APC, G-5 merger: Will bubble burst?

Not only has the merger of the three main opposition parties been successfully completed to form the All Progressives Congress (APC), five of the G-7 governors who rebelled against the PDP noisily have also joined the new party. Furthermore, reports said former Vice President Atiku Abubakar’s Peoples Democratic Movement (PDM), hitherto a major chunk in […]

Not only has the merger of the three main opposition parties been successfully completed to form the All Progressives Congress (APC), five of the G-7 governors who rebelled against the PDP noisily have also joined the new party. Furthermore, reports said former Vice President Atiku Abubakar’s Peoples Democratic Movement (PDM), hitherto a major chunk in the PDP, is also considering merging with APC. In the first place, instead of evolving an ideologically distinct new party the merger seems to have produced a party that is very much like the one it seeks to replace. Needless to say, the choice of an alternative government will hardly be significant to the electorate where politics is not based on issues that are predicated on divergent ideologies and policies. 
Anyway, as a result of all these developments arch political rivals in some parts of the country have now found themselves within the new ‘mega’ party. For instance, Gov. Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso and Malam Ibrahim Shekarau in Kano; and Gov. Aliyu Magatakarda Wammako and Alhaji Attahiru Baffarawa in Sokoto, are once again in the same boat and not only are they supposed to see eye-to-eye but dine and laugh together. Well, will that ever be possible? Will these marriages of necessity and convenience at state and federal levels work? Will the development usher in the much-clamoured change in the way this country is being run? Or will there be upheavals in the new mega party, in such a way that the great expectation of Nigerians will be dashed?
If truth must be told, I am a bit pessimistic about it all, but I’m not a prophet of doom. I will not tell you what I fear just yet. I therefore join well-meaning Nigerians in welcoming the development. It is good; we need a formidable opposition party that the people of Nigeria can always change to when the one in power fails. We need to be able to upset the apple cart of a sit-tight party that decides to, by hook or by crook, remain in power whether it is doing well or not, and whether the people have voted for it or not.
However, we have to be realistic; we have to ask ourselves how practicable it is for rivals such as Kwankwaso and Shekarau to eschew their long-standing political rivalry overnight and move on as if nothing has happened. So much has indeed happened between some of them, as we all know, and it has been painful to both sides.
Don’t tell me that the leadership of the APC has assured that the political interests of all the persuasions within it would adequately be taken care of. Don’t tell me also that Buhari has come out to deny and assuage the fears that he has planned with someone to hoist his anointed candidate for the governorship election in Kano state. That is all political talk; and in politics you say one thing and do another.
In my view, the conglomeration of these parties has its merits and demerits. But unfortunately, I think the demerits outweigh the merits. The main problem to me is the way we do politics in Nigeria. I think the political actors will most likely mar this new political alignment that we all now embrace which, as some people say, has to happen in order to save the country from a certain doom.
One sure source of dispute, which is a recipe for disaster, is the agreement reached between APC leaders and the G-5 governors, as revealed by Gov. Murtala Nyako of Adamawa state shortly after joining the party. The party structures in the states, he said, would be taken over and controlled by the governors as party leaders. Hence, where you have a haughty and uncompromising party leader with autocratic tendencies it will certainly not take long before a serious conflict begins. Why not? It would be a typical case of a tenant bossing the landlord, or tail wagging the dog.
The tragedy that is lurking, therefore, is that the crisis that may ensue in APC will be, if allowed to occur, on grander scale than what we are now witnessing in PDP. Only the naïve will be skeptical of this. Just cast your mind to the past and review relationships of some actors, not only in Kano and Sokoto, and see what I mean. Then, if this is the case, what can we do to avert it? While religionists may say what can be done is simple if we return to God’s way, it may be something BIG for some politicians. This is because it has something to do with ethics.
There is a glimmer of hope, though, as I have seen in the 10-point mission statement of a group known as “Kano APC Forum for Equity and Justice” contained in the programme of events for a Sensitization Workshop organized in Kano recently. I hope all the beautiful ideals enunciated there will not in due course be trampled on like with “iron boots,” and things will work out in the interest of all in the end.
And when the elections finally come in less than two years time, we will see whether the so-called Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) will act according to the conscience of its leaders and be a truly impartial umpire. We will then see if it has learned its lessons from the Anambra debacle, or whether it will again blame some election officials for “messing” it up, the kind of messing up it will not go back on but proceed to impose election riggers in power again.
May those who prevaricated over their defection to the APC not go back on their word but remain and work assiduously for the success of the party. May they not promote factionalism but strive to reconcile conflicting interests within the party. Only then would the bubble not burst and there will, hopefully, be light at the end of the tunnel. Then the struggle for good governance in Nigeria under APC may one day succeed, hopefully in 2015. And then the people’s tears will be wiped as they ultimately experience better days ahead – so help us God.
Muhammad, former Editor-in-Chief of Triumph Newspapers, wrote from Hotoro Quarters, Tarauni LGA, Kano <[email protected]>