A major crack has set into the once boisterous Nigerian Governors
Forum, NGF, following last weekend’s re-election of Governor Chibuke
Amaechi as chairman and the determination of his opponents within the
forum not to recognize his election. The fissure is a firm fit into
alleged plans of presidential minders to clip Amaechi’s wings and give
the presidency unfettered leverage in its unfolding political plans.
The split in the Nigerian Governors Forum, NGF did not come as a
surprise. The failure of the Presidency to cage the forum under the
leadership of Governor Rotimi Amaechi of Rivers State was an attraction
to slice the body into factions.
The allegation against Amaechi by his opponents is that he has been
using the NGF to confront President Goodluck Jonathan on many serious
national socio-political issues thereby stifling the president’s
performance in office.
Rotimi Amaechi, Rivers State Governor
Whether that assertion holds water or not, the pro-Jonathan’s
loyalists in the NGF would not want to hear his name as their leader any
longer and had laid a political ambush to cut him to size last Friday
but failed woefully to achieve their aim.
The intrigues laced with high wired blackmail and some level of
intimidation would have caught fire and sent Amaechi packing if his
opponents led by Governor Godswill Akpabio of Akwa Ibom State had put
their acts together before and during the tension-soaked NGF election.
But many things went awry for the pro-Jonathan faction even before the
ballots were cast.
Of course, same elements had convinced President Jonathan that
Amaechi was aligning forces with those from the North, who were opposed
to his re-election bid in 2015 and why he should be shoved aside as the
NGF chairman.
Paradoxically, while they were emboldened by the strong backing of
the Villa to uproot the Rivers governor, the delivery of the plot,
however failed to sail through. For those who know Governor Godswill
Akpabio, the arrowhead of the campaign to flush out Amaechi, no one
would accuse him of not working hard to accomplish to goal. But many
blunders came along.
Indecision killed the Jonathan camp: Of all the blunders committed by
the pro-Jonathan group that gave easy ride to Amaechi, none was as
disastrous as the refusal of the camp to stick to a single candidate for
the poll on time.
Thus, its greatest undoing because the shifting of candidates up to
the last moment and the results hit them below the belt, leaving them
and President Jonathan with a sour taste in the mouth.
All along, the presidency, through Akpabio, had been presenting the
Katisna State Governor Ibrahim Shema as the beautiful bride being
courted by the Villa as its candidate to challenge Amaechi.
Although Shema was still not acceptable to all the PDP governors, it
was clear to all that he could pose a serious threat to Amaechi.
Curiously, barely five days to the vote, the same presidency, through
the PDPGF leader, had a change of mind on Shema and suddenly drafted the
Bauchi State Governor, Mallam Isa Yuguda, into the same race,
jettisoning Shema for reasons yet to be made public.
Jonah Jang of Plateau State
The signing on of Yuguda, it was learnt, was even more attractive to
both the PDPFG and the Northern Governors’ Forum, headed by Dr.
Babangida Aliyu of Niger State, a recent political enemy of Jonathan.
Aliyu got into the bad books of the Presidency when he challenged
Jonathan to remember that he had signed a document with them in 2010 to
do just one term in office and vowed that the North would not support
his re-election in 2015.
However like a stillbirth, the duo of Shema and Yuguda, who had
already been railroaded into the ring of contest and their supporters
ignited in the process, found it difficult to agree to step down for
each other until last Friday.
All attempts to browbeat them to see reasons to withdraw for the
other fell on deaf ears and the Northern States Governors’ Forum had no
option than to force them to pull out of the contest and give way to a
neutral candidate in the person of Governor Jonah Jang.
The ‘sudden’ drafting of Governor Jang into the race to replace
Yuguda, who was the last candidate favoured by the presidency,
significantly altered the voting pattern against the presidency and its
candidate.
Some governors from the core north opposed Jang, whom they claim is
grumpy and politically powerless and began to look in the direction of
Amaechi, whom they claim, had led the NGF effectively and did not see
why the president wanted to sacrifice him.
“We know that Amaechi has not done anything wrong. Whenever we ask
what his offence is nobody has been able to advance one concrete reason
apart from saying that he has a problem with President Jonathan.
Governor from the north
And if we ask what type of problem Amaechi has with the President, some
would say that it is something that is best known to Jonathan himself,” a
governor from the north loyal to Amaechi, said.
A shot in the foot: Apart from the indecision over the choice of
candidate to fly its flag, the pro-Jonathan group was also in a fix to
get its supporters to work together at the venue of the election because
of the blocking of all forms of communication by security agencies in
and around the Rivers State Governor’s Lodge in Asokoro District of the
Federal Capital Territory, where virtually all the governors’ lodges are
located.
Misfire: Apparently convinced that it had a simple majority of
governors based on those who had signed a prepared document in favour of
the Presidency’s candidate, the security agents were instructed to jam
all GSM phones around the venue of the voting so as to prevent the
pro-Amaechi governors from infiltrating the pro-Jonathan’s camp.
Gov Akpabio of Akwa Ibom state
Thus, as early as 4pm when the NGF meeting was about to start, hordes
of security agents had stormed the venue and blocked communication
channels making it difficult for anyone to communicate with the outside
world. It was a shot in the foot as the move ironically worked against
the pro-Jonathan governors.
A governor, who was at the venue lamented that those who jammed the
GSM phones contributed to the failure of the President’s candidate.
The governor said, “Well, what the pro-Jonathan governors plotted
actually turned against them and I think that is the way the Almighty
God wanted it to be. They blocked all forms of communications around the
Rivers Governor’s Lodge for over four hours making it impossible for
anyone to use their phones.“I believe strongly that if they had not
blocked the phones it would have been possible for the supporters of the
camp to brief the Villa on how the election was going and they could
have stopped the voting when they realised that Amaechi was poised to
win.
