run or if he doesn’t want to run, and to consult the party on his decision.”
Well, it appears Buhari may have decided to run again and has already begun consulting. The president has not come out plain, but recent subtle overtures and politicking paints the picture of a man in need of something.
During a meeting with the national executive council of the APC on October 31, Buhari said he was soon to appoint more ministers and reconstitute the boards of parastatals to “bring in more supporters at the federal level” and also to “make sure all parts of the country are equitably represented.”

Buhari accused of nepotism
Mr. Buhari, a Fulani Muslim from Nigeria’s northern region, has been accused by southerners of marginalizing their region in favor of the north. He’s been accused of nepotism in his appointments.
Minus two, the current security chiefs are from the north. Also, the political heads overseeing and supervising Nigeria’s military and paramilitary arms and agencies are from the north.
At the peak of his campaign in February 2015, Mr. Buhari while seeking votes, told supporters that an APC-led federal government “Will insist on and cut out wastages and run a lean and efficient administration.”
Following widespread uproar in his delay in sending the names of ministerial nominees to the Senate on September 30, 2015, four months after assuming office, Mr. Buhari excused his lateness as “careful and deliberate”.
He admitted that he had set up a committee to advice on the reorganization of the federal government structure. According to him, he had been waiting for the committee to submit its report before taking actions.
“It would have been haphazard to announce ministers when the government had not finalized the number of ministries to optimally carry the burden of governance,” Buhari told Nigerians.
When the nominees were approved by the national assembly, Buhari had merged the ministries of power, works and housing into one. This decision was viewed as him keeping his campaign promise to run a lean government.
This is why this recent decision to appoint more ministers is seen as political.

New appointment as political
The delegates that pick a party’s presidential candidate are drawn from Nigeria’s 36 states and federal capital territory Abuja. In Nigeria, for a president to get the nod of his party to become its flag bearer, he must court the state governors whom exercise unlimited powers within their states.
In November last year, governors under the APC met with Vice-president Yemi Osinbajo behind closed doors and accused Buhari of singlehandedly running his government and making key appointments without consulting them.
Sometime this year in March, a leaked memo addressed to the president by Nasir El-Rufai, Kaduna state governor and a member of the ruling party, accused Mr. Buhari’s chief of staff of causing problems for the president.
Governor El-Rufai wrote that “Some officials around you (Buhari) seem to believe and may have persuaded you that current APC State Governors must have no say and must also be totally excluded from political consultations, key appointments and decision-making at the federal level.”
He told Buhari “It is the current and former state governors that may, as members of NEC of the APC, serve as an alternative locus of power to check the excesses of the currently lopsided and perhaps ambivalent NWC.”
Last week on October 31, some governors of the APC speaking on the sidelines of the party’s national executive committee meeting in Abuja said they would support Buhari if he decides to run for a second term.
Governor Simon Lalong of Plateau state conditioned his support for Buhari.
“Concerning the issue of a sole ticket for Mr. President, I want to say that if Mr. President is performing, well-respected and carrying everybody along, all of us have resolved that we will work for him,” Lalong said.
It’s insinuated that this new appointments which Buhari promised to make soon, is being done to pacify APC governors who feel aggrieved that the president has until now, ran his government without “consulting” them.

Buhari is no Mandela
In March 2015, while campaigning for Buhari in Lagos, Imo State Governor, Rochas Okorocha said, “Buhari is the Mandela of our time. At 72 what does he want? He will do one term, fix the country and move on…”
Last week when APC governors endorsed Buhari for second term, Governor Okorocha said, “If Mr. President wants to run for election, he will follow all the processes and if he is the person, we will all support him.”
Following the endorsement, the silence from the presidency can be interpreted as an indication that Mr. Buhari will likely seek reelection in 2019.
Buhari can be all things to his supporters, but he is no Nelson Mandela. The late world icon, champion of freedom, and former president of South Africa was known for uniting a racially divided country.
Buhari on the other hand has divided Nigerians, mostly alienating the southeast sub-region where the Igbos, one of Nigeria’s major ethnic groups resides. In July 2015 at an event in the US, he described them as the “5%” who didn’t vote for him, vowing not to treat them equally as those who did.
Except for the constitutionally mandated provision to appoint ministers from each state, Mr. Buhari has deliberately alienated the southeast from his administration. He has repeatedly made comments that disparage the Igbos.
Elected president on the strength of a touted impeccable integrity, but after his administration’s poor handling of issues of corruption perpetuated by members of his cabinet, many voters are now questioning his credibility.
Although among his core supporters Buhari’s integrity may still be flawless, but to majority of Nigerians, the comparison to Mandela holds no water.

