John ODHE
The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) seems to have successfully prepared a fertile ground to woefully fail the 2023 presidential election which is less than two months from now.
The factors gravitating PDP’s seeming inevitable failure at the polls are quite obvious even though the political players are blind to them, therefore complimenting the proverbial saying that “who the gods want to kill they first make mad”.
One major reason the PDP is most likely going to lose the election is because the party seems to enjoy a repeat of ugly history.
Prior to the 2015 presidential election, the PDP which was too self confident and claimed to be the largest political party in Africa, boasted that it would lead Nigeria for 60 uninterrupted years. That was when it was just 16 years old as a ruling party.
Despite her boastfulness, the PDP made negative history in 2015 by becoming the first ruling party in Africa to lose an election to an opposition party.
The All Progressives Congress (APC) which was formed in less than a year to the 2015 presidential election defeated the then ruling party fair and square.
Before the election, political eagle eyes saw the PDP’s imminent fall coming and the party was duly forewarned, but they won’t listen.
A few months to the polls, aggrieved five state governors pulled out of the PDP, citing high-handedness on the part of the leadership of the party.
To the PDP then, the exit of five governors from its fold was as inconsequential as a bird that loses only one of its feathers, which cannot stop if from soaring.
The five governors and other aggrieved members who left the party to form the newPDP were neglected and left to do their worst until they helped to sink the former ruling party and made it an opposition player.
From all indications, the PDP is back on the threshold of facing presidential defeats, the third time in a row.
In 2019, the PDP under the presidential candidacy of the former vice president, Atiku Abubakar, suffered another defeat in the hands of the ruling APC led by President Muhammadu Buhari.
Despite the dismal performance of the APC at the centre of Nigerian governance as being adjudged in different quarters, the PDP’s approach to the forthcoming presidential election does not suggest that they are out to take advantage of the APC’s adjudged non- performance, to win.
They seem to have carved an opening for a repeat of a repugnant political history. For instance, another G-5 governors scenario is glaringly playing out in the PDP with no sight to an end of the political quandary that is fast consuming the once great party.
The Wike Factor
Governor Nyesom Wike of Rivers State is leading the G5 governors splinter group and he is unpretentious about it. Other members of the group include Seyi Makinde of Oyo state, Samuel Ortom, Benue state, Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi, Enugu state and Okezie Ikpeazu of Abia State.
Wike, who aspired for the PDP presidential ticket but lost to Atiku has drawn a battle line against his party and his grouse is double-headed. On one hand, he feels betrayed by his co-South-South governors all of whom had reportedly agreed to support a southern presidential candidate for the next election but turned against him at the eleventh hour.
Wike believes that the north, having ruled the country for the past eight years, should allow power return to the south for the sake of equity and fairness.
On the other hand, Wike and his co- travellers have been demanding, to no avail, the resignation of Iyiocha Ayu, the PDP national chairman who is from the north where Atiku Abubakar, the party’s presidential candidate hails from.
Egbona Partners NGO On Free Health Services For Abi/Yakurr People
A few days ago, Wike told the people of Rivers state on the governorship election in Rivers state they should vote the candidate of the PDP but in the presidential, he was going to give a directive on who to vote for. That indeed speaks volume.
They are of the opinion that Ayu should step aside for a southerner to emerge as the party’s national chairman since Atiku is from the north. The G5 has vowed not to shift grounds until their demands are granted.
Ayu and his backers are obstinate. The heavens will rather fall than for Ayu to resign his national chairmanship.
Time is not on the side of the PDP, as it were. They are obviously going into the battle with a severally punctured and perforated umbrella, not minding the danger such situation in an election that promises to be the most competitive election in the history of Nigeria. Can they put their house in other before the Election Day?
