PDP’s onslaught against APC governors: Who is next?

PDP’s onslaught against APC governors: Who is next?

With the impeachment of Governor Murtala Nyako of Adamawa State on Tuesday and the commencement of impeachment proceedings against his Nasarawa State counterpart, Tanko al-Makura, so soon after the defeat of Governor Kayode Fayemi in the Ekiti State governorship election, it is safe to conclude that governors of the All Progressives Congress (APC) have become endangered species. 

In days before the June 21 governorship election in Ekiti State, stalwarts of the APC were upbeat. They were apparently reveling in the projections that the elections would be a walkover and that the people of Ekiti, being progressives, would only vote for a party that wore that toga. In Abuja, many of the stalwarts boasted that the signal for an end of the road for the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) would be flagged off during the Ekiti election.

But the outcome of the election, which saw the candidate of the PDP, Mr Ayodele Fayose, defeating the incumbent governor and candidate of the APC, Fayemi, forced many of the chieftains of the party into their shells. In trying to explain away the shock find and mitigate the effect on their persons, their protagonists on the social media propounded the theory of “stomach infrastructure” as well as claims of “photocromic” scientific rigging. The APC has since gone to the election tribunal to contest the victory of PDP’s Fayose.   

 With the 2015 general elections drawing closer, it is apparent that the outcome of the isolated elections in Ekiti and Osun states will provide some sort of barometer and insights into the likely outcome of the general elections. Already, the projections by the APC of its strength in Yoruba land have been punctured by the outcome of the Ekiti governorship election. Hitherto, APC chieftains in other parts of the country have been made to believe that former Lagos State governor, Senator Bola Tinubu, had to be given a huge role in the party, being the custodian of over 14 million votes from the South West. His party is believed to have the people in its pocket. What the election in Ekiti has, however, done is to produce a practical electoral geography other than the one drawn up by leaders of the APC and members of the coalition parties.

Given the fact that the ultimate agenda of the coalition parties that formed the APC is to alter the 2011 electoral map which saw President Goodluck Jonathan emerge victorious over General Muhammadu Buhari, has the outcome of Ekiti polls helped that cause? It is difficult for the answer to come in the affirmative, but some would say the scenario has just started evolving.

Notwithstanding the decision of the APC to head for the courts, supporters of the PDP have continued to bask in the victory. To many of them, the election was already a pointer to the likely outcome of the next general elections.

As the theorists of the APC are busy churning out possible excuses to explain away the loss in Ekiti, the PDP appears bent on re-using its Ekiti template in Osun. Sources said that the party has seen the wisdom in ensuring that its tickets for all elective positions in the 2015 polls are won by popular candidates.

“Away from the usual practice of imposition, we want to ensure that our candidates are acceptable to the party men such that the job of marketing such individuals is made easy. It has been observed that fielding candidates who would have to put forward the party’s name as their selling point can be a liability to the party,” a chieftain of the party said.

More than that, the outcome of the polls is also emerging as a veritable source of postulations for the next general elections. Before now, the APC had believed that the party had locked down the votes of the South West. Its leaders were said to have insisted on the merger of the three legacy parties, the All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP), the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) and the Congress for Progressives Change (CPC), following its reading of the electoral map.

The map shows that the South West comes next to the North West in terms of voting capacity. They had projected that once a party popular in the South West and the North West came together, the process of winning the Nigerian presidential election was guaranteed.  They also projected that with a leg in the South East through a faction of the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA), the task of rooting the PDP out of power would be less arduous.

But with the PDP showing that it could win a free and fair election in a South West state, the projection that led to the APC merger is being challenged. Besides, sources had pointed to the presidential election results in the South West in 2011 to substantiate the claim that the APC was mistaken in its projection. It was clear that President Jonathan won in all the South West states except Osun. In many of the states, candidates of the opposition parties, including that of the ACN and CPC struggled to record paltry votes. The PDP won in Lagos, the base of APC chieftains.

With a bloodied nose in Ondo and Ekiti elections and with the stakeholders in Oyo and Ogun states regrouping for the PDP, it appears that the APC has a troubled future ahead in the South West, one of its strongholds. However, if the APC wins in Osun State on August 9, it may bounce back and use that victory as a steel wall against the hurricane of the PDP threatening its existence everywhere.

But in the intervening time, the chairman of the APC, Chief John Odigie-Oyegun, has deplored the PDP’s stranglehold on his party as events in Adamawa and Nasarawa states have indicated, and with Edo, Osun and Rivers states in sight. 

Odigie-Oyegun, on Wednesday, at a press conference, accused the president and his party of desperately trying to crush the opposition and destroy the country in the process.

“President Jonathan is destroying Nigeria in his obsessive bid for re-election. All Nigerians must be worried about power with impunity, which is what President Jonathan and his party, the PDP, have resorted to in their desperation to crush the opposition and destroy Nigeria in the process.

“I have called this press conference to address the grave dangers facing Nigerians as a people, our country as a nation and our democracy as our hope, at this very critical time. 

“Events in Nigeria in the past few weeks point to a return to the dark old days of state dictatorship, lawlessness, impunity and repression.

“We know it has been the dream of the ruling PDP to rule for 60 unbroken years, not minding if Nigeria becomes a desert land in the process,” he stated.