Maduekwe is editor at Discussing Africa. Follow him on Twitter @Ojo_Maduekwe

Source: The Cable


#2019Election: I’ll vie for presidency if Buhari declines — Yerima

By: Bhodemarz on November 06, 2017 / comment : 0 , , , ,

A former Governor of Zamfara State, Senator Ahmed Sani Yerima, has said that he will contest the 2019 presidential election if President Muhammadu Buhari declines to seek re-election.

He told newsmen yesterday in Abuja, that his announcement did not negate his avowed commitment to support President Buhari if he decided to re-contest the 2019 election.
Yerima, representing Zamfara West in the Senate under the ruling APC, seconded the motion by the National Executive Committee (NEC) of the party for Buhari to run in the 2019 election.
He assured that he would not contest against Buhari, but expressed optimism that nobody would condemn him if he decided to contest for the presidency if Buhari declined.
 “I am in politics not for personal aggrandizement but for the sheer glory; I am in politics to serve and I have not failed to do that,” Yerima said.
The senator’s declaration of support for the president to run for second term followed massive support by 186 groups under the aegis of the Buhari Support Group (BSG) on October 27.

Source: DailyTrust

2019 Election: No automatic ticket for Buhari, others - APC

By: Bhodemarz on November 03, 2017 / comment : 0 , , , , ,

All Progressives Congress has come out with its strongest position yet on the controversy generated by the clamour by some party members for an automatic ticket for President Muhammadu Buhari in 2019.
In separate media interviews in Abuja, on Thursday, APC National Publicity Secretary, Mr Bolaji Abdullahi, and Chairman of the Progressives Governors’ Forum, Mr Rochas Okorocha, said neither the President nor any member of the party would be given an automatic ticket.
Abdullahi, responding to a question on whether President Muhammadu Buhari would be given an automatic ticket to contest the next elections, said the party’s constitution did not have provisions for such.
He noted that as a law-abiding party, APC would abide by its own rules as enshrined in its constitution when dealing with the issue of nominations.
The party spokesman further argued that Buhari had not indicated interest in seeking re-election, stressing that the talks about his second tenure was, at best, “presumptuous.”
“What I can assure you is that APC will abide by its Constitution on such matters and our constitution does not provide for automatic ticket, our constitution does not provide for the right for first refusal. So, our party will abide by the constitution.
“We have looked at what our President has done and as a party we are happy with his achievements; if he comes up today to say he wants to contest, we will support him but to begin to throw things like automatic ticket, right of first refusal, they don’t exist in our constitution.”
Speaking in a similar vein, Okorocha on Thursday said there would be no automatic ticket for President Muhammadu Buhari to seek re-election on the platform of APC.
Okorocha, who is also the governor of Imo State, said all candidates on the party’s platform must emerge through transparent democratic process.
The governor made his position known in an interview with State House correspondents after a meeting he had with Mr Buhari at the Presidential Villa, Abuja.
He said although the President was qualified and healthy enough to seek re-election, due process must be followed.
He said the ruling party would not encourage imposition of candidates.
“The gentleman (the President) is looking much more handsome than even before he went to hospital; he is looking stronger and so, he has every right and qualification to re-contest, there is nothing wrong at all.
“But, we don’t allow imposition of candidate. It must be democratically done.
“If President Buhari will lead the ship in 2019, it must be democratically done, and I said, democratically done, transparently (done) to the amazement of the whole world, the way we do our things in APC and people will be happy.”
The party stalwarts made the statements three days after some governors on the party’s platform had tried to use the platform of the National Executive Council of the party to seek the endorsement of Buhari for a second term. The move, however, failed.
Meanwhile, in order to increase the fortunes of APC in South-East, Okorocha said on Thursday that Buhari would soon visit states in the region to shore up the population of party members.
He disclosed that the President’s trip would start from Ebonyi State.
“The South-East before now was not measuring up to standard in APC but we have worked out strategies and modalities on how to improve relationship between the people of the South-East and APC government.
“That was top on the agenda and the need for Mr. President to come to the South-East as quickly as possible to begin to show his presence. Luckily, the President will be coming to Ebonyi State very soon and he will pass through Imo State to Anambra State.
“So, covering three states within this short time will be the right step in the right direction because we have come to realise in South-East that we are better off in APC than any other party in the Federal Republic of Nigeria,” the governor said.
Punch

