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ANPP: still battling for survival
ADESOJI OYINLOLA reviews the festering crisis in the All Nigeria
Peoples Party (ANPP) and concludes that with the attendant intrigues the party
is on the fringe of collapse.
The All Nigeria Peoples Party is in trouble,
and it knows it. For a couple of
weeks now, it has been busy trying to find a solution to the conundrum of the
problems that have created a wide gulf within the party that its chieftains are
already going their different ways.
Although the Chairman of the Board of Trustee of the party, Admiral
Augustus Aikhomu , this week, with an air of finality declared that Chief Don
Etiebet remained the chairman of the party which is the second biggest party in
the country, events after the announcement have cast doubts on the belief that
the battle is over.
Already, Lt. Gen. Jeremiah Useni who
has since emerged as a factional leader following the crisis which blew open
some weeks back has countered Etiebet, saying that Don Etiebet remained
suspended. He said the meeting
where Etiebet was said to have been ratified was attended by Aikhomu alone from
the board of trustees of the party.
The national executive committee of the party, he said, would soon meet
to address the issues raised at the meeting.
His words: “I wish to state that our party’s NEC will soon
meet and address issues raised at the said meeting and decide on the way
forward. For ease of
understanding, we wish to reconfirm that the decision of NEC on 9th September
suspending chief don Etiebet from office as national chairman still
stands.”
Although some chieftains would want
the public to believe that the crisis has been divided over the case of a bad
leadership and the need to uproot it once and for all, not many discerning
minds would agree. Infact, without
having to read in-between the lines, many have concluded that more than
anything, the presidential ambition of some prominent Nigerians including that
of former military president, General Ibrahim Babangida, Brig. Gen. Muhammed
Marwa and Vice President Atiku Abubakar has been the major undoing of the
party.
If nothing else pointed to this,
last week declaration by the governor of Jigawa State, Alahji Saminu turaki
did. In an action that is likely
to further throw spanner in the works of the party, the governor announced that
he would soon be abandoning his party for the ruling Peoples Democratic
Party. And of course, that he
would be moving into the party with his teeming loyalists. There is, perhaps no gainsaying why
Turaki has decided to decamp to the PDP.
His long time romance with Vice President Atiku Abubakar whose ambition to rule the nation 2007 is
unwavering explains it.
If the development in the party is
anything to go by, it is certain that the last may not have been heard about
the exodus to the PDP, as some governors of the party who are loyalists of the
vice president may see the need to shift base to lend the needed support to him
for his ambition. And even those that may want to remain in the ANPP may
remain, but with loyalty to the possible candidate of the ruling party.
While the dramatis personae may be
acting a sincere script of merely ensuring that the vice president takes over
his boss’ position come 2007, their actions and inactions may afterall be
a blessing to the ruling PDP which has in all its deeds been all out to draw as
much as possible from the pool of the members of other political parties,
particularly, the ANPP and the Alliance for Democracy. A case in point on the
case of the AD is the continued movement of some of its members to the PDP in
recent times.
Smarting from the defeat it suffered
in Lagos State which the AD won overwhelmingly, the PDP in the state, in
conjunction with its South-West
zone led by Chief Olabode George braced up for the challenges of 2007 and has
been spreading its tentacles to bring into its fold, some of the member of the
AD. In recent times, the PDP had
won some members of the AD in the House of Representatives, and a former
chairman of Agege Local Government, Chief Enoch Ajibosho. Also, some top members of the AD are
being fingered as having joined the ruling party, with Senator Musiliu
Obanikoro leading the list.
With the PDP having dealt with the
AD by capturing five of the six states in the South-West, it appears the focus
on the ANPP is total and may do a lot of damage to it. At least, with the present situation
whereby Saminu Turaki, for instance, has resolved to decamp to the PDP, and
there are still more governors whose views and ideas tally with his, the
further weakening of the ANPP is only a matter of time. But how did the party which is
dominated largely by northerners get into its present situation?
Although there had been several
denial of a conflict in the party, the problem became public knowledgein the
first week of September, when the National Working Committee of the party
announced the suspension of the Sokoto State Governor, Alhaji Attahiru
Bafarawa, for alleged anti-party activities.
Before then, the national secretary
of the party, Alhaji Sanni El-Katuzu, had been suspended for his alleged role
in a N300 million bribery allegation against the national chairman, Chief Don
Etiebet. Some state executive
committees of the party were dissolved too.
