Less than 35 days to the presidential election, the People Democratic Party (PDP) still appears to be going into a war without a concrete battle plan. Though the chieftains may not readily agree, it seems the party is now faced with a seeming potent threat of dissent from within, with a G5 rebellion in the shadows.
All efforts to paper over the cracks on the wall to prevent trouble have been taken by way of reconciliation, but from the look of things, more need to be done to ensure the ultimate electoral prize: victory.
Nigeria is marching toward the coming general elections with hope. This is because the race, this time around, especially from the presidential angle seems tighter.
Unlike the 2019 election which had 73 presidential candidates, the 2023 general election will feature only 18 candidates, with four main contenders: Atiku Abubakar of the PDP, Bola Tinubu, All Progressives Congress (APC), Peter Obi, Labour Party (LP), and Rabiu Kwankwaso of the New Nigeria Peoples Party (NNPP).
The group of five PDP governors, now also known as ‘Integrity Group’ are still unyielding to demands including that party chairman, Iyorchia Ayu, should quit office for a southerner, ‘power shift to the south’, among others, are still roaring.
Despite the attempts to break their ranks, the governors, Oyo State’s Seyi Makinde; Okezie Ikpeazu (Abia); Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi (Enugu), Samuel Ortom (Benue) and Nyesom Wike (Rivers), have not yielded to full reconciliation.
•Wike: We’re set to announce preferred presidential candidate
As they dig in, G5 leader and Rivers State helmsman, Wike has announced that his force would soon announce his preferred candidate in the forthcoming 2023 general election, before the end of this month.
Speaking at the commissioning of the tenth flyover constructed by his administration at the Obio-Akpor local government area of Rivers State, Wike said late last year, “From January next year, I will campaign to my people whom they will vote for. So, all of you who have been in suspense, saying all manner of things and abusing me, wait until January comes.
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“Not only will I tell them where they will vote, but I will also move from state to the state telling them why they should vote for the people I said they should vote for. Nothing will happen.
“So all of you, appearing on television, abusing me, don’t waste your time again, January has come. Don’t waste your silver and go on your platform.
“It’s not to be on the podium and raise your shoe high and raise your wristwatch high, time has come to convert it to vote.
“Those who have never been stabled, moving from PDP to… and there back to PDP, those of you who made a campaign in 2015, telling Nigerians if they vote for PDP, they are voting for insurgency, corruption, wait all of us will reply, we will tell Nigerians this thing you said how far what is the system now, is it the same PDP or a new PDP?”
January is now here, and the Rivers State governor recently reaffirmed his stance on the announcement of a plan to name the preferred candidate of the ‘Integrity Group’.
While that plan is on, the situation was again aggravated following the suspension of the former governor of Enugu State, Chimaroke Nnamani, and the entire executive of the Ekiti State.
Wike described the dissolution of the Ekiti State executive committee of the PDP by the Iyorchia Ayu-led National Working Committee of the party as an act of tyranny that would be challenged in court.
The governor, who dared the PDP national chairman, Ayu, to suspend him or any of the G-5 governors, warned that the resort to despotism by the NWC would not do the PDP any good in the forthcoming general elections.
The Rivers State governor stated this while speaking at the campaign flag-off rally by the State PDP Campaign Council in Bori, Khana Local Government Area over the weekend.
Wike explained that the reason the dissolution of the Ekiti State working committee would be challenged in court was that there are still members of the PDP who believe in the rule of law and that the party should respect its constitution.
“Let me also use this opportunity to say to Iyorchia Ayu and his team, your dissolving Ekiti State Exco will not help you in any way. Your suspending people will not help you in any way. The battle line has been fully drawn.
“As I speak to you, we will do everything legally possible to challenge any decision we know is illegal, stressing that the Ayu-led NWC resort to tyranny would do more damage to the PDP as far as the 2023 general election is concerned.
“So, don’t think you can threaten people by saying so, so persons have been suspended. Rubbish! Completely rubbish. We are above that level that you think you can threaten anybody, intimidate anybody with whatever illegal decision you have taken,” he said.
The governor dared Ayu and his cohorts to extend the despotic tendencies to the G-5 governors and see if they could withstand the repercussion.
“So, we are waiting for you to announce my own and any other of my friends. Like I have said, when a man says you will not sleep, he too, will he sleep. Will Ayu sleep? Will those his cohorts sleep? So, don’t worry, we can pay you back. We can tell you that enough is enough.”
•Plenty water has passed under the bridge, so reconciliation is almost impossible -Source
However, a source in Rivers State, noted that having a full settlement with the G5 governors at this time is almost ruled out.
“They have waited for a long to have issues sorted out but the Atiku group has been buying time. The Integrity Group has taken its positions it will play out during the presidential election. They made their demands long ago and the PDP refused to bulge. Well, I do not foresee any real settlement,” he told ThisNigeria.
In early January, and shortly after new year’s day, in the raging midst of the PDP war, presidential candidate Atiku said he was not perturbed by the reported ‘plots’ of the G5 governors to endorse the presidential candidates of other political parties ahead of 2023.
Speaking through his media aide, Phrank Shaibu, the former vice president also stated that he was not perturbed by the G5 governors’ move to back another party’s presidential candidate in 2023.
According to the Wazirin Adamawa, power only comes from God. He maintained that he was confident that no man could arrogate to himself the powers that God alone has.
The PDP flag bearer added that “any person boasting of having such powers to stop his presidential bid should first make himself president.”
A spokesman for the Atiku/Okowa Campaign, Kola Ologbondiyan, said, “We will soon put our enemies to shame on this matter. We know those who are afraid of PDP’s imminent electoral victory would want the issues we are about to resolve to continue but I assure Nigerians that sooner than later, these outstanding issues will be resolved and Nigeria will be the better for it.”
•Opposition party plots new strategy if the worst happens
With its glaring failure to capture the courtship of G5 in its permutations, the APC has opted to look elsewhere for redemption.
A chieftain of the ruling party, among others, has said they are going to win the presidential poll, even without the G5.
A source said the strategy of the opposition is to ensure that they get a mandatory 25 per cent in all the states controlled by the PDP if it is not going to be an outright win.
