Jonathan’s former aide says Atiku’s victory impossible

The immediate past Managing Director of the News Agency of Nigeria, and Director General of the APC Door-to-Door Campaign in Delta State, Ima Niboro, has congratulated President Muhammadu Buhari for his victory in last Saturday’s Presidential polls.

Speaking to journalists at his Warri residence on Wednesday, Mr Niboro said Mr Buhari’s victory was inevitable as much as an Atiku Abubakar’s victory was statistically impossible.

The former aide of ex-President Goodluck Jonathan pointed out that as long as politics thrives on structures and not on day dreams and wishful thinking, it was structurally impossible for the People’s Democratic Party’s candidate to oust the sitting APC president.

Mr Niboro said, “As at the day of the elections, APC was in control of 22 states, while the PDP controlled 13 and APGA one. No governor would surrender his state to the opposition because the template of the presidential elections would be the same with the coming gubernatorial elections. Even if the governor is not on the ballot, he is sponsoring a successor. He will fight tooth and nail to deliver his party in all the elections.”

He pointed out that the votes in the presidential elections were consistent with the structural realities of Nigeria’s party politics. He stated that Sokoto and Gombe went inevitably to the APC because the structures that emplaced those PDP governors were actually and presently APC both in content and character.

He attributed the big fall of Bukola Saraki and PDP in Kwara to “a protest movement, marshaled by no less than his blood sister, Gbemi, in broad alliance with the ‘Oto’ge movement, Alhaji Lai Mohammed and the wealthy and politically savvy Abdulrasaq family.”

According to him, the same thing happened in the South South, even though in reverse order.

“Take Godswill Akpabio of Akwa Ibom and Emmanuel Uduaghan of Delta. These are no doubt popular grassroots politicians and former two term governors. Both, of APC, just lost to PDP and no one is talking about it. Why did they lose? Simply because the structures that undergird the politics of Akwa Ibom and Delta are still powerfully PDP, even though the APC is making greater inroads every day.

“Governors are very powerful in our country, even the seemingly harmless looking ones like that fellow in Akwa Ibom. They successfully fought these two heavy weights to a standstill.”

 He continued: “I spent most of my adult life reporting politics, so I know what I am talking about. As far as I know, the only states that went out of character are Ondo and Oyo. But I am certain you will find, upon greater interrogation, that those were protest votes not against Buhari but against the internal power structures of both states.”

“I urge Alhaji Atiku Abubakar and the PDP to emulate former President Jonathan and take the moral high road. It is not too late for them to congratulate President Buhari, reorganize their party, win over more governors, and challenge the APC for the presidency in 2023.”