“Unfortunately for them they hit themselves with their own weapon
because while the Amaechi’s camp was united and determined to return
him, the camp loyal to the President was divided over the sudden change
of candidate. I can tell you that if Mallam Isa Yuguda or Shema had been
allowed to run against Amaechi, the situation would not have been the
same.
While the battle to get a consensus candidate for the Jonathan’s camp
lasted, it was learnt that a lot of water passed under the bridge and
altered the political formula already agreed with the presidency
regarding the poll.
Under the arrangement, the list of the 19 PDP governors, who had
earlier appended signature to a secret document in front of the
President shortly after the Nigeria Economic Council meeting in Abuja,
was to be presented to the meeting of the NGF as the decision of the
governors. Thereafter, the pro-Jonathan group was to insist that Amaechi
should step down as the NGF chairman since they already have a majority
of governors on its side.
Nonetheless, when the Jonathan governors arrived the venue of the
meeting and saw that they still had the majority of governors in
attendance, they opted for secret balloting believing that all the
governors whose names were on the list would vote for Jang. It was an
optimism carried to far in a murky political game where anything could
happen.
Shocker for Amaechi’s opponents: By the time the result of the
election was read out by the Director General of the NGF, it was already
too clear to the anti-Amaechi group that they had shot themselves on
the foot and that the only way out was to mount a belated protest in a
bid to salvage what they had lost through a transparent ballot.
In all, there were 35 governors present at the Rivers Governor’s
Lodge, venue of the voting and all of them voted in a free and fair
manner, believing that Amaechi had been booted out peacefully. But that
was not to be, as he trounced Governor Jang by three votes coasting
home with 19 votes to 16 netted by his Plateau counterpart.
The result shocked Akpabio and the other governors in his camp. It
was equally very difficult for them to swallow such a bitter pill. What
will the governors report back to Jonathan, whose aides had been working
round the clock to stop Amaechi and whose ears were on the ground to
get the results and forward to him in far away Addis Ababa, where he is
attending an AU summit?
President Jonathan
Protest as a panacea for pro-Jonathan’s camp: Protesting the outcome
of the vote, Akpabio, leading 17 other governors, accused Amaechi of not
stepping down before contesting, thereby violating the election
procedure. He said the group would henceforth have nothing to do with
Amaechi, having ceased to be their leader on May 26, 2013.
The pro-Jonathan governors, who spent most of the weekend trying to
confer legitimacy on Jang, who actually lost the election, met at the
Benue Governor’s Lodge in Asokoro after which they read a six-paragraph
communiqué, affirming their support and loyalty to Jang. They promised
to set up a parallel secretariat in Maitama so as to disengage from
Amaechi.
Shortly after that meeting on Saturday, they met with the Board of
Trustees Chairman of the PDP, Chief Tony Anenih in his Asokoro residence
and tried to convince him to support their camp. The Akpabio group did
not end there. They then proceeded to the Presidential Villa where they
met with Vice President Namadi Sambo and also briefed him on the actions
they were taking to stop Amaechi from being recognised as the leader of
the NGF.
Discrediting the process
Analysts believe that the full participation of the pro-Jonathan
governors in the NGF election from the beginning to the end and the
belated attempt by them to discredit the process after the defeat of
their candidate is like disowning one’s wife after she had delivered a
baby not liked by the husband.
But Amaechi has chosen to remain calm and calculated, savouring the
victory he recorded against all the forces arrayed against him by the
Presidency and others opposed to him.
In a terse response after his victory, Amaechi said there was neither
victor nor vanquished but democracy at work. Despite the obstacle
allegedly planted against him before the poll, the governor still
pledged to work with President Jonathan to achieve peace, development
and unity in Nigeria.
‘’We remain committed to supporting our leader, the president and
commander in chief of the armed forces of the Federal Republic of
Nigeria, His Excellency, Dr. Goodluck Ebele Jonathan to realize the
development dream of all Nigerians by reducing tension, uncertainty and
insecurity in our beloved country.
‘’We want to pledge our steadfastness and resolve working alongside
Mr. President to better the lives of our people as we render transparent
and accountable stewardship,” Amaechi pledged shortly after being
declared winner of the election.
Nigerians react: Human Rights lawyer, Femi Falana, has berated the governors crying foul over Amaechi’s victory.
Describing the action of the anti-Amaechi governors as
self-embarrassing, Falani said the victory complied with the NGF’s rules
and could not be faulted by any of the members.
Plausible next steps: The script being played by the anti-Amaechi
governors, it was gathered, fits into one of the game plans that had
long been drawn up by the forces loyal to the President and President
was not in the mood to recognise the governor as the NGF leader.
In fact, some of the Presidential strategists are said to be very
comfortable with the decision taken by the Akpabio-led group to
discredit Amaechi’s victory so that at best two factions of the NGF
would emerge to stop the governor from further prodding the political
landscape.
There were also suggestions that some powerful PDP chieftains might
be on their way to lobby Amaechi to back down on his rumoured vice
presidential ambition with Governor Sule Lamido of Jigawa State so as to
appease the President to recognise him as the NGF leader.
The beginning of the end: How soon this will happen remains to be
seen and leaves many at the brink. But as a democrat and acclaimed
stickler to the rule of law, will Jonathan feign ignorance of the
re-election of Amaechi and recognise Jang, who lost the election?
Now, if Jonathan recognises the loser of the election, the issue then
is, of what relevance is Jang to Jonathan’s re-election in 2015. What
is Jonathan going to lose if Amaechi remains the NGF chairman? As the
nation awaits answers to the posers, one thing remains on the horizon
for the NGF: a dirge, as the denouement is already unfolding.
