It is another election year in Nigeria and as usual, the stakes are high. There have been constant political realignments in the past few months as politicians pitch their tents with camps they’d think have potentials for victory at the next year’s polls.
The year will be filled with uncountable political intrigues and as Professor Andrew Efemini succinctly puts it, it is a sensitive year as we will witness more politicians hopping on to political trains that they feel will protect their interests and help have their dreams realized.
With two gubernatorial elections scheduled for this year in Ekiti and Osun states, it will present political parties with the fertile grounds with which their popularity will be tested.
And with the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) successfully electing their principal executives late last year and with most parties expected to hold their conventions later in the year, the atmosphere has become charged and almost ready for the electioneering processes.
Rivers state’s political climate will perhaps not only be the most intriguing but will be the object of national attention as it has always been. Political daggers have been drawn with the All Progressive Congress (APC) seeming very determined in their quest to occupy Brick House come May 29th 2019.
In short, the party has shown utmost seriousness and dedication with its quest to take power and advance over the PDP with their early campaign and their extension of hands for handshakes with their ongoing grassroots mobilization and establishment of political structures across the 23 local government areas using the Free Rivers Initiative.
That is to say that the party understands and have come to appreciate the importance of grassroots structure at the unit and ward levels and will reach out to those who are yet to decide on which side to support: something we are not seeing happening with the PDP.
This is perhaps their last battle as stated by the Minister of Transportation and the leader of the party in Rivers State, Rotimi Chibuike Amaechi. The Minister had said at a reception organized in his honour by the Ikwerre Youth Movement, at Isiokpo, earlier in January that if they fail this time, they will be finished politically.
Discerning minds at the reception understood that the Minister was talking figuratively and sounding the alarms of seriousness, as he is evidently aware of the level of influence the Nyesom Wike- led administration wields at the grassroots level.
With the unlikeliness of the party participating in the upcoming local government election as proposed by Governor Wike , if the APC fails to muster the political will with which they will overthrow the PDP at the gubernatorial election, then it will be a long night for the party in the state.
The APC presents a somehow genuine case by maintaining that the Ikwerre ethnic nationality should hand over power to others. Nevertheless, politics is about interest and numbers; and the party understands that power is not given, it is taken – and in this case – through the ballot.
The APC as a party have incurred many baggage that will be working against them as they once again sell the party to the electorate – one of which will probably be the party’s inability to produce a candidate with the political clout that will measure up and match that of the Governor in the state as the party seems divided.
Internal wrangling within the party might be its doom and a planned reconciliation will go a long way in galvanizing party faithful so as to work towards a common objective.
Hate him or love him, Governor Nyesom Wike enjoys a reasonable level of goodwill in the state and beyond, especially among the non-indigenes resident in the state who see him as a non-discriminatory leader – a fit that will be hard for the APC to surpass given the perception the people have about the Buhari-led federal government’s handling of affairs in the country.
There is almost a consensus in the South especially South East and South South that President Mohammedu Buhari loathes the two regions, which is evident in the way the president has treated the regions with the issue of political appointments and certain utterances that were less presidential.
In short, the antics of the government at the center presents the biggest barrier for the party at the state level and it will be to their own advantage if they focus on issues within the state and expunge any attempt at praising the president in their campaigns.
But therein lies the conundrum! How will the state chapter of the party disassociate itself from the central government?
The handling of the economy which has led to jobs being lost in millions and the kid gloves with which the farmers-herdsmen clashes is being treated , has also irked many not just in the South but in other parts of the country and have massively derailed support for the party in the regions. And unless the party does something drastic to change the perception of many, it is going to affect the number of votes that the party will receive in the region come 2019.
The spat between the Minister of Transportation, Rotimi Amaechi, and the Senator representing Rivers East senatorial District, Senator Magnus Abe has divided the party’s loyalists at the grassroots level: a division that is not good for a party that had to rely on lengthy court battles to secure the two senatorial seats they currently enjoy in the state.
The Senator who is reportedly eyeing the office of the Governor has come out publicly to blame the minister for the division in the party and for targeting party officials loyal to him.
However, with the current clamor by the Ogoni ethnic nationality that it is their turn to produce the next governor and the likelihood that the Senator will not be the party’s choice during the primaries , the rift between the two political big weights will have adverse effects on the party at the polls come 2019.
Writing off the Senator portends danger for the APC as he has strong support of the Ogonis and the Etches, a fit which will be a gain for the PDP and Governor Wike, coupled with the fact that Rivers state has become the unofficial headquarters of the PDP with benefits of having the party’s Chairman.
Governor Wike’s constant attacks on the federal government, truthful as some of them are, especially on the failure of the federal government to pay the agreed counterpart funding for the Bodo-Bonny road reduces, on a daily basis, the momentum that the APC is hoping to gain within the state.
Can the APC surpass these hurdles and become victorious at the polls next year?