Source: reubenabati.com


2019: Elections ‘must not hold’ in IDP camps

By: Bhodemarz on October 29, 2017 / comment : 0 , ,

The National Forum of Democrats (NDF), a civil society group, says on no account should elections take place in internally displaced persons (IDP) camps.
At a press conference in Kaduna on Saturday, Gambo Dambata, leader of the group, said some politicians were planning to use IDP camps as “rigging spots”.
Dambata said the architects of this plot plan to generate a security report that would make the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to shelve election in some localities but hold it in IDP camps.
“Borno State as you all know has been at the receiving end of the Boko Haram scourge since the group turned violent in 2009,” he said.
“You may have noticed reports in some quarters about occupation of some territories in Borno State allegedly by Boko Haram.
“This subtle campaign which appears to draw sympathy to the local population in the said territories is nothing but an orchestrated narrative for the manipulation of the forthcoming general election and to hoodwink multilateral agencies and other humanitarian organisations into donating funds.
“The calculation of is to claim that Boko Haram is occupying certain territories in Nigeria and to generate a security report that would make INEC to shelve holding the 2019 poll in this locality and thereafter hold same in IDP camps where they are able to carry out their rigging plans.
“There is a deliberate plot by some selfish politicians to sponsor attacks across the north-east in the name of Boko Haram just to cause panic, apprehension and pandemonium in the state as to give room for them to easily manipulate the results in favour of their preferred candidates.”

Source: The Cable

2019 Election: Shekarau writes PDP, declares intention to run

By: Bhodemarz on October 26, 2017 / comment : 0 , , , ,

A former Minister of Education, Ibrahim Shekarau, has indicated interest to run for the presidency in 2019 on the platform of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP.
His spokesperson, Sule Ya’u Sule, said Mr. Shekarau, who is also a former Governor of Kano State, sent a notification letter to the PDP of his intention to run.
The party’s spokesperson Dayo Adeyeye, in a text message this morning confirmed that the party received Shekarau’s letter of interest.
Mr. Sule said Mr. Shekarau has communicated his political ambition to various elders, community leaders, opinion leaders, political associates and religious leaders regardless of their ethnic and party affiliations.
“Malam Shekarau deliberately refused to make his ambition public because he does not want the relevant stakeholders to read it for the first time on the pages of newspapers. He first notified them before making it public. He is now making necessary consultations,” he said.
In a letter which he was said to have personally signed and sent to one of his political associates, Hassan Indabawa, dated August 22, 2017, Mr. Shekarau said after the 2015 general elections, there had been requests by individuals and groups from different quarters urging him to contest for the presidency in 2019.
Prior to this, former Governor of Jigawa State, Sule Lamido, also sent a letter of notification PDP leaders and members on his interest and readiness to run for presidency in 2019.
The party has zoned the position to the north. Despite this, governor Ayodele Fayose of Ekiti state in South-west Nigeria had declared interest in the position noting the aparthy (to declare) of prospective Northern candidates as one of the reasons for throwing his hat into the ring.

Source: PremiumTimesNG

Prisoners to vote in 2019 elections – INEC

By: Bhodemarz on October 25, 2017 / comment : 0 , , ,

The Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, said it is making plans with the Nigeria Prisons Service to ensure prisoners can vote in the forthcoming 2019 general elections.
INEC Chairman, Mahmood Yakubu, said this on Tuesday in Abuja at a dialogue session tagged Nigeria Civil Society Situation Room Dialogue.
The dialogue session involved over 70 civil society organisations in Nigeria.
This development is coming three years after a Federal High Court in Benin, Edo State, ruled that prisoners in Nigeria have the right to vote in all elections conducted in the country.
Mr. Yakubu said the commission was considering creating polling units in Nigerian prisons to give some categories of prisoners the opportunity to vote.
He explained that only ”certain categories of prisoners” would be given such an opportunity depending on the nature of the crimes committed.
“We have already engaged the Comptroller-General of Prisons and we have statistics on the number of prisoners nationwide and the number of inmates registered.”
“We are looking at the possibility of creating polling units in the prisons and to enable some categories of prisoners to vote.
“Ghana does it but there are some categories of prisoners who by the nature of crimes committed lose the right to vote. Whatever we can do to open up the process to ensure that as much as possible Nigerians are given the opportunity to vote, will be done.”
Speaking on the forthcoming Anambra governorship election, he also said the commission would do everything to ensure that the election is not inconclusive or rigged.
Mr. Yakubu raised concerns on the wrong substitutions of names of governorship candidates by two political parties ahead of the governorship election but refused to disclose the names of these parties.
He however warned that if the act was challenged in court, the whole election could be voided because of that and the country will be made to bear the financial load of conducting a new election.
He said the high level of non-compliance to the Electoral Act by the political parties was threatening the electoral system.
Clement Nwankwo, the Executive Director, Policy and Legal Advocacy Centre, and convener of Situation Room, said the event was organised to know the commission’s preparations for the forthcoming Anambra State governorship poll as well as other elections.

