PDP’s art of (mis) managing defeat

Words from a verse in the song ‘The Boxer’ by Simon and Garfunkel in the ‘70sAhmadu Adamu Mu’azu is the boxer, and a fighter by his trade. The scars of all the pummelling that the All Progressives Congress gave the Peoples Democratic Party at the 2015 elections are all over him, reminders of every defeat […]

Words from a verse in the song ‘The Boxer’ by Simon and Garfunkel in the ‘70s
Ahmadu Adamu Mu’azu is the boxer, and a fighter by his trade. The scars of all the pummelling that the All Progressives Congress gave the Peoples Democratic Party at the 2015 elections are all over him, reminders of every defeat the ruling party in Nigeria suffered shamefully.
Did he cry out ‘I am leaving, I am leaving’ and is the fighter still remaining in his anger and his shame?
In Jigawa State, outgoing Niger State Governor Mu’azu Babangida Aliyu, bemoaning the debacle, pointed out that it only stood to reason that National Chair Ahmadu Adamu Mu’azu took full responsibility for the failure of the Party and resigned. Chief Servant Babangida argued that it is standard practice in democracies, that when the type of defeat that PDP suffered ever occurred, the Chairman took all the blame and quite. He quickly cited the United Kingdom incident, when the Chairman of the Labour Party announced he was quitting, taking the blame for the colossal defeat the party suffered. This is where the issue lies. Hs the Peoples’ Democratic Party conducted itself in any manner akin to how political parties conducted themselves in functional democracies? If it never operated by this norm, it is hardly thinkable is it not, that Ahmadu Adamu Mu’azu would so do in these times?
Thus with the passage of each day, PDP stalwarts, acting like fighting prostitutes, spill the beans on one another. In the run up to the election, Chairman Mu’azu did raise alarms about his fears that the election would be lost if the campaigns went on the way they were going. He was reported to have publicly urged the President to call the First Lady Patience Goodluck Jonathan to order, charging that the language coming from her, Presidential spokesmen Doyin Okupe, Femi Fani-Kayode, and Dr Doyin Okupe, was setting parts of the country irretrievably against the president. Now in the brickbats of flying accusations and counter accusations, the nation is being treated to embarrassing revelations about the misdeeds that led the party to this monumental failure.
This is not the way a defeat is handled. The Leader in this case, the president, needed to call all stakeholders and comfort them, blaming himself for the loss. Since he can no longer resign, he is to chart a way forward towards recovery. In dignity and honour, the end can play out and restructuring for the rejuvenation of the Party can start. It is not as if new party leaders will be manufactured, but rather, it is the same victims of this failure, albeit self-inflicted, that will rise to the challenges of rebirth.
Is it any secret why the PDP lost the election?
In January 2014, when Ahmadu Adamu Mu’azu emerged PDP National Chairman by “consensus”, I asked in this column if he was one more Chairman to bite the dust. I took a look at the party’s standing as the “Game Changer” was taking over in words that do not ring hollow even today.
“For Bamanga Tukur as Chairman, many challenges were clear and present. There was and to date, no internal democracy in the party, let alone any level playing field for the opposition. What and who the president wants, the party gives, and this is replicated in the states where the governors hold sway as the be-all-and-end-all. The governors determined the state party executive, just as they did whoever contested and won any elective office from state assembly to the House of Representatives and the Senate. The third tier – the Local Governments had been compromised and nullified so to speak. Thus by hook or by crook, the ruling party had installed a one party participatory democracy in the land.
Economically, the numbers pointed to a performing economy with growth of 7 per cent, and should have made Nigeria happy, but indicators spoke differently and still do.
Poverty and the skewed revenue allocation formula have caused a dangerous regional dichotomy, making it easy for the president to be unpopular in the North. Clearly the North is grossly so disfavoured that to accept the status quo is to await sudden political upheaval and doom, that will not augur well for the continued sustenance of the Nigerian dream.
The security situation was also a challenge for which President Jonathan lost popularity in the North, for admitting he had Boko Haram agents in his government, and yet did not arrest them. The handling of insecurity caused and has worsened the low Northern esteem for President Jonathan.
The defined expectation is for People’s Democratic Party to win the 2015 election and as of importance, return President Goodluck Jonathan to another term. Against the challenges enumerated here can and will Chairman Ahmadu Adamu Mu’azu deliver? That was in January 2014! How then could Ahmadu Adamu Mu’azu alone take the rap for the defeat, when the situation I described above had remained the same, if not even worse? Mu’azu was just another one to bite the dust. Others include all the party’s demigods that fought each other for the shine of the countenance of favour from President Goodluck Jonathan, misdirecting him to lead the party to its failure. The few who spoke bluntly and truthfully were demonised and ostracised till only the brave and sincere remained. What PDP lost, APC gained.