Fate of PDP

After its loss at the federal level and its not too impressive showing in most of the states, especially in the northern part of the country, there has been an avalanche of defections to the APC. And the fear is that if this trend continues, by 2019 the party will be a gaunt shadow of […]

After its loss at the federal level and its not too impressive showing in most of the states, especially in the northern part of the country, there has been an avalanche of defections to the APC. And the fear is that if this trend continues, by 2019 the party will be a gaunt shadow of its former all-conquering self. Apart from the Senate President David Mark who said that he will not defect to any other party even if it means he will remain the last man standing in the party, it looks like everyone in that once dominant party is ready to defect if given the slightest excuse or incentive. Today, the story of the PDP is that although its body is still very much alive, its spirit and soul have departed from it.
I am not feeling sorry for the PDP. I am just being concerned about the fate of Nigeria if she once again goes back to the era of a one party state as was the case when the PDP     used to hold sway. The APC is made up of human beings and not angels. If it finds that it has effectively replaced PDP, it will behave just as arrogantly and with impunity as the PDP used to behave. Let us note that the APC is made up of Nigerians, most of whom were once top notches of the PDP. We cannot afford to replace one sort of one-party dominance or dictatorship, if you will, with another form of it. Even if APC is made up of angels, as Chinua Achebe once noted, no one should welcome the dictatorship of even angels.
When you take a critical look at the disastrous fall of the PDP you have every cause to feel concerned. With the loss of the centre, its source of finance is severely cut off. And even more alarmingly, there is no one with the charisma, the conviction, the commitment and the war chest to rebuild the party to provide constructive opposition to the APC. After leading the party to its first and most disastrous loss in 16 years, President Jonathan will not be willing to associate too deeply with the party. Former VP Atiku Abubakar would have been relied upon to do it but he said recently that he will not leave the APC for anywhere else again.
And the fire has gone out of veteran politician Chief Tony Anenih. Another respected Nigerian and PDP bigwig T.Y. Danjuma cannot be summoned now to undertake the arduous task of rebuilding the party. The uncommon governor Godswill Akpabio will go the senate. Unless he elects to forfeit his seat, he cannot be recruited to undertake a job that demands full time attention. The lot, then, would seem to fall on outgoing Jigawa governor Sule Lamido, that is, if his heart is still with the party.
Lamido has what it takes to provide leadership for the PDP. He is after all one of the party’s founding fathers. Even when its many acts of impunity led to the defection of five of its governors to the opposition party, leading to its eventual fall, Lamido decided that he cannot leave the house he helped to build on the basis  of some misunderstanding normal in all political parties but that he would rather remain to fight from inside. Lamido is also a battle tested political veteran who knows Nigerian politics inside out.  With the possible exception of Atiku Abubakar, there is no Nigerian politician who has political friends and associates from all parts of the country more than him.
But looking at the situation on the ground, I think that if the PDP is to have a fighting chance for survival and to give the APC a run for its money in 2019, Sule Lamido should not be recruited for the national chairmanship. Rather, it he who should be groomed to be the party’s presidential candidate for 2019. As things stand today, any attempt to have the PDP presidential candidate for 2019 come from the south will provide a dangerous scenario for the country. The APC would be seen as a northern Muslim party and the PDP a southern Christian party. We cannot survive such a sharp division.
Given the character of Nigerian politicians who do not play politics of ideology or conviction, there is no hope of any possible realignment before the 2019 general election tom infuse life into the PDP. That may be feasible only if there is some monumental mistake on the part of the APC that would cause the type of disaffection that led to the exodus of heavyweights from the PDP to other parties and which resulted to its eventual decline and fall. Since Nigeria has somehow evolved to a strong two-party system, we should seek for a balance of forces so that one can act as a check on the excesses of the other. We need competitive elections in which outcomes cannot be easily predictable. That is the only way the cause of the nation would be served.
It does appear that as a man of principle, Buhari as a person has recognized the wrongness of the current gale of defection from the sinking PDP boat to the APC and has said that he will not reward those who so casually betray their party because it experienced some setback, with some significant appoint-ments. But there is no politician who really wants a strong opposition who can threaten him or his party in an election if he can help it, he will only want a weak opposition that would only serve to legitimize his government.
In the course of time, many in the APC are likely to persuade Buhari to reward decampees from the PDP in order to deplete its ranks and make the APC a strong vote-harvesting machine in the mould of the former PDP. With such a prospect Nigeria would be the loser.