There are strong indications that the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, may zone its presidential ticket to the North and its national chairmanship slot to the South.
Sources within the party also hinted that the party might also zone the vice presidential slot to South East to appease Ndigbo, as they are yet to produce the president since the return to democratic rule in 1999; and micro-zone the position of the national chairman to the South West for strategic reasons.
Already there is a growing clamour for power shift to the South, with calls on the leading parties to pick their presidential candidates from the South one of whom will succeed President Muhammadu Buhari, a northerner when his eight year tenure ends.
Chairman of the Southern Governors Forum and Ondo State Governor Oluwarotimi Akeredolu and a PDP chieftain and former presidential spokesman, Dr Doyin Okupe, among other prominent politicians from the South are in the vanguard of the campaign that Nigeria’s next president should come from the South.
In fact, Akeredolu and Okupe are categorical that any party which zones its 2023 presidential ticket to the North should consider the coming presidential election a loss already.
Amid this caution, the stakeholders hold divergent views regarding what to settle for between the national chairmanship position, and a vice-presidential ticket, as the countdown to the October 2021 National Convention for the election of new members of the National Working Committee (NWC) continues.
The newly appointed 44-member zoning committee headed by Governor Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi of Enugu State is already plotting the formula for sharing positions that will appease all and sundry.
Indeed, intrigues within the South-West geopolitical zone further suggest that the party may eventually concede the position of national chairman to South West as a way of placating the region for the perceived injustice in the December 2017 national convention, when Governor Nyesom Wike, allegedly pushed South South’s interest and got Uche Secondus in the saddle, after the South West failed to produce a consensus candidate.
In the wake of Secondus’ emergence at that national convention, many strong stakeholders from the South West quit the party angrily, with the development also seen as one of the major factors that cost PDP victory in the 2019 general election.
Southwest’s Contenders
With former governors of Osun and Ekiti states, Prince Olagunsoye Oyinlola, and Ayo Fayose, as well as the gubernatorial candidate of the party in the last Ondo governorship poll, Eyitayo Jegede (SAN) in the race already, the zone is the only one that has since shown interest in producing the national chairman.
Oyinlola, a very close ally of ex-President Olusegun Obasanjo, is said to also have the tacit support of the former President of the Senate, David Mark, and erstwhile governor of Jigawa State, Sule Lamido, among others.
However, some interest groups in the North are averse to Oyinlola’s ambition as they fear that if his dream is realised, Obasanjo would remotely control the party through the former Osun State governor and one-time military administrator of Lagos State.
Some PDP groups in the zone are also sceptical about Oyinlola leading the party effectively as he had once defected to APC, and also worked assiduously against the party during the 2015 general election, as well as the governorship election in Osun State.
A member of the party said that Lamido’s recent visit to Obasanjo had to do with Oyinlola’s ambition.
Jegede is alleged to have been drafted into the chairmanship race by Wike, and former Vice President, Atiku Abubakar.
Wike, according to some members, is attracting Jegede to the race, while also positioning himself as running mate to any northern presidential candidate. Atiku, on his part, also allege plans to use Jegede to achieve his aim of getting the party’s presidential ticket.
But Jegede’s ambition does not resonate with those that are aggrieved with the way that Wike has been trying to rubbish Secondus because of his personal ambition, as well as the insults that he allegedly hauled at South West during the 2017 convention.
On his part, Secondus is said to be enjoying the support of some governors of the party from the North, especially those who felt that Wike cannot continue to dictate to the party.
Still in the North, some powerful forces are also preparing Fayose for the race. One of the reasons adduced by them is that the former Ekiti State governor is neutral and cannot be manipulated by forces that are bent on achieving personal objectives as against the general interest of the party.
Although key PDP groups in the North deliberated about getting the former Ekiti State governor on board, last Tuesday, some groups even visited him in Lagos and enumerated several reasons for him to join the race.
Fayose neither confirmed nor denied the development when contacted, but insisted that the position has not been zoned to any region.
He said: “The position has not yet been zoned to the South West. Even if it has, it is for the benefit of our people in the zone. So, we have to do due diligence. It’s not about contesting, but making a success of the office.
“I understand there are other people that are interested in the position. They are also eligible and competent. But wherever the South West goes is where I will go. I will follow the South West. Wherever the Yoruba go when the chairmanship position of our party is zoned to the South West is where I will go. It will not be a do-or-die affair. That’s all I can say for now.”
Speaking on the development, the immediate past vice national chairman South West Zone of the party, Dr. Eddy Olafeso, expressed fears that what played out in 2017 was gradually playing out again, as he “fears an imposition where individuals will not have a say in what is going on. But I am very confident and hopeful that we will realise our failures in 2017 and begin to do the needful to correct that.”
He said South West is usually divided into three zones, which are Ekiti/Ondo Zone, Oyo/Osun Zone and Lagos/Ogun Zone. As it is, Oyo/Osun has already picked one of the three positions of the National Working Committee (NWC) that is the national vice chairman, which I contested for, but lost to the former Deputy Governor of Oyo State, Taofik Arapaja. So, Osun and Oyo states are out of the picture. If the chairmanship is coming to the South West, it would be contested by Lagos/Ogun.”
By implication, Olafeso is saying that Oyinlola is not eligible to contest for the national chairmanship since Arapaja is from Oyo in the same zone as the retired general.
According to him: “If we must go by the principles of equity and justice, Ondo/Ekiti and Lagos/Ogun should present candidates for the position if it is eventually zoned to the South West.”
