Convinced that the ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) would before the December 16 convention prune its long list of presidential aspirants, those who strongly believe that they could be shunted aside have started making frantic contingency efforts, particularly General Ibrahim Babangida.
Gen. Babangida and some of the aspirants who are not happy with the arrangement to stop some of them from participating in the primaries stayed away from the meeting between the party’s leaders and presidential aspirants on Thursday in Abuja, ostensibly as a form of protest.But convinced that the ruling party would not back down on its plan to make the number of those that would appear at the convention less wieldly and not ready to deny themselves the opportunity of being judged by the electorate on election day, some of the aspirants have intensified manoeuvres aimed at securing other platforms for their aspirations or working their way into vantage positions for possible selection as Vice Presidential candidates.
The party, reading the lips of the national chairman, Dr. Ahmadu Ali, at Thursday’s meeting, seems to have made up its mind to field one of its governors for the top position, based on the report of the committee of governors headed by Gov. Olusegun Agagu of Ondo State.
This will, automatically exclude Gen. Babangida, Gen. Gusau, Commodore Ebitu Ukiwe, Admiral Mike Akhigbe, Brig. Gen. Mohammed Marwa, Gen. Mamman Kotangora, Prof. Jerry Gana, Chief Albert Horse fall, Chief Okorocha, Mrs. Sarah Jubril and such others who have indicated interest in the race.
Vice President Atiku Abubakar’s chances seem to have long been foreclosed, given his strained relationship with President Obasanjo and the leadership of the party as well as his Petroleum Technology Development Fund (PTDF) problems. He is currently suspended by the PDP and though he is fighting both his suspension and the indictment over the PTDF matter in courts, the general feeling is that it would be difficult for him to disentangle himself sufficiently from these problems before December 16 when the PDP would be picking its flag bearer.
Babangida, Atiku, Gusau and the other aspirants who still feel that they could put up a fight outside the PDP are thus fine tuning their plans in readiness for the big battle.
Aides of Gen. Babangida say that he is not losing sleep over the PDP’s speculated plan to field a governor. According to one of them who is already operating outside the PDP, though the former military president is aware of the fact that PDP would have been a more comfortable platform on which to try to regain power, he is already to activate another platform which he said had been standing by, waiting for an eventuality such as may present itself if the PDP does not allow him to run on its platform.
The party chief said that the military tactician could at short notice mobilize a coalition of such parties as the Democratic Peoples Party (DPP), led by Gov. Attahiru Bafarawa of Sokoto State and former minister of the Fedral Capital Territory (FCT), Gen. Jeremiah Useni (Retd)., the National Democratic party led by Alhjai Habu Fari and the United Nigeria peoples Party (UNPP) led by Alhaji Saleh Sambo along with elements of the All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP).
Observers, however, say that even though these parties may be ready to cede their platforms to Gen. Babangida, they may not have the combined capacity to deliver the presidency to him.
The DPP is strong only in Sokoto and one or two other states, the same as NDP which can boast of Niger State.
The UNPP cannot claim any state as its stronghold while the ANPP is the common fishing ground for such aspirants as Gen. Muhammadu Buhari, Vice President Atiku Abubakar, Gov. Sani Yerimah of Zamfara State and the newest entrant to the party’s presidential contest, Chief Harry Akande.
Also, IBB may run into an Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) ambush once he strikes out on his own outside the PDP’s umbrella, given statements credited to the EFCC chairman, Malam Nuhu Ribadu in recent times that tend to suggest that the agency may move against the one-time military president. Such an action would not only distract Babangida but may even frustrate his aspiration.
Alhaji Abubakar’s plan B, clearly, is the Action Congress (AC) whose leaders and members literally gave him the platform on which he declared his presidential aspiration recently on the occasion of his 60th birthday anniversary.
Most of his closest political allies who left the PDP are already leaders of the AC and close watchers of the political terrain says it is only a matter of time before the Adamawa state-born politicians makes the move to the AC where it is believed that the party’s ticket is being reserved for him.
Solid as the arrangement seems from the outside, however, with Gov. Bola Tinubu in firm control of the structure, some analysts fear that Atiku may step out of the PDP and walk into another shocker in the AC where already, some of the party’s chieftains have started saying that their presidential ticket cannot be reserved for anybody, including the vice president.
Some politicians with presidential aspiration and with capacity to challenge the vice President, however feebly and still in the party, including former Communications minister, Alhaji Abubakar Rimi, former Speaker of the House of Representatives, Alhaji Ghali Naabba and former Minister of Foreign Affairs, Chief Tom Ikimi.
Apart from internal opposition that he may face in the AC, the VP is well aware that once he leaves the PDP, moves may be made to impeach him or to strip him of the office which would translate to his loss of immunity which would result to his immediate arrest by the EFCC for prosecution in connection with the PTDF scam, which the presidency and the EFCC still insist has not been killed by the judgment of the Lagos High Court.
Gen. Gusau, the man who walks in the shadows is also said to have his plan B waiting to be activated at short notice. Because of his intelligence backgrounds, his aspiration had remained a subject speculation till the stepped forward last Monday to pick the PDP form. Many know that he has an awesome network of local and foreign contacts and that any political platform he steps on, he can at short notice, activate his network, of contacts to begin to move towards snatching the presidency.
But the snag is that the man has been too much in the shadows and has come out too late to make the kind of impact that running on the PDP ticket would have allowed him to make. Any platform he puts together now would not run as smoothly as the PDP network would have been able to run, and if he makes any serious impact, it would mean that he would have worked twenty times harder than he would have if he had been running on the PDP platform.
Aspirants like Ukiwe, Akhigbe, Marwa, Kotangora and Gana may most likely grumble, even aloud, but would remain, to work for the party’s success at the polls in the hope that they would be compensated with appointments and other forms of patronage as well as the assurance of he who fights and runs away would be there to fight another day.
But others, traditional fighters like Mrs. Jubril and Chief Okorocha may storm out to show their fighting spirits, but they may have nowhere to run to. Jubril is not likely to find accommodation in the Progressive Action Congress (PAC) from where she left and which has thrown its weight behind Buhari, Okorocha would also look funny if he returns to AA to pick its presidential ticket for the 2007 race.
