According to a report, Nasir el-Rufai, governor of Kaduna, says he will “reluctantly” contest the 2023 presidency in a joint ticket with Rotimi Amaechi, minister of transportation if President Muhammadu Buhari insists. Ahead of the 2023 presidential election, several politicians have declared their ambition for the number one seat while some are still making consultations.
Well, many people see this as El-Rufai being his usual brutally frank self. And has indicated that Amaechi has been anointed by the president. But many Nigerians have reasons to think differently.
Firstly, if that is true and El-Rufai respects the president as much as he wants us to believe in the interview, why would a man of his intelligence and experience in politics reveal the president’s position and preference on a national television? Knowing the implications and upheaval it will have on the party. The alignment of forces at the party’s upcoming convention and primaries, the APC government itself and the overheating of the polity as both the ruling party and opposition parties re-strategize to defeat the so mentioned ‘anointed one’.
El Rufai is too smart and this looks like a strategy to stir up a fierce potent gang up against Ameachi by all the power blocks in APC as well as the opposition. We know Wike will rather shelve his ambition, empty Rivers state treasury to ensure Amaechi never emerges. El Rufai’s statement in this light is therefore not a flippant leak perse but a calculated weaponized tale to stir up a gang up against Amaechi ahead of the convention & primaries.
Whatever it is, this El-Rufai’s interview has underlined the need for the GAC group, who the 2023 presidency is theirs to lose in February next year, to close ranks, put their house in order, squash this feud propagated by sponsored speculators between Tinubu & Osinbajo & come up with a common front in Tinubu, Osinbajo or Fashola.