It is sad that our politics has become highly monetized. Nothing epitomized this transactional nature of our politics more than the reported display of money politics at the recent PDP special convention held in Abuja. The transactional nature of our politics, especially in the two major political parties, is the major reason Peter Obi left the PDP and went to the Labour Party, a party of workers with leftist ideology. The party primaries so far have not shown that our politicians have imbibed the tenets of democracy. It is still business as usual and reign of impunity and imposition of candidates. It is still a do or die contest where the strongest person wins and where money speaks. Our politics is not yet inclusive. It is a business for the moneybags and their foot soldiers and hailing supporters.
Despite the hide and seek game between the All Progressives Congress (APC) and its twin brother, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) over which of the duo will first conduct its primaries, the latter last weekend conducted its presidential primaries at MKO Abiola Stadium, Abuja. The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) had eaten its words on June 3 deadline for the party primaries and extended it by six days at the eve of PDP primaries at the behest of political parties, ostensibly the ruling behemoth, the APC. When next the INEC chairman, Prof. Mahmood Yakubu, swears about the commission’s independence, Nigerians will take it with a pinch of salt. While the PDP presidential primaries can be said to be transparent in the manner it was conducted and beamed live on a national television with global reach, there were deafening shouts of dollar rain, betrayal and intrigues that defined the exercise. The dollar rain was too much that some overzealous officials of EFCC stormed the venue with their trade mark red aprons probably to arrest those sharing dollars, both genuine and fake ones. The comic relief offered by the appearance of EFCC officials at the PDP convention is not lost on Nigerians.
We hope that the EFCC operatives will have a cameo appearance at the APC convention on Monday or thereabout. One of the oddities of the PDP convention is the dramatic withdrawal from the race by Sokoto State governor, Aminu Tambuwal, and the directive to his supporters to vote for Alhaji Atiku Abubakar who won the primaries with 371 votes, while tough-talking governor of Rivers State, who pundits tipped to win the race or who believed that he would win the race, came a distant second with 237 votes.
Without Tambuwal’s coup or ambush or betrayal or treachery, Wike would have coasted home to victory. He would have made history as a PDP presidential candidate but that was never to be on account of betrayal by his friends and fellow governors. Wike blamed his loss on the gang up by his fellow governors. He must have learnt a lot of lessons from the primaries, described in some quarters as another political bazaar where amounts ranging from $10k, $15k and $20k allegedly exchanged hands and the lucky delegates smiled to their banks wishing and praying for another four years to come for another super dollar rain. Another oddity is that the PDP primary also produced a hero and that single hero, according to the PDP chairman, Dr. Iyorchia Ayu, was no other person than Tambuwal, and not the delegates who actually voted and determined the winner. In Ayu’s estimation and reading of the situation, he ascribed heroism to Tambuwal’s melodrama, which many regard as betrayal. Anyway, heroism can assume different meanings to different people. One man’s hero may as well be another man’s villain.
Another oddity of the PDP presidential primaries is the flagrant negation of the power shift agreement between the North and the South on the presidency. With Buhari coming to the end of his eight-year tenure, it is expected that power will automatically shift to the South. But the PDP in its quest to wrest power from APC believes that ceding the presidency to the North instead of the South will do the magic. We shall see how that permutation pans out. No doubt, Nigeria will live with its consequences.
Another problematic of the primary is the voting pattern of South East delegates who saw the exercise as another market and decided to collect the dollars instead of voting for their brothers, Anyim Pius Anyim and Mazi Sam Ohuabunwa. While Anyim got 14 votes probably from Ebonyi delegates, Sam Ohuabunwa managed to get one vote probably from Abia. The other 80 South East delegates probably voted for either Atiku or Wike or both. The irony of South East voting pattern is that it contradicts their claim for the presidency.
Their conduct is a betrayal of that quest for Igbo presidency. They should have voted for one of the South East aspirants to demonstrate that we need this post. However, their behavior is in line with Igbo mercantile nature, which is individualistic, and the transactional nature of our politics. Maybe there was a communication gap between Igbo aspirants and their delegates. The South east must redefine its politics and engage in politics of ideology and people-oriented politics, politics that will address the needs of the masses, education, health, housing, unemployment, poverty and many others. The bane of Igbo politics is its self-serving and transactional nature. Nigerian politics is dictatorial, a politics where those in charge determine what happens and who gets what including those that will contest for elective posts.
That is probably why President Muhammadu Buhari has informed the 22 governors of APC to allow him choose his successor. Buhari pleaded with the governors that since he allowed them to go for second term and even choose and promoted their successors, they should do the same thing to him. Buhari’s argument appears innocuous and persuasive. However, it is loaded with meanings. Buhari wants to handpick his successor in defiance of the extant provisions of the electoral law on the conduct of party primaries.
The current electoral law prescribes only three modes of primaries, direct, indirect and consensus modes, and each political party is at liberty to choose any. What Buhari intends to do is outside these three prescribed modes of primaries. It is dictatorial and undemocratic. It will amount to an imposition of a candidate on the party and there will be consequences for such ill-advised action.
The fact that his governors have done so, in fact all governors do the same, does not in any way make it right, just or democratic. What Buhari should have done or still do is to lobby the delegates to vote for his anointed successor. Hand picking his successor, no matter his tone of argument, does not offer a level playing ground to all the aspirants. It may cause implosion in the APC. It is not in line with democratic ethos.
The APC primaries should not be reduced to a traditional stool or family affair where the head of the family decides who gets what position or the other. Buhari should not act as the headmaster of APC, he should allow internal democracy to reign in the party. His request to choose his successor is undue meddlesomeness in the affairs of the party. The interference is needless and must be avoided.
Although the PDP presidential primary poll was not perfect, there are lessons the APC can learn from the exercise. One of such lessons is that the exercise was transparent and devoid of any imposition of a candidate. Since the PDP has reneged on the power sharing arrangement between the North and the South, it is hoped that the APC would correct that mistake because it will be incestuous and immoral for another Northerner to be president after eight years of Buhari.