Source: PremiumTimes

2019 Election: Sule Lamido writes PDP, declares intention to run for president

By: Bhodemarz on October 24, 2017 / comment : 0 , , ,

A former Governor of Jigawa State, Sule Lamido, has written to inform members of the Peoples Democratic Party of his decision to seek the party’s flag in the next presidential election.
According to a report by Vanguard newspaper on Monday, Mr. Lamido said in his letter that all the party needs to reposition Nigeria is to take over power in 2019 and bring the country back to the path of recovery.
Lamenting that the nation has departed from the dreams of the PDP founding fathers, Mr. Lamido said the PDP needs to lead the nation back to a brighter future.
“Today, 57 years after the independence of our dear country, can we in all sincerity claim to have achieved the dream of our founding fathers? Where did we fail and from where did we begin to fail? Nigeria with its natural endowment and human capacity cannot be forgiven for being otherwise.
“We cannot even demonstrate our ability and capacity to meet domestic, regional and global challenges which currently seems to overwhelm us. The PDP will and must lead the nation back into a bright, progressive, and innovative future,” the former governor wrote.
Mr. Lamido said “the PDP must rekindle in Nigeria a new hope, a nation of united people with a common and assured destiny” and that the country must demonstrate its “confidence, tenacity, ability and capability to address our domestic regional and global challenges that confront us.”
“It is against this background that I offer myself to vie for the office of the president of the Federal Republic of Nigeria in 2019 if my party finds me worthy to fly its flag. I am no means claiming to be the only capable material, any PDP member given the trust and support can fly our flag, and I expect many more aspirants will express the desire to run.
“My hope and prayer is that at the end of all the process which I hope will be open, fair transparent and credible is to give Nigeria in 2019 a candidate who will lead the party and Nigeria. This is because there is no alternative to PDP in 2019, it will be a defining moment in the Nigerian political evolution.
“Our imperfect union as a federation should not be an excuse for our legendary failure which appears to have found vent in the call for restructuring, a union of multi-ethnic multi-lingual and multi-religious can certainly task the best of human capacities, but that is precisely the challenge and how to work on it and build a nation of people of a common destiny, and this is where the PDP must raise to the challenge.
“The starting point is where the PDP began in 1998 and critical to it is creating an open environment in which every Nigerian must not only been seen to be, but must be an equal stakeholder and therefore restoring trust and faith in our shared union and this PDP was able to achieve in its first four years,” Mr. Lamido said in the letter.
He said while the clamour for restructuring rages, the most important aspects of addressing the Nigerian economy by creating prosperity will make the debate less emotional and sentimental and that the PDP has enough talents to salvage the nations from its current woes.
The PDP, which ruled Nigeria from the dawn of the Fourth Republic in 1999 until it was defeated by the All Progressives Congress in 2015, has zoned its presidential ticket to the Northern region of Nigeria.

The arrangement, however, did not deter Ekiti State Governor, Ayodele Fayose, who last month publicly declared his ambition to seek the ticket.