 “The evil machinations of the PDP have manifested in Ekiti. They have manifested yesterday (Tuesday) in Adamawa, They have carried it to Nasarawa, and they have Edo, Osun and Rivers in their sights.

“In the states mentioned, all of them, opposition strongholds, President Jonathan and his party have abused national institutions, resorted to a crude use of force and engaged in unprecedented financial inducements to achieve their objectives.  

“All these anti-democratic tactics come under the umbrella of power with impunity,” he argued.

The APC described Nyako’s impeachment as illegal and vowed to challenge it in court.

Adamawa, Nasarawa and other threatsBut the APC is also facing further threats. The reality of the impeachment of Nyako of Adamawa State is a huge threat to the strength the party hopes to take into the 2015 challenge. The House of Assembly in that state actualised the impeachment of Nyako on Tuesday. The House of Assembly of Nasarawa State also served their own governor impeachment notice on Monday. In both Houses, the PDP has very clear majority.  The situation in Nasarawa State appears precarious for the APC. The PDP is in total control of the House of Assembly, with 19 members to five.

Oyo, Ogun and Rivers Very ominously, there are other threats even where it had been thought the party was impregnable. In Oyo State, the party has lost the two senators it had to other parties. Senators Femi Lanlehin and Ayo Adeseun are now respectively in Accord Party and the PDP. In Ogun State, the APC is experiencing depletion due to internal strife. A case in point is the defection of a member of the House of Representatives, Honourable Abiodun Akinlade representing Yewa South/Ipokia Federal Constituency, to the PDP. The lawmaker, elected on the platform of the defunct Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN), returned to the PDP with a horde of his supporters, including a member of the state House of Assembly, Honourable Samson Onademuren. Akinlade cited what he called the readiness of the PDP to administer the state again for his action. Onademuren, on his part, said no fewer than 10 members of the assembly would join the PDP soon. Also, there are indications that a national leader of the APC and former governor of the state, Chief Olusegun Osoba, alongside three senators, six assembly members and a considerable number of his followers from across the 236 wards of the state are set to dump APC for other parties.

 An analyst feared during the week that there could be a continuation of attempts to spread the Nyako treatment to these states, including Rivers. 

Chief of Staff to Governor Rotimi Amaechi of Rivers State, Tony Okocha, however, on Thursday, told an online news medium on Thursday that his principal would complete his tenure despite alleged moves by some politicians in Abuja to instigate six members of the state House of Assembly to get him impeached.

Edo and ImoEdo State, one of the strongholds of the APC, is also in turmoil presently. The House of Assembly is divided between the APC and the PDP, with claims emanating from the APC government to the effect that the House members were plotting to impeach Governor Adams Oshiomhole. While the governor still retains control over a majority of the Assembly members, the centre is obviously not holding between the legislature and the executive in the state. Again, many of the political chieftains who made his election possible in 2012 have defected to the PDP. The APC also faces serious challenges in Imo State, where Governor Rochas Okorocha is facing huge threats from the ongoing realignments among PDP heavyweights in the state.

Zamfara, Borno The situation in Zamfara State where chieftains of the ruling APC have been defecting to the PDP is also not painting a comfortable picture for the APC. Sources have said that Governor Abdulaziz Yari appeared to have alienated himself from power brokers and political heavyweights who helped him to power just as a large portion of the populace are said to be waiting for the Election Day to deliver their verdict on his government’s performance.

Outside Zamfara in the North East, the gale of mass movement outside the APC reached a frightening level on Monday with the defection of the Board of Trustees chairman of the defunct All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP), one of APC’s legacy parties, former Borno State governor, Ali Modu Sheriff, to the PDP.  His movement out of the APC with a mass of critical stakeholders in the politics of the state appears to have made the position of the incumbent governor, Kashim Shettima, very threatened, especially if the APC loses its current majority membership of the House of Assembly. 

Osun and LagosWith the emerging scenario in the South West, the APC seems to have been dealt a huge blow through the loss of Ekiti polls. The opposition has been emboldened in Osun State, deploying tactics similar to those that won Fayose the governorship seat of Ekiti. The handling of the loss of Ekiti by the Bola Tinubu clan within the party appears to have further polarised it and made the party more vulnerable. Segun Ayobolu, Tinubu’s Chief Press Secretary when he was governor, a columnist in the former governor’s newspaper, The Nation, literally, in his column two weeks ago, contextualised the loss of Ekiti within the personal failings of Fayemi. Fayemi’s own side have replied, describing the attack as “very unnecessary.” All these were on at a time the party ought to be back on its feet fighting to rescue Osun State from PDP’s mortal onslaught which an analyst described as the possible last battle of the APC. “If the PDP wins Osun on August 9, it is almost certain it will put everything into winning Lagos in 2015,” an analyst told Saturday Tribune. Indeed, PDP’s candidate, Iyiola Omisore, did not mince words in an interview with Saturday Tribune on Tuesday that the APC and its candidate were finished in Osun State. But the incumbent governor, Rauf Aregbesola, has not only declared that he would win the election, he has also vowed, ominously, to engage the federal might on the streets of the state.  

However, a PDP chieftain said that even if the APC wins the governorship election in Osun, the euphoria of a moving train had been lost and the party would have to explain itself to the people to get really accepted. Originally, the party was hoping to ride on the euphoria of “a brand new party,” contending with “an old bad party.” The music has, however, changed with the results of Ekiti polls.