On the present pressure being mounted on Fayose, Oyinlola and Jegede by interest groups, Olafeso said: “They are eminently qualified to contest, but I wonder who are those people mounting pressure on them? They are qualified whether there is pressure or not.”
To a former Chairman of PDP in Ogun State, Adebayo Dayo, there is the possibility that the zoning committee will concede the national chairman position to the South West to placate the region for the maltreatment of 2017.
He, however, expressed reservation that some elements within the zone are clamouring for the vice-presidential ticket as a way of balancing in the next general election.
According to him, “The argument is if the APC zones its presidential ticket to the South and South-West in 2023, the vice will go to the North. The proponents of the vice president coming to South West will create a kind of balancing in the election. This is where we may have issues and need to sit down for proper deliberations.”
A former member of the PDP Board of Trustees (BoT), Chief Ebenezer Babatope, said: “When the South-West PDP led by Chief Olabode George meets very soon, we shall issue our position to the entire world.”
But another founding member of the party in South West, who preferred anonymity warned that the South West will not tolerate the excesses of Governor Wike, not even the way the Rivers State governor insulted people that are old enough to be his father the last time.
For the Lagos State PDP Chairman Adedeji Doherty, who is a member of one of the national zoning committees: “The zone should leave the chairmanship position to the South East, or South-South. We should fight at the national convention, and at the committee, level to get the number two position in the country. That is my own candid position. It is the right time that the PDP should provide a South West vice president. The president in APC is from the North and the vice president is from the South West. If we are going to zone the president to the North for the first time in the history of the PDP, we should have a South West vice president. Everything is tilting towards that end, and for me, I am looking at a situation whereby the zone gets the slot of vice president.”
However, the National Publicity Secretary of PDP, Mr. Kola Ologbondiyan said he could not speak on zoning for now until the committee in charge submits its report to the National Executive Council (NEC).
Akeredolu had warned that any political party that fields a northern candidate for presidency in 2023 risks losing the support of southerners.
He made this known on Friday in an interview on Channels Television monitored by The Cable.
While speaking on the resolutions of the Southern Governors’ Forum on the 2023 elections and the fact that the presidency must be zoned to the South, Akeredolu said this was for the sake of justice and fairness.
He argued that when President Muhammadu Buhari, a northerner, completes his second term in 2023, the next president should come from the South.
Akeredolu said: “There are about three political parties that are in the Southern Governors’ Forum, we have the All Progressives Grand Alliance, Peoples Democratic Party and the All Progressives Congress. All of us are unanimous in our position that the next president of this country must come from the South.
“For us, we are unanimous. It (the forum) is not a political platform. I believe that any party that picks somebody from the North would have to face the whole southern region because they will not support it.
“It has to come from the South. We are saying that there must be what I will call rotation. The justice of it and the fairness in it are what we are preaching. If my president – President Buhari — has been in office for eight years, it can’t be from the North. The next president must come from the South.”
While replying to critics who said competence should override zoning for the 2023 election, Akeredolu said there were competent persons both in the northern and southern regions.
He stated, “There are many people that are competent. We have competent people in the North as we have competent people in the South, so the president can come from any part of the country.”
The PDP chieftain stated this in an interview with journalists in Abuja on Saturday.
Okupe argued that the zoning arrangement in the PDP ended with the 2019 presidential election but that some people within the party are insisting on presenting a northern candidate for the 2023 poll.
He said major politicians were defecting from the party because of the issue of a northern presidential candidate.
He expressed the fears that the party could collapse before 2023 if the gale of defections continues.
Okupe said: “The gale of defections in the Peoples Democratic Party has nothing to do with any form of crisis. It is just part of happenings when a general election is approaching
“Those who have defected have personal issues with party leadership, especially on the zoning arrangement.
“The issue of zoning shouldn’t be a basis for defections at this time because the committee set up to determine that will soon conclude their assignment and submit their report
“However, there is a strong indication that the party is erroneously tilting towards zoning the presidency to the North.
“Zoning is a veritable instrument that ensures equity and balancing in the nation, gives hope and confidence and support to our national unity.
“The zoning arrangement which the PDP started since 1998 was based on the assumption that the party will be in power consistently but the moment it lost power in 2015, automatically the arrangement has to be reviewed in view of the development
“When the PDP lost power, there was a southern president in power. If the party didn’t lose power and completed in 2019, zoning would kick in and power would have shifted to the North.
“However, the party that won the election presented a northern candidate who by 2023 would have ruled for eight years.
“We still carried on as if the former arrangement was still in place in 2019 and it was justifiable because within the PDP at that time for us to put forward a northern candidate.
“In 2023, with APC having ruled for eight years with a northern candidate, it will be preposterous, unjust, uncaring and blatant for the PDP to zone the presidential ticket to the north because the arrangement expired the moment our party lost power in 2019.
“There should be a reset of the zoning arrangement in 2023. It does not make sense to replace a northern government of eight years with another northern government for another eight years, it doesn’t make sense.
“That is why the PDP should zone the presidency to the South. The southern governors who are the leaders of the South had spoken, we should listen to then.
“It will be folly, reckless and insensitive for any political party to ignore the position of the southern governors
“Some people who think they control wealth are talking within the party while reasonable and strong men are keeping quiet. Some are being given money to keep quiet.
“The struggle between Secondus and Wike is unnecessary. It ought not to have degenerated to this level. Our party may lose again if we zone presidency to the North again in 2023, ” Okupe added.
With additional report from The Guardian