Source: Premium Times

Why Not Put Jonathan On The Ballot For 2019? By Peter Claver Oparah

By: Bhodemarz on October 24, 2017 / comment : 0 , , ,

Since he was defeated in an epochal presidential election in March 2015, former President Goodluck Jonathan has refused to keep quiet. Known for his notorious flippancy and carefree tongue that has always been a source of embarrassment to himself, his party and his supporters, he has seized every opportunity to talk, even when such opportunities are better utilized keeping quiet. All his utterances since that defeat have been tailored towards telling us how good he was, how meritorious his regime was for us and how we ought to regret voting him out. Also, he had not wasted any time to tell of his graciousness in accepting defeat, though he does not tell us of any other option he would have taken in the light of the very many desperate but futile efforts he made to hang on to power. What else does a person defeated in an election do than hand over?
Jonathan does not waste time in telling whoever takes his words serious how Nigerians should regret voting him out and how his regime outperformed the one that replaced him, headed by President Muhammadu Buhari. But in all his cheeky efforts, Jonathan betrays the mien of a man sorely pained and living in personal turmoil. Jonathan, in his several careless utterances shows he still bears the sores of his defeat and he believes that by talking often, he will live down that sore. He shows clearly a man that is so eager to write his report card and exonerate himself of the legions of unpardonable indiscretions, awful corruption, impunity, indescribable incompetence that all ganged up to see him off power. He emits clearly the symptoms of a troubled mind, not very comfortable with his deserved place in history but who neighs, one way or the other, to re-write history to give him a more favorable verdict than that which he rightly got for his six years in power. Is he not struggling in vain? Is he not indulging in the childish act of bolting the stable door after the horse has escaped? He clearly is and this is shown by the series of angry reactions Nigerians always give to his frequent efforts to bathe himself in adoring glee. With each effort to remake himself, Jonathan comes off worse which speaks of a clear personality deficit he has no inkling how to deal with. When golden silence would have done him tremendous good, Jonathan hurtles out with annoying outbursts full of gaffes, unfathomable errors and vacuous claims that fly in the face of the bumbling mediocrity he is largely perceived of by Nigerians.
Expectedly, Jonathan’s waning party, the PDP, faced with the massive uprising that threw it out of power, had tagged alongside him in this futile effort. As Jonathan’s gains were PDP’s gains, his travails are also theirs. His baggage is also theirs. So they are right to shore up his poor efforts at self-recreation. They are Siamese twins who complimented each other in the egregious misrule that hobbled this country and therefore should seek to strike a partnership with each other as they battle life outside power.
They have not stopped telling us of the glorious era of Jonathan, when life was so sweet, painless and easy. They have constantly jammed our eardrums with sonorous rendezvous of the garden of Eden which the last PDP government writ here for us, only to be rewarded with a shock rejection in 2015. They have not failed to tell us that we never had it so good and rosy as in the Jonathan era where everything was almost free, there was enough money for every Nigerian to the extent that there were tens of trillions of Naira to be stolen without any pain felt by the country, food was almost given out free to Nigerians, hunger and misery disappeared, jobs were everywhere for the picking, security of lives and properties were air tight, life was more abundant and the heavenly Jerusalem was brought down to Nigeria. If you listen to an average PDP and Jonathan apologist, you certainly will miss your way trying to figure out the Nigeria they talk about because the tragic Hobbesian empire they created still exerts unforgettable scars on the minds of Nigerians who are always hit with pangs of bitterness if they remember the horror PDP and Jonathan made here for the years they were in power.
But the subject of this discourse is not to excurse into Jonathan and PDP’s trajectory as Nigerians rightly did a referendum on that regime in March 2015. I am not writing this report to contest the fairy tales with which PDP and Jonathan want to distort the reality that saw them thrown down the dustbin just two years ago. I am not contesting PDP and Jonathan’s frequent efforts to mangle our sensibilities and loot our minds for another tortuous journey in self-dubiety. This report is not about joining issues with Jonathan and his PDP in their self-delusional hope that they will re-build a cracked egg shell. It is not an effort to pore into their cocoon of belief that Nigerians are dolts who can be easily swayed by the kind of puerile white washing and fantasy-tale they are doing today.
It is obvious even to PDP and Jonathan that they are lying to themselves and Nigerians when they ceaselessly tout their achievements in power.  It is obvious even as they mischievously believe it, that they are aware of the gash their steeling and looting of a huge oil boom inflicted on the country today. It is obvious even if they deny it, that these philistines know very well that President Buhari and his government are doing their utmost best to contain the negative fallout of the brigandage they unleashed here before they were booted out of power. They are aware that they are duping themselves (not Nigerians) by noisily singing their praises.