In a retaliatory move, loyalists of
Governor Bafarawa announced the suspension of the national chairman, Chief Etiebet
and reinstated the national secretary of the party and the state executive
committee and named the deputy national chairman (North), Lt General Jeremiah
Useni, as acting national chairman.
The latest crisis that
has engulfed the party in recent times, according to investigation is hinged on
the resolve of some political hawks to hijack the ANPP to realise their
ambition of succeeding President Olusegun Obasanjo in 2007. Some insiders in
the ANPP have pointed out that Governor Bafarawa, by his actions have been
acting a script to hold the party in trust for Babangida, who seems to have
realised how near impossible it would be
for him to win the favour of PDP members in winning its ticket for the
next presidential election. In the
PDP, Babangida’s main opposition is the vice president whose group, the
Peoples Democratic Movement, has proved to be very strong and a factor in
determining some key issues in the party.
The plot by the IBB group to hijack
the party through Bafarawa and install its loyalist to run the party, sources
have said, is to enable IBB have a safe landing in case he fails to clinch the
ticket of the ruling party in view of the several odds that have starred him in
the face. For the proponent of this idea, it would be quite easy to achieve
this for Babangida only if the Don Etiebet-led executive is pushed out.
Our correspondent also
gathered that Bafarawa loyalists may also want to exploit the opportunity of
enriching themselves for the purpose of Bafarawa’s own political
ambition, but pretend to be hijacking the party for the interest of the Minna,
Niger State born general.
Known to be good in investing in the
future Bafarawa antecedent speaks for him. He was very prominent among the powers that installed
Etiebet in the first place. Although he is hiding under the pretence of having
his eyes on one of the senatorial seats in Sokoto come 2007, those who should
know said the claim was a diversionary tactics to keep probing eyes off his
real ambition, the Presidency.
While the plot to ease out the
Etiebet-led national executive of the party by Bafarawa and his co-travellers
began to gain momentum, other groups which were quick to read the signs also
got into action with desperate moves to checkmate him. One of such moves was the resistance of
the plot to have the party under the dominance of a group.
The latter group led by Admiral
Augustus Aikhomu, former vice-president to ex-president Babangida woke up early
enough to stop the alleged shenanigan by Bafarawa and his loyalists. Aikhomu did not hide his disgust
for the plan by Babangida, his former boss to destabilise a party they had
painstakingly built over the years.
Arguably, for the first time, he joined issues with the former president
and dismissed his alleged plan as not being enough to dismember the party. The Aikhomu group also
declared that Babangida should forget the idea of representing the party in the
presidential race come 2007 arguing that Babangida was not a member of ANPP.
“The issue of Ibrahim
Babangida should be put to rest.
He is a bonafide member of the PDP and will not be vying for the
Presidency on our ticket,” he said
While the gladiators in the
festering crisis continued to plot their ways of realising their ambition,
other stakeholders in the party were quick to recognise the danger of having the party factionalised and
they hurriedly put in place a peace committee to bring back sanity into the
fold.
Within a spate of two weeks, all the
seven governors of the All Nigeria People’s Party (ANPP) brainstormed all
night at the Yobe State Governor’s lodge, Asokoro in Abuja and agreed to
end the stalemate in the party’s rank. Yobe State Governor, Bukar Abba
Ibrahim spoke the mind of his colleagues when he said the group is determined
to reconcile all factions of the party, which he described as the only official
party with enough muscle to stand up to the ruling PDP’s move to remain
the dominant party in Nigeria politics.
Tried as they could, the
governors’ efforts seem not to be yielding the expected results as the
faction led by General Useni and the one loyal to governor Attahiru Bafarawa of
Sokoto State have continued to make a mess of whatever is determined to be
achieve by the governors.
The evidence that the Useni faction
is bent on disintegrating the party came at a time when the six ANPP governors
were meeting at the Rockview Hotel, Abuja with Etiebet and his group. The
Useni-led faction not only shunned the parley, it went ahead to the national
headquarters of the party in Abuja and forced themselves into the office of the
national chairman. Upon gaining
entrance, they roared in joy and shouted “up chair, up chair”. They later left for Sokoto to pledge loyalty to Bafarawa who was
under suspension by the National Working Committee.
The peace committee, after its
marathon session issued a no victor, no vanquished judgment and said the party
should return to status quo ante.
