July 17, (THEWILL) – The political difference between an intention and practical reality started dawning on the critical leaders and stakeholders of the governing All Progressives Congress (APC) since last Sunday when the party’s presidential candidate, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, a Muslim, announced Senator Kashim Shettima, also a Muslim, as his vice-presidential candidate in the 2023 general election.
The Muslim-Muslim ticket has ruffled some feathers within the leadership and the rank and file of the APC, with resignations from its Presidential Campaign Council and calls from aggrieved party chieftains to President Muhammadu Buhari, urging him to undo the perceived damage by aborting the ticket.
With the July 15, 2022 deadline for the submission of substitute party candidates past and the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) having closed its registration portal, the APC is facing a potential crisis from within that may threaten its dominance in the party’s political strongholds across the country.
Investigations by THEWILL show that the party’s Muslim-Muslim ticket has put the proverbial knife on the things that once held APC together across the six geo-political zones and posing a serious threat to the plan to retain the presidency in the February 25, 2023 election.
Ordinarily, Nigerians who are generally given as religious would readily grab the next opportunity that serves their interests and advance the cause of their community as many have repeatedly shown in their support for even dodgy politicians and corrupt public officials facing arrest or a stiff competition and contest against rivals. But the factor stoking the fire against the same faith candidacy appears to be lack of sufficient consultation by Tinubu.
According to a top APC chieftain who confided in THEWILL, “The way Tinubu took his decision was tantamount to a slap. You do not look people in the eye and say you cannot do anything to the decision you have taken. Anybody who is defending that choice is trying to be clever by half. Why did the party respect religious balancing of the ticket in 2015 and 2019? Is it now when there are cries of marginalisation everywhere because of religious disharmony and ethnic bigotry, that the party would say there is nothing wrong with the choice? Nigerians have always feared marginalisation and the ticket has deepened that fear. Balancing the ticket as we did in previous elections would have fulfilled the constitutional requirement of representation.”
The politician stated that the choice has brought religion to the fore of national discourse, arguing further that, as a party man, he knew that Tinubu held the view long ago of a Muslim-Muslim ticket in the thinking that he would take care of the Christians. “What does he mean by saying I will take care of Christians?” the chieftain asked.
The choice, according to the politician, will certainly affect the chances of the party in the 2023 poll except some practical steps are taken to address the fears of aggrieved party members and concerned Nigerians.
Another big wig in the party told this newspaper that what made the Muslim-Muslim ticket audacious was the thinking in party circles that Tinubu had long zeroed in on Shettima and was only waiting for the appointed time, close to statutory deadline for the submission or substitution of names, to give no room for options.
The reason, he said, was both personal and strategic, according to the argument. Shettima, the former Borno State governor has had a good working relationship with Tinubu for a long time, while his North-East geo-political zone also came into the cold calculations.
GROWING DIVISIONS
A few weeks before Shettima’s emergence, political leaders in the vote-catching North-West geo-political zone, comprising the swing states of Kano, Katsina, Sokoto, Jigawa, Zamfara and Kaduna met in Kaduna to pitch for the VP position, flaunting their collective electoral strength in the face of argument for the position. They contended that the geo-political zone had always produced over 20 per cent of the total votes for the party nationwide. In the 2019 general election, for example, the voting strength of the North-West alone was over 20 million, representing 24 per cent of the national spread, while the North-East boasted a little over 11 million votes, which represented 13.44 per cent.
Moreover, the North-West zone has the majority of the 13 APC governors in the North, who decided Tinubu’s candidature and victory at the party’s convention on June 8, 2023 when the presidency cabal was determined to foist President of the Senate, Ahmad Lawan, on the party as consensus candidate.
This is the main reason, THEWILL has gathered, that put some of the governors from the zone like Nasir el Rufai of Kaduna State and Abubakar Atiku Bagudu of Kebbi State in contest for the VP ticket. They believe Shettima’s emergence was due to loyalty rather than competence, integrity, fairness and innovation as canvassed by Tinubu under the political cover that the North-West had had its fill of democratic leaders since the Second Republic, with Shehu Sahagari, through Umaru Yar’Ardua and President Muhammadu Buhari as against only First Republic Prime Minister, Tafawa Balewa, who was from Bauchi.
The situation in the North-West has opened the zone to the looming threat posed by former Governor of Kano State, Rabiu Kwankwaso and his New Nigeria Peoples Party (NNPP). Apart from Governor Mohammed Matawale of Zamfara State, all the six other governors are concluding their second tenure, which means that they will not be strong enough to resist the pressure from Kwankwaso and his radical Kwankwassiyya Movement. The movement has spread across Kano, Jigawa and Kaduna States.
Also, waiting in the wings is the presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Atiku Abubakar, who also lookspoised to benefit from the APC crisis. In the North where the Muslim-Muslim ticket has thrown up the religious argument, his ethnicity as a Fulani has become more pronounced. That was one of the points highlighted by a former Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Babachir Lawal, in his rejection of the choice of Shettima, when he said, alongside party members from 19 states in the North, that apart from complicating campaigns for other positions of APC candidates of the Christian faith in the North, the Muslim-Muslim ticket would favour Atiku who would be seen by the grassroots, as “one of their own.”
Even the presidential candidate of the Labour Party (LP), Peter Obi, is said to be getting more than a passing glance among the Christian communities in the North, following this development in the APC. This means that there is a likelihood of a four-horse race in the North, which will eat deep into APC strongholds in the zone, in particular.
It is against this brewing crisis in the two core North geo-political zones that the Muslim-Muslim ticket exploded on the party since last Sunday’s announcement, with Christian leaders within the party already voting with their feet and opening the zone’s vote to the candidates of other rival parties. This may seriously erode the popularity of the APC in its strongholds.
