2023: The man on Tambuwal ticket that will give Atiku a run for his money in PDP

Wike’s absolute power could hurt PDP ultimately in 2023

By Elijah Olusegun

The Peoples Democratic Party’s BoT chairman had a hard time not spilling his gut when journalists peppered him with questions about a serial presidential contestant in the party warming up for 2023 again.

“Can we say he has failed?” Walid Jibrin responded, not expecting an answer during a media chat in Kaduna recently.

“If Atiku wants, he has the right to do so …”

Because it’s a free country, ex-V.P. Atiku Abubakar, who the party fielded in the Feb 23 presidential election, can run again. But the PDP, choking in the stranglehold of its most powerful governor, may rue it if Atiku clinches the ticket.

Then Jibrin followed his first answer quickly with another—a rhetorical question: “Do you think it’s only Atiku that wants to contest?”

As things stand now, others want to.

Sokoto Gov. Aminu Tambuwal wants to, pairing with a south-south governor, the enfant terrible of the party. Former Kaduna Gov. Ibrahim Maikarfi will also take another stab. There may be other small fries too.

But they mostly will come from the north. And that stacks the odd further in favor of Atiku Abubakar, a billionaire, and the most experienced (four ties in 16 years) of presidential contestants in Nigeria. At 77, on his fifth run for the presidency, he will be the oldest of the lot coming from the PDP.

For his billions and cheerful giving, for which he’s popular, Atiku may win the hearts of those who believe anybody is free to contest. That is in the party. And they are in the majority within the PDP.

But for Atiku to win the ticket, he will have the youthful twosome of Tambuwal and Rivers Gov. Nyesom Wike (if it’s well speculated) to contend with. And the two will sure give him a run for his money. The rumpus won’t be easy for the PDP to handle then.

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Many analysts are already watching if the opposition will even get to 2023 in one piece, considering the party activism Wike now does with the energy of a gang-buster. He has been pulling at the very heart of the party each time he throws his tantrums—which have been coming in torrents since he became governor.

He first lashed out at the troupe of the party chairmanship aspirants from the southwest in 2017 when he told them their region hadn’t contributed much to PDP. Along with Ekiti former Gov. Ayo Fayose, Wike then mobilized the PDP governors to support his candidate, the acting chairman Uche Secondus who comes from the south-south, to contend a position initially zoned to the southwest. Many of the aspirants, like Bode George, Rasheed Ladoja, Jimi Agbaje, and Gbenga Daniel, had to hop out of the race in a huff. They were almost headed out of the PDP but for peacemakers.

But that move of Wike’s became the stamp of his authority on the PDP leadership. And he flaunts it not just in sheer display of hubris, but also in brinkmanship.

Towards the 2108 PDP national convention, Wike was ut with the party again, at such delicate point. He lambasted and threatened the National Executive Council—for changing the venue of the presidential primary initially fixed for Port Harcourt. “Let me warn the party,” he said, with no regard for party supremacy, “if you dare it, Rivers State will teach the party a lesson.” He was telling a visiting presidential candidate then.  “Those days have passed when they took Rivers State for granted. Nobody can use and dump Rivers State.”

He didn’t spare the aspirants, either. “I don’t know why anyone who wants to be president will be afraid of a venue,” he said. It was obvious then he had a candidate in one of his colleagues among the contestants—Tambuwal. And Wike seized that space to blindside the most prominent of the contestants. Atiku’s campaign theme was a hot potato in national debates then.

“You come here to deceive us about restructuring.” he said, referring to the former vice president.  “Just that Rivers State is a venue, you fight it. Then, when you are there, what will happen? You think we are fools where you preach restructuring….”

After all his saber-rattling, the party bowed to the blowhard, and shifted the convention back to Rivers. Even there, delegates from the state couldn’t be repressed. They displayed—against the convention’s rules— who they were voting for: Tambuwal.

There was no eyebrow raised against that. In fact , no one, including Atiku, has ever challenged Wike. Even when he did the most anti-PDP thing. Like when he was the only PDP governor who congratulated President Muhammadu Buhari on his victory over Atiku at the Supreme Court months ago. He still bluffed his way out. “Is it not better for me to congratulate him than to go to his house in the night,” he told his shocked audience.

He claimed he has a list of PDP’s governors who visit Buhari nightly.  He had one of presidential contestants the APC planted in the PDP in 2018. Wike always has a list. And everybody is on his radar.

The next PDP governor on his list is his kinsman Seriake Dickson, Bayelsa’s outgoing governor. Dickson just lost the state to the APC, and Wike already had a dossier on the governor’s dalliance with President Buhari, the EFCC, and the APC, which led to the sell-out.

The two south-south governors have been sparring, with Wike having the upper hand. The root of the quarrel is an oil well on the border between the two states which the court just handed back to Rivers. The loss sparked a big fire of animosity already penned up—since Dickson edged their godfather and ex-President Goodluck Jonathan out of Bayelsa’s politics in the lead-up to the Nov 2019 guber election. For that and other transgression, Wike now engages in a no-hold-barred duel with Dickson

As usual, the PDP intervened, and its reaction was well metered, because Wike brooks no nonsense. According to the party’s publicity secretary, the tone of disagreements between the two was only “skin-deep”, borne out of their love for their states. “The national leadership, having noted the issues, has activated the party’s internal reconciliation mechanism to settle the matter amicably,” said Kola Ologbondiyan days ago.

But Wike didn’t buy that. “I don’t know why they are interceding,” he said through his media aide Simeon Nwkaudu. “Are they interceding on behalf of someone who betrayed the party?” Wike is even ready prove that Dickson is a rat—that he has made up his mind to defect to the APC. And as such, the PDP leadership intervention is hopeless—as far as Wike is concerned. “In fact, Governor Dickson ought to have resigned from the party by now,” he said.

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The party leadership, by now, know they have a tartar on their hand. The only person in the PDP that has Wike’s ear is Tambuwal. It was the Sokoto governor that calmed him down when he wanted to reel out the names of all the PDP governors fraternizing with Buhari.

Why the former education minister looms larger than life is not clear yet. But he always talks about Rivers’ ‘resources’, ‘use’ and ‘dump’. As one of the top five collectors of federal allocation, Rivers got N237bn 2018, apart from the 13 percent derivative as an oil-producing state.

With so much to throw around in a cash-crunched party that has been out of power for five years, Gov. Wike cannot be anything lower than a sacred cow. And his added bullish stubbornness will make him a factor as the party prepares now for 2023.

It will interest many to know how the PDP will herd Wike—as a member and running mate to Tambuwal, if that happens—together with Atiku, another money bag and career presidential candidate the younger ones consider outdated.