The verdict of the committee has
however not removed the fear that sthe party remains on the verge of
collapse. There are indications
that its non elective convention, schedule for December this year may not hold.
What fuelled this suspicion was the plans by three of the ANPP Governors to
dump the party for the ruling People’s Democratic Party
The three Governors are said to be
loyalist of the Vice-President,Alhaji Atiku Abubakar who is known to be highly
interested in succeeding his boss come 2007. Two of the three governors, Adamu
Aliero and Saminu Turaki are said to have concluded plans to join the PDP any
moment from now. The fear being entertained by some party faithful on the
chances that the December convention may not hold afterall is hinged on alleged
plans by the Useni group to hijack it and remove the Etiebet leadership. The
Bafarawa/Useni group are said to be banking on the fact that the Sokoto State
governor piloted the emergence of Etiebet through mere nomination where the
elective convention elements were totally absent. The calculation of the group
is that having installed the Etiebet faction in the first place it is not going
to pose an obstacle for its total take over of the party. They are therefore
waiting for the convention period to deal a fatal blow on the Etiebet
leadership. However, it is highly doubtful if the Bafarawa/Useni group has taken into consideration the
fact that some of the governors may go for the kill by planning to dump the
party in order to support their political mentor in the battle for Aso-rock.
The fear being entertained by Babangida loyalist is that the party may not be
as strong as it is expected to be should the governors go ahead with their
threat to dump the party.
Obviously, the action would weaken their plans to use it as alternative
in the event that their candidate fails to clinch the PDP ticket. .
Some political analysts are of the
opinion that the much touted idea of the Bafarawa/Useni group having an easy
run on the Etiebet group may not be a straight jacket thing as the group may
find Etiebet and the six governors that include, Ahmed Sanni Yerima of Zamfara
State, Saminu Turaki of Jigawa, Ali Modu Sheriff of Borno and Adamu Aliero of
Kebbi too formidable to dismiss in an electoral contest. The duo of Abba Bukar
Ibrahim and Ibrahim Skekarau of Kano State though have the peace project
uppermost in their minds, they have nonetheless played any partisan role for
anyone to place them among the two warring factions.
One thing that is very glaring
according to party loyalists is that all the six governors are not too
comfortable with the domineering influence of their Sokoto State counterpart
and are naturally bound to react to any move that will make them to be
subservient to a colleague. They
are not the type one to fold their arms while one of their own takes custody of
their collective efforts in building the All Nigeria People’s Party, the
six governors are said to be pulling resources together to battle the Bafarawa
group in the case that the
National Working Committee agrees on an elective convention.
Whichever form it takes and whatever
way it goes, the stage is set for the battle of the ANPP soul as some party
analysts said that part of Bafarawa’s plans is to stall further efforts
of former Head of State, General Mohammed Buhari, to contest for the presidency
again in 2007.
A section of the party sees Bafarawa
as indulging himself in anti-party activities. It is said that rather than for him to work for the
realisation of an ANPP presidency come 2007, his own ambition of having former
President, Ibrahim Babangida as president had beclouded his reasoning to the
extent that he could not even think of the implications of breaking the party.
Those who see the Bafarawa group as
capable of rocking the boat were quick to add that he controlled a large
followership in the party and that it would be very difficult to dislodge him
and his firm grip on the party machinery.
Unlike the rest of the ANPP
governors, Bafarawa is said to have invested time, resources and energy in the
party and at his prompting could draw from his goodwill to install anybody he
liked as the national chairman of the party.
They also said he was capable of
changing the non elective convention to an elective convention to actualise his
political goal for those who were sympathetic to the cause of ANPP. They posited that the party might not
be able to survive the battle in view of its magnitude. This argument is hinged on the fact the
some northerners in PDP are also fast jumping into the PDP ship.
The thinking of these people is that
rather than for ANPP to engage itself in the present battle, it should work
ahead to enlarge its membership and spread its tentacles beyond the North where
it enjoys some influence at present.
Many reason that the fact that the
party lost the two central states of Kogi and Kwara to the PDP should be enough
food for thought and serve as a deterrent from engaging itself in fruitless
ventures.
The political implication of ANPP
going under is also viewed as not too good for the political development of
Nigeria as it may leave the PDP to enjoying a near monopolistic position. With
the situations of thing however, it is difficult to predict where the pendulum
swing as the party face the acid test of its live,. It is no doubt, a battle for survival.
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