My concern is that a party that once governed Nigeria is still burying its head in the sand. My concern is that PDP and Jonathan are furiously romancing their thighs and believe they can get pregnant from that silly effort. You may wonder why I have these concerns? It is not for the interest of PDP which, each day, is hit by cases of desertion from its emptying core. If you doubt the sorry state of PDP, ask Doyin Okupe who wrote off his once-darling party as a tree than no longer bear fruits. Ask PDP former National Chairman, Ahmadu Ali, who had advised his party to stop hallucinating about 2019, as they can never win the presidency in 2019. Ask Governor Seriake Dickson of Jonathan’s Bayelsa State who had told his party that it is impossible for PDP to win the 2019 presidential election. Ask Ibrahim Mantu who recently asked his party to go on its knees and tender unreserved apology to Nigerians for its sins as a way of seeking reinvention. Ask Ifeanyi Ubah who recently said that PDP is still digging its grave. Ask former Head of State Abdulsalami Abubakar who expressed the worry that PDP is not offering any meaningful opposition to the ruling APC.
But my point in proving the self-elected dubiety of the PDP on its achievements during its years in power, especially during the Jonathan years, is that presently, the rank and file of what remains in PDP, including Jonathan are crisscrossing the country, begging different people to fly its presidential ticket in 2019, the year they have noisily boasted they will take back power. They are now traversing the north and romancing several people to take their presidential ticket in 2019 with no luck. They even offered same to foremost businessman Aliko Dangote, who retorted that he is not a politician and even if he were, he can never ever seek to fly the presidential flag of the PDP against President Buhari. It is so bad for PDP! However, such public scorn has not deterred PDP and Jonathan from foraging for newer grounds in seeking someone that will take their presidential ticket in 2019 and you wonder what informed their vacuous boast of unseating Buhari when they are finding it hard to have a candidate to stand against Buhari?.
In the face of this public humiliation and given PDP’s insistence that the last regime turned Nigeria into an Eldorado under Jonathan, and that Nigerians have regretted replacing Jonathan with Buhari, why are they not tapping that golden opportunity by drafting Jonathan to contest against Buhari in 2019? Why have they turned nomads in the elusive search for a credible 2019 presidential candidate when they have a ready-made achiever in Jonathan? Why are they not putting Jonathan on the ballot so that Nigerian who have regretted voting for Buhari against Jonathan in 2015 can rectify their mistakes and bring Jonathan and PDP back to power? Why is the PDP wasting its efforts to search for an elusive candidate to beat Buhari in 2019 when they have a ready-made candidate in a Jonathan that was a super hero when he was here for nearly six years? Why is PDP not taking the Jonathan option but have been touting his regime as the best gift God deigned Nigeria after pure water?
Your wonder widens when you observe that Jonathan himself is also involved in this scavenging when he knows that nothing stops him from putting himself on the ballot for Nigerians to do a clear referendum on him against Buhari as he pretends not to know his rightful place in the history of the country. Jonathan contested as a sitting president and lost in 2015 so he is viable to stand for election again, so why is PDP not putting him up to snatch the seat from Buhari n 2019, knowing how well he performed before he was mistakenly voted out? Who is playing tricks on himself? Who wants to dupe himself?
However, PDP will prove those that posit that it plays pranks on itself right if they continue to market the horrendous travesty of Jonathan’s regime as a better option for Nigerians yet refuse to put Jonathan on its 2019 ticket. Nothing prevents Jonathan from contesting the 2019 election, so the best way for him and his sagging party to test their stand amongst Nigerians is to be put in the ballot in 2019 so that Nigerians will have that historical opportunity to rectify the mistake PDP and Jonathan said Nigerians did in rejecting them in 2015. PDP must quit its pranks. Jonathan must quit his well-known penchant to play the ostrich and enter the ring for the 2019 contest if they really believe in their jeremiad that Nigerians regret voting them out or that they performed creditably even to their own personal judgment. Nothing more than this is required if PDP and Jonathan are not conveniently lying to themselves to con Nigerians into embarking on another perilous journey we had when they were steering the Nigerian ship to perdition. So enough of this enfoolment. Let PDP re-present the Jonathan ticket for 2019, if they sincerely believe that they did well when he was here or keep quiet, apologize to Nigerians for the Jonathan/PDP tragedy and do large-scale reforms on the party before even presenting themselves as alternatives to what we have at present.

Peter Claver Oparah writes from Ikeja, Lagos. You can reach him at petercalver2000@yahoo.com


Source: Sahara Reporters
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