As politicking for the 2011 elections comes alive, former president, Olusegun Obasanjo and E.K. Clark are pitted against each other for the attention of President

Goodluck Jonathan President Goodluck Jonathan is caught in the middle as his disparate godfathers pull at his helm. It is one of the key battles the former vice president who hopes to run for office next year has to contend with, as the race gets closer. President Jonathan has always been seen as a protege of former military head of state and later civilian president Olusegun Obasanjo. The former president has missed no opportunity to recount what is public knowledge, that as president he advanced the political career of Jonathan. He had complained to an aide that, “who is Jonathan? I made him governor, vice president and president, but the boy is behaving like he has forgotten his history!” The former president’s anger is that Jonathan has been trying desperately to distance himself from him.

That decision to do so, say sources, is the product of two main characters in Jonathan’s new political life, the Ijaw leader Chief Edwin Clark and the chairman of the Presidential Advisory Council, General Theophilus Danjuma (retired). Both men have made it clear to Jonathan that he must chart his path away from Obasanjo’s and avoid his political baggage. The former president has been uncomfortable with the way Chief Clark has carried on like he made Jonathan the president, telling one aide that, “where was Clark when I was fighting battles to make this boy the president?”

Though Jonathan has taken no discernible action to indicate that he is no longer Obasanjo’s handyman, and is in fact still doing everything to please the former president, it is apparent that the retired Army General can read the writing on the wall. Some recent events have convinced Obasanjo that his ‘boy’ has grown wings. One of these was when he wanted to see Jonathan at Aso Rock during the search to find a new chairman for the ruling Peoples’ Democratic Party, PDP. Obasanjo had driven into the presidential villa to meet with Jonathan, a process that was previously commonplace. This time the president was in a meeting and sent words to Obasanjo that he was in a meeting and would see him later. The former president who also had Senate President David Mark with him was incensed and left the villa. Sources say it is unlikely that Jonathan snubbed the former president; rather, the situation is that Obasanjo considered it belittling to be told to wait. Yet, at the time, both PDP leaders were on different pages on who should be supported as the new chairman of the party, so Jonathan may have found a way to avoid Obasanjo’s haranguing.

Obasanjo never wanted Chief Okwesilieze Nwodo to succeed Victor Ogbulafor as PDP chairman. At least the one thing he could agree on with Jonathan is that Ogbulafor should be sacked. Nwodo was the secretary when Obasanjo was president and sanctioned his sack in 2003 and subsequent trial for fraud. He views him as too independent, arrogant and one who will not give the former president the chance to play ‘god’ in the party. Obasanjo preferred former minister and retired Army General Ike Nwachukwu as the lesser of two evils. His first choice, former Education minister and Ebonyi governor Dr. Sam Egwu, was not even on the cards. Sources say Obasanjo tried desperately to have Jonathan back his position but the president chose a different route, egged on by the governors and other leaders who want to see Obasanjo’s role in the party diminished. The former president is currently the chairman of the Board of Trustees and to drive home his point that he does not support the Nwodo chairmanship, Obasanjo is not playing the pivotal role he used to play at party meetings, some of which he has found excuses to avoid. Last month, Obasanjo was at his vindictive best. A man not known to mask his emotions, the former president gave the current one a cool reception when they met at Uyo. Obasanjo was guest of Governor Godswill Akpabio, the Akwa Ibom State governor who was hosting President Jonathan during a two – day official visit. When Jonathan stretched his hand to greet Obasanjo, the former president took it calmly but maintained a straight face; he made no comments. Throughout that visit, Obasanjo was taciturn, refusing to play any active part in the activities.

The former president told a select audience at his home in Abeokuta that Jonathan is carrying on like he has found new friends, especially among the governors and a few ethnic leaders like Clark. “Suddenly, the whole thing has been reduced to an Ijaw agenda, with other South South ethnic groups as co-travellers, threatening, shouting and promising hell for anyone who opposes Jonathan, and Baba does not like this”, one close aide of the former president told Armada. “You know if there is one thing you cannot blame Baba for is ethnicity; he is not an ethnicist and despises people who want to rise to power on the ethnic level”, he adds.