THREATS IN APC STRONGHOLDS
Apart from the geo-political jealousy between the vote-catching North-West and the North-East, Christians and sympathisers from the North Central through the entire northern zone, which some aggrieved party leaders now call the “Christian Middle Belt” could also hurt the APC over the same faith ticket issue.
Luka Binyat, spokesperson of 67 ethnic groups in the North, told THEWILL that with this crisis in the APC over its choice of vice presidential candidate, the days are gone when Christians were unable to assert their political rights. He sees the Muslim-Muslim ticket as a good omen. His group, he said, are ready to accept the evidence of their marginalisation and inequity as demonstrated by APC approval of the same faith ticket. “They are ready to speak and act with one voice now, “he said.
This political Middle belt, which coincides with a Christian enclave, according to Binyat, runs through 13 states out of the 19 northern states. They are, according to him, in southern Kaduna, southern Kebbi, Gombe State, Adamawa State, southern Borno State, Taraba State, Benue State, Plateau State, Bauchi State, Niger State, Kogi State and Kwara State.
Explaining further on the electoral value of the Christian vote in 2023, he said the voting population of this “Christian Middle Belt”, is between 15 and 20 million. “With this bloc voting strength, we are going to send a message to those who want to paint Nigeria as a Muslim state to the world,” he added.
When told that Tinubu said he voted for competence, integrity and in adherence to excellence in choosing his VP, Binyat disagreed: “How can Tinubu say Muslim is more competent and has excellence. In education and industry, Christians are not wanting? How can he say balancing does not matter? Even President Buhari with his chunk of 12 million votes contested election three times until he did the needful. If Tinubu wants to take it for the first time, let him go ahead.”
In making his choice based on certain qualities and status of his preferred candidate, Tinubu said last Sunday: “Having now listened to the sage, careful advice of a broad section of the party and of the nation, there are a few points I feel I must make about the exceptional and extraordinary person with whom I will share the APC ticket and the principles of open and good governance that informed this choice.
“I realise the momentous times we have entered. I know what lies in the balance. I also know that our political choices and activities send both intended and unintended signals to portions of the Nigerian electorate.
“All my life, my decisions regarding the team around and supporting me have always been guided by the principles of competence, innovation, compassion, integrity, fairness, and adherence to excellence.
“Our focus, therefore, must be on getting the job done; and that means getting the very best and competent people to do it. In this crucial moment, where so much is at stake, we must prioritise leadership, competence, and the ability to work as a team over other considerations.”
WALKING THEIR TALK
How prepared and how far are the aggrieved party leaders ready to take their grievances? APC Christians leaders’ protest against the ticket has merged with the stand of many religious organisations which warned the governing party against the same faith ticket before political parties held their various conventions between May 29 and June 8, 2022.
With 18 political parties taking part in the 2023 general election, the voting choice is democratic enough to bounce off the protest against the Muslim-Muslim ticket. But as investigation revealed, the anger against the same faith choice has rubbed off on the government because it is the governing party with a majority of 22 governors in the 36 states of the country, 66 Senators out of 108 and 211 out of 360 representatives. The decision of the same faith choice thus makes it look like it is a policy of the governing party.
Contacted for comments, the National Publicity Secretary of the APC, Felix Morka did not pick calls to his phones.
Moreover, politics in Nigeria is a zero sum game because of the winner-takes-all system. This makes people and groups weigh the options guardedly.
“This is about our rights, our future,” Binyat said.
That future is Now. The leadership of the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) is said to be taking active part in mobilising the community against the ticket, even though there is no indication that a particular political party would be made the beneficiary of the mobilisation.
“This is the time to declare our collective power and make people who made this choice pay with our votes,” said Senior Pastor of Realm of Glory International Churches, Sam Aiyedagbon. “They say they are tacticians. We are going to show them our power with our votes. For a party where the leadership of the National Assembly, Presidency are Muslim and most appointments are determined by religion, this Muslim-Muslim ticket is a direct assault on our rights. I feel pained.”
Tinubu’s point men however think the choice is realistic. Governor Oluwarotimi Akeredolu of Ondo State said the buck stops at the table of the President and if Tinubu were to win, the presidency would handle public affairs with fairness and equity, calling on people to see the ticket as a political strategy to win election and nothing more.
Another Tinubu ally like Akeredolu thinks otherwise. That is Babachir Lawal, former SSG, who was Tinubu’s campaign manager before the party’s national convention and until his revolt against the ticket, a member of the Presidential Campaign Council of the APC, who even submitted the blank list of VP to Tinubu.
“I would love Bola to be our next President. But, I am afraid, a Moslem-Moslem ticket will be ‘dead on arrival’. And the arrival date, according to INEC’s election timetable, is February 25, 2023. This ticket will drag down the whole APC members to the pit. We should all reject it,” he said.
Tinubu, in addition to giving reasons for his choice, described the protest as a storm in a tea cup. Asked about the likely effect of his choice of the party’s chances in the upcoming poll, he said; “We shall win the election, Insha Allah.”
Breaking his silence on the same faith ticket for the first time since his nomination last Sunday, Shettima said on Friday night to a group of professionals who paid him a visit: “I want to reassure Nigerians that we are not about to start Islamising Nigeria. Tinubu married a wife who is a pastor. He did not impose his religion on his children. I think we should look at the larger picture, which is to make Nigeria work for our people.”
About the Author
Amos Esele is the Deputy Editor of THEWILL Newspaper. He has over two decades of experience on the job.
