APC Failure in Taraba State Gubernatorial Election, a consequence of Tyranny and Impunity
By Olumuyiwa Onlede
April 03, 2023
It is a known fact that healthy party politics depends importantly on a free flow of information among party leadership, party members and candidates for public offices. The right to speak and be heard in the merit of the complaints whenever one arises within any process leading to every election is a major determinant to how well a party will perform in a general elections.
Conflict itself is not a detriment to any party performance in any election, but how best, capable and willing the leadership of the party is in managing the said conflict is what determines how best party members will showcase their strength in the field for the overall victory of the party in any pool.
Looking at events leading to the Primaries in Taraba State chapter of the All Progressives Congress (APC) especially the Gubernatorial primaries that never legitimately held in the first and second instances but had a legally contestable candidate in both instances, both members of the party and those outside of it will not believe less that APC Taraba State Chapter was programmed to fail at the pools as orchestrated by the National leadership of the party under the leadership of Senator Abdullahi Adamu whose interest as showcased in his connivance with Senator Emmanuel Bwacha ruined the golden chance and opportunity to foster a common unity among APC members in other to form a long awaited competent and people’s oriented government in Taraba State as envisaged by the people of the state who are downtrodden and had been beaten to abject poverty in the midst of plenty resources in their land due to incompetence, bad governance and incapability of PDP led government in the state.
Before February,2022 when Senator Bwcha joined APC through the back door ,Taraba APC had a handful of Competent, visionary and purposeful leaders aspiring to lead the state to the promise land and of course their capacity is not in any way in doubt looking at their antecedent, for example Chief David Sabo Kente with his unblemished record in the public service and private sector, Senator Yusuf Abubakar Yusuf representing Taraba Central in the red chamber of the national assembly since 2015 to mention a few among the numerous hands wishing to liberate the state from bad leadership of yesteryears.
The hope of the people of Taraba getting their desired kind of Governor became dimed in the month of February, 2022 when Senator Bwacha one of the nemesis of the people decided to seek refuge in APC from PDP in a bid to save his dwindling political career and finally the hope of having good leadership in place in Taraba State was dashed when it was obvious that the National Chairman of the APC, Senator Abdullahi Adamu was involved in an unholy alliance to install an unpopular Senator Bwacha as the gubernatorial candidate of APC, what an irony, all the plans manifested with the declaration of Senator Bwacha as APC candidate in a primary that never held and subsequent disobedience to the order and judgement of the supreme court by conducting a kangaroo primaries in February 2022 without any legal backing, yet again they returned Senator Bwacha against the wish of party members and the people of Taraba State who are in dire need of a change of governance and ideas in government house solely for the benefit of the people.
The elections may have come and gone, but the pains and anguish to be felt by the people for the next four years still and will continue to be the concern of patriotic sons and daughters of Taraba State who are averse to the happenings in the State. It is no doubt that the people have long awaited Chief David Sabo Kente to take the mantle of leadership in the state so as to save the state from total collapse both in infrastructure and human capacity a situation that calls for great concern among all asundry.
If good governance must have a place in Taraba State and Nigeria as a whole, we must start looking at politics in a modern perspective i.e our politics must be a politics of the people and it must be a politics of competition of ideas which will give those that aspire to lead us the opportunity to put their antecedent and life in the court of public opinion for the people to scrutinize and have a choice and a say about those that governs them instead of been made to elect unpopular leaders that is foisted on them through undemocratic party arrangements.
All hope is not lost all that the people of Taraba State needs is perseverance for another four years as we believe in the capacity of Chief David Sabo Kente to bounce back and form holy alliance with lovers of the state to rescue her from the shenanigans of the people whose agenda is to keep the state and her people in abject poverty in order to continually manipulate them for their own selfish interest to the detriment of the people.
2027 general election hold another stake in the live of the people and for that reason the job starts now for the total liberation of Taraba State through no other person than Chief David Sabo Kente.
Comrade Olumuyiwa Onlede
Executive Director
Citizens Awareness Against Corruption and Social Vices Initiative (CAACASVI)
Writes from Abuja