Obasanjo’s barbs are directed at Clark, who since Jonathan ascended the presidency has virtually relocated to a palatial home in Maitama, Abuja. Clark’s fortunes have changed tremendously since Jonathan became the substantive president in March. Interestingly, that home was presented to him as a gift by the late President Umaru Yar’Adua for his role in getting the Niger Delta militants to the negotiating table. In that house he holds court and from there has engineered the hounding into exile of former Delta State governor James Ibori and attempts to install a new governor in the state next year. In June on the occasion of his 82nd birthday President Jonathan held a dinner for Clark in the Villa, a function that attracted the cream of the political class to behold this new godfather. One observer described the dinner as Clark’s Inauguration as a political force. To members of his political family, the dinner was fitting given that Obasanjo and previous presidents have even honoured lesser chiefs, kings and politicians. Clark is revered in the Ijaw states of Rivers, Delta and Bayelsa and his stance on anti-corruption, though selective, finds support in Delta State. He is Ijaw of an Urhobo mother and so can claim a wider ethnic base in the region, yet he will need more than the zone to play the ultimate godfather. That title may well be for Obasanjo. The former president has no cult following but what he lacks in that ethnic base he has aplenty in street wisdom, the guile of a military general and experience on the national political stage.

Jonathan would need a few lessons. Since he came into office the president has been playing the appeaser, as one observer put it. He is visiting states, trying to make alliances and has generally not come across as a forceful president. That last point is what scares Obasanjo. The former president may not just desire the good of Jonathan but may just be scared for his own fate, if the president loses control of the political establishment. Having assured himself that he had installed Yar’Adua to watch his back, Obasanjo was surprised how the ailing president who later died was held hostage by a combination of forces, many of whom are his enemies, including Ibori. Soon, he was persona non grata in Aso Rock. That changed momentarily when Jonathan became Acting President. Now, fresh forces are seizing control of the new man.

But those close to the president say people who think they know the man do not know him. Though he is close to Clark, an aide of the president says Jonathan is fiercely independent. “The one thing you won’t find him do is take panicky decisions. If you recall, many people have been clamouring that he should change service chiefs. The president does not think there is a need for that. He wants people to know that the system can operate without all these panicky, excitable announcements that do not add value”. Indeed, Jonathan told his audience at a banquet organized for him by Governor Alao-Akala when he visited Oyo State, that “I remember when I was made Acting President so many people advised that I should remove the service chiefs because they will remove me the next day. I told them that look, we are still hoping that Nigeria will stabilize politically. “First is for the democratic system to stabilize and if I had removed the service chiefs as Acting President, which I could have done by mere pronouncement, and all of them would have left, but my conscience will begin to prick me and I would not be comfortable; but let me leave them even at the expense of my own position and if by God’s grace we succeed Nigeria will say at least politically we have stabilized”. Obasanjo was at that dinner but sources say he thinks differently of Jonathan’s decision.

Obasanjo’s quarrel with Jonathan may not affect his support of the president to run in the 2011 election. The former president has maintained that Jonathan is free to run despite the zoning arrangement in the PDP, a position that Northern politicians are yet to concede. By the PDP zoning arrangement, the north should produce the party’s candidate at the election, but with Jonathan’s incumbency factor, that is becoming difficult to justify. Northerners say they are being shortchanged since they supported the zoning policy that gave Obasanjo, a Southerner, a two-term ticket. Now, since Yar’Adua died, power has gone back to the south. Northern politicians believe that they can win a free election if they mobilize on ethnic sentiments.

They may but even the Northern Governors Forum that met on July 27 to take a decision on the zoning could not reach a consensus. Reports say while ten of the 17 PDP governors supported the zoning, seven opposed it, giving an indication that they may throw their weight behind Jonathan at the primaries. At the South South governors and political leaders meeting in Port Harcourt a day earlier, the support for Jonathan was unanimous ..

