Has this fang the requisite venom?
One of the strategies devised by the gladiators was the constitution of a consensus committee under Malam Adamu Ciroma, with the sole mission to select one, out of the four aspirants from the north clearly, to avoid the disadvantage of divided votes at the primary election. Ciroma told the world that the ultimate choice of […]
One of the strategies devised by the gladiators was the constitution of a consensus committee under Malam Adamu Ciroma, with the sole mission to select one, out of the four aspirants from the north clearly, to avoid the disadvantage of divided votes at the primary election.
Ciroma told the world that the ultimate choice of the committee would “surprise” and “excite” Nigerians! Who, among General Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida, General Aliyu Muhammed Gusau, Dr. Bukola Abubakar Saraki or, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar would “surprise” or “excite” the excited, waiting Nigerians?
After the ding dong, a decision was taken. But the questions many are asking are: is this the fangs we all have been so afraid of? Does this fang contain the requisite venom to knock off a sitting president?
Many observers predicted that Arewa was going to bring forth General Babangida. The thinking was hinged on the fact that the man has an aura of awe and myth around him; his name is a household one in all nooks and crannies of the country. IBB is one Nigerian who is seen as an enigma and believed to be endowed with political sagacity, audacity and one with legendary generosity, goodwill, friends and followership in all parts of the country. These attributes should easily translate into political advantage for him, so calculated political pundits. It was therefore thought that the consensus committee would settle for him as none of the other aspirants possessed his chest of arsenal needed against a sitting and obstinately determined president in the all – important battle for the PDP’s presidential ticket.
Ciroma proved us all wrong by ditching him. Was it pay back time for IBB for the “sin” he committed way back in 1992 when as military president, he annulled the primary election of the defunct NRC which Ciroma looked set to win?
The Arewa–led committee was also widely speculated to look at General Aliyu Gusau as the choice who would excite Nigerians. A highly respected intelligence officer who has served three heads of state, including President Jonathan, as National Security Adviser, no one should have been better considered as the man the rest of Nigerians would have excitedly embraced in view of the myriad of security challenges currently facing the country. If the consensus committee also wanted to avoid the choice of a candidate with a huge baggage of controversy, Gusau was the ideal pick of the basket given his seeming unblemished record and gentleman posture. Moreover, who amongst the four should have been the best to complete the anticipated two–term tenure of late President Umaru Musa Yar’ Adua but General Aliyu Muhammed Gusau who hails from the same North–west geo–political zone as our late president?
Dr. Bukola Abubakar Saraki was also highly rated and permutated to emerge as the consensus of the north on several grounds. Thoroughly educated, being a medical doctor and a post–independence child, Bukola was perceived as the excellent answer of Arewa to the emerging national and indeed global preference for generational change and sound education in the choice of political leaders. His widely applauded achievements as governor of Kwara State was also anticipated to endear him to the consensus committee as a credible material from Arewa to the rest of the country.
Being a Yoruba–speaking minority of the north, Ciroma’s committee was speculated by many discerning observers to take into account, the salient fact that the choice of Saraki would have also put to rest the perception among the minority groups in the north and people of the south of the country, that the Hausa/Fulani majority is in reality, the political definition of Arewa. That is beside the great opportunity the choice of Bukola would have offered the north to reward the grand old Senator Olusola Saraki, the Turaki of Ilorin, for all that he has done for Arewa in particular and Nigeria in general. But then, the wise is more far–sighted and discerning.
The choice of Alhaji Atiku Abubakar must have been informed by the panel’s appraisal of his experience in the country’s politics since the 1990s. A man of stupendous wealth, the man is well known for lavish spending in pursuit of his political ambitions. Atiku would, therefore, appear to the panel of wise men as the most appropriate of the four to give Jonathan “a run for his money.”
Adamu Ciroma and his fellow wise men would want to flaunt the political antecedents of Atiku Abubakar as glowing credentials of a democra who fought against Obasanjo’s Third Term, battle that led to several legal and constitutional reforms. But to his critics, Atiku’s political career merely depicts the credentials of obsession and over ambition. Beside, Ciroma’s Arewa and the handlers of Atiku must tighten their girdle for the herculean task of selling to the PDP delegates, an aspirant who is not accepted in his home.
Just as it remains to be seen how the Yoruba race would be swung from their age – old attribute of critical and principled stand on matters of choice of political leaders on the bait of, “he is the husband of our daughter.” Therein seems to lie the wisdom of Ciroma’s panel of wise men but, to many of us, Arewa might have once again, brutally shot itself on the foot.
Ibrahim Adeleke writes from Yakubu Gowon Crescent, Asokoro – Abuja