By Hamza Waziri.
According to a list released by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), no less than 12 gubernatorial candidates are vying for the seat of the governor of Niger State, in a state that is assumed by many as a two-party state system and by some estimates, a more or less one-party state system, as presently composed.
It will be hard to dispute the hypothesis that the state is no more than one or at most a two-party system going by the fact that you can hardly feel the presence of the opposition(s) in the state.
The tradition has always been winner takes all in Niger State, at least since the return of democracy in 1999 except in the year 2007 when the seats of the House of Assembly were shared almost equally between the then-ruling party, PDP, and the defunct Sen. David Umaru led All Nigerian Peoples Party (ANPP), which also won some Local Government Council elections.
Since the birth of Niger State in 1976, the opposition has never taken power from the ruling party until 2015 when APC ousted PDP, although history records that the legendary Alh. Alhassan Abubakar Badakoshi’s opposition party, Nigeria Peoples Party (NPP) beat Alh Awwal Ibrahim’s ruling party, the National Party of Nigeria (NPN) in the 1983 gubernatorial election, a victory that was only affirmed in the Supreme Court in 2003, 20 years after, and exactly 19 days after his(Badakoshi) death on the 16th March 2003.
So it is a safe bet that even though 12 candidates will be on the governorships ballot, only two parties, APC and PDP are expected to truly lock horns even though many thought New Nigerian People’s Party (NNPP) was going to be a third force until he fell short of expectations by getting embroiled in a leadership crisis.
The party leadership conducted another governorship primary, two months after the first one and at which purported rescheduled governorship primary election, held on Thursday 11/Aug 2022, at the Party’s state headquarters in Minna, it was revealed that Alh. Mohammed Idris Malagi, one of the APC governorship aspirants that lost to Hon. Mohammed Umaru Bago, who had not defected to any opposition party (even today he is not known to be officially or publicly a member of another party other than APC) was declared to have scored 124 votes out of the total number of votes cast by the same number of party delegates.
It was not at the time clear to a lot of Nigerlites when Malagi joined the party, why the party had to rerun the governorship primary election, and how many people participated in the contest.
Even though some of Malagi’s close allies came out and repudiated the claim that Malagi consented and contested in the Kangaroo election, the authentic flag bearer of NNPP, Alh. Mohammed Yahaya Ibrahim Sokodeke, stood his ground and resisted the hoax called primary election until INEC came out to inform the world that he was the only one recognized by the Electoral Commission.
Ever since then, the light of the would-be third force party keeps deeming, until the gubernatorial candidate and other elective candidates on the party’s platform have become largely powerless.
As for the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), ever since the power slipped out of its hand in 2015, the party’s strength has tapered off until it has been unable to abate the gale of defection.
Today, one can easily count the number of strong men and women remaining at the party. No doubt, the continuous weakening of the PDP or lack of strong opposition is advantageous to APC, but it is injurious to the state, because even the ruling party needs a formidable opposition to keep her in check.
Unfortunately, the last time we had a strong opposition voice in the state was when APC was in the opposition and in the early life of the party when she took control of the state as Sen. David Umaru was constantly speaking out even against his own party, and the former governor of the state, Dr Muazu Babangida Aliyu ‘shook the table’ when he alleged that the government of his successor Alh. Abubakar
Sani Bello mismanaged $181 million Islamic Development Bank (IDB) loan secured by his government but which only materialized when the APC government came on board, for the dualization of Bida/Minna road. He also accused the government of Bello of misappropriating the N N1. 4 billion his government had left behind for the abandoned five star hotel project in Minna, the state capital.
These two weighty allegations, especially, coming from the former governor, really got Nigerlites buzzing on social media and of course there were denials and counter accusations from the government’s side.
Since then the opposition has gone into hibernation, and even the PDP gubernatorial candidate, Alh. Liman Isah Kantigi has not been visible. Some sources close to his campaign organization however said he is quietly busy canvassing for votes at the rural areas.
Political pundits believe such a strategy may hold some benefits but it is certainly not good enough to uproot APC or defeat Bago as majority of the votes are in the major cities and towns, going by the analysis of the number of registered voters, especially as Bago is fully on ground in these cities and towns. They said our electoral process may be below par, but there has been tremendous improvement in the process thereby making rigging difficult, so, the battle ground has shifted to urban cities unlike what was obtainable in the past.
These analysts observed that beside the continuous reduction in the membership of the PDP, the bickering within the party among some members and the inability of the party leadership to pacify Hon. Mohammed Sani Idris Kutigi, one of the governorship aspirants who lost to Hon.
Liman Kantigi, enough to withdraw the case he filed against the party’s candidate, has dampened their chances of making any serious challenge, as nobody goes to war with a divided house.
They described the APC gubernatorial candidate, Hon. Mohammed Umaru Bago as an intelligent, skillful and smart Political General who knows his onions, adding that while PDP was acting as a novice party without clear direction, Bago and APC embarked on a reconciliation movement that brought the party into one fold (as it very rare in Nigeria to hold primary elections without grievances).
They said Bago’s reconciliation initiative killed three birds with one stone; first, he was able to make at least 70 percent of the aggrieved party members to sheath their swords; secondly, even though it was strictly a gathering of party faithfuls, It provided an opportunity to campaign to members; and lastly, the party members who had not met him before had the opportunity to do so and mostly these meeting changed the negative perspective they previously held about him.
Most analysts described Bago as a true leader and a serious candidate who is determined to win the election, and that by not waiting for the governor or the party to initiate reconciliation moves, and by holding meeting with some of the critical stakeholders of the society, he has managed to score some major marks.
The pundits concluded that Bago is the candidate to beat, and further declared that
Niger State is APC, and nothing would change from the present situation whereby all elective positions are occupied by the APC: the three senate seats, ten House of Reps seats, 25 out of 27 state Assembly seats and 24 out of 25 local government council seats, as well as majority of the councilor seats.
Therefore, it would be a high mountain to climb to wrest power from the hands of APC.
Some however, warned that with the council elections around the corner, and with the adoption of a consensus method of nominating flag bearers for the election, the outcome has to be well managed so that what Bago gained during the reconciliation movement is not affected.