Still, the president will not get a smooth sail back into the Villa. The permutations of the contending forces for the presidency next year indicate that the landslides of the past may not be easy to reenact, especially if the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, conducts a fair poll. On the PDP, the Jonathan – Namadi Sambo ticket is expected to be maintained. The north will produce one main candidate expected to be Abubakar Atiku and spoilers in the form of Ibrahim Babangida and Ibrahim Shekarau. Sources say agreeing on a tentative unity candidate is one of the sore points of the northern opposition. The governors and elders had reportedly advised the many candidates posturing to run to trim their egos and settle for a common candidate. One source said that candidate may be Atiku after preliminary talks. He is believed to have a wider pan-Nigeria political base, less hated and more likely to be welcomed than Babangida, the former military president who annulled the June 12, 1993 election. The candidates plan to turn the South West and South East into political battlegrounds. Atiku is being linked with asking former Abia governor Orji Uzor Kalu to be his deputy. Kalu is seeking accommodation in the PDP after running his PPA political group aground. Interestingly, the governor of Atiku’s home state Adamawa, Admiral Murtala Nyako (retired), neither supports the former vice president’s return to the party nor the zoning argument.

Babangida’s aides are doing battle in the South West using acolytes like Ogun State governor Gbenga Daniel and whatever is left of the late Adedibu political stock in Ibadan. On a good day the former military president should be able to count on several states across the country where he has sown political seeds over the years to yield fruit, but the allegiances have since proven to be fluid and driven by the immediate self-interest of the actors. It is a major challenge that makes the 2011 race open for now.

His entry into the political space may not be forceful, but Nuhu Ribadu is being watched as to what role he will play in the transition. The former EFCC boss was widely expected to take up a job with the Jonathan government, but he says no offer was made to him. The president himself has admitted to aides that he was amused when some newspapers reported that he was going to make Ribadu an anti – crime czar after smoothening the process that enabled the retired police officer to return to Nigeria. Ribadu, who admitted to this magazine that he has political ambition, is being touted as a possible presidential candidate of the Democratic Front for Peoples Federation, DFPF, a party promoted by the Nobel Literature laureate Professor Wole Soyinka. Some sources aver that the DFPF may enter into an alliance with the Action Congress and other ‘progressive parties’ and put Ribadu forward as presidential candidate. If that happens, it is hoped that given the popularity he enjoys for his work at the EFCC, Ribadu will make appreciable impact and perhaps in a free and fair poll, get elected and begin the ‘transformation of Nigeria’.

Yet it is a prospect some observers dismiss given the way the late iconic lawyer and Human Rights activist Chief Gani Fawehinmi was mercilessly defeated when he set up his party and ran for president in 2003. That defeat, though, was attributed to the rigging that defined the elections of that time; hopefully, this will be different.

Yet those close to Ribadu say he has not made up his mind where to run and on which platform. His friend and associate Nasir el-Rufai is a PDP member and had joined the party’s reform group after returning to Nigeria, hoping to get a footing in the party. That group has since lost relevance. Both friends may wish that they could get the behemoth behind them. Getting the PDP base is a major point for all contestants. The reason is that the PDP has a solid structure across the states and even where the electoral umpire promises a free poll, many parties do not have the resources to campaign and sell their programmes; PDP has both the men and the money.

So with Jonathan in pole-position, how will the challengers claim the platform? That is the challenge confronting Atiku, Babangida and other aspirants. The key is Nwodo, the chairman. According to one politician, the chairman can drive the process toward his preferred candidate. Though a product of the South East PDP governors, Nwodo’s nomination eventually had the backing of Jonathan to sail through. Obasanjo had told a few friends that he fears for Jonathan because he sees Nwodo as being too close to Atiku. It is one of the worries of the ex-president as he watches his protégé battle to run his first race and win his first battle.

Additional reports by

Chuks Onwudinjo
 

Mohammed Bougei Attah on Friday Aug 27 commented:

Thanks for this report, Obed and Chuks. One thing is clear about Nigeria politics, it is selfsocracy.