Recently, leaders of Southern and Middle Belt organizations expressed outrage over the Peoples Democratic Party‘s (PDP) decision to abandon zoning in its presidential candidate selection process for the 2023 elections, threatening to act against the party if a Northerner is fielded.
There were hopes that the PDP will zone the presidential ticket to the south, in keeping with the zoning regime in existence since 1999, when Nigeria returned to civil rule, under which the presidency rotated between the north and south.
President Muhammadu Buhari, a northerner, will leave office in 2023 after serving eight years, and Southern stakeholders, like the Southern Governors’ Forum, have pushed for a power transition to the south.
However, the PDP’s 37-member zoning committee, chaired by Benue State governor Samuel Ortom, proposed that the presidential ticket be made available to contestants from throughout the country.
Historically, the region that holds the national chairmanship of the PDP does not generate the party’s presidential flagbearer. PDP stakeholders from the south lobbied for the zoning of the national chairmanship to the north in the hope that the move would open the way for a Southerner to run for president in 2023.
Iyorchia Ayu, a Benue State resident, eventually became the PDP’s national chairman during the party’s October 2021 national convention.
The zoning committee’s decision yesterday drew the wrath of leaders of thought from throughout Southern Nigeria. The Southern and Middle Belt Leaders’ Forum (SMBLF), the Pan Niger Delta Forum (PANDEF), Afenifere, Ohanaeze Ndigbo, and the Middle Belt Forum are among the organisations in the forefront of the power transfer.
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While the PDP’s decision is left to the party, Bitrus Pogu, the Middle Belt Forum’s leader, stated that their position, as expressed at a January 22, 2022 meeting in which they proclaimed their opposition to any political party that does not field a Southern presidential candidate, remains unchanged.
“We believe that after eight years of President Buhari, the presidency should go to the South by 2023. We also say any political party that zones its ticket to the North, we will work against that party and we will campaign against that party. Our position has not changed. So, it is up to the PDP leadership to know what to do.”
Sola Ebiseni, the spokesman for Afenifere, the pan-Yoruba sociocultural organization, spoke in the same vein. “I don’t want to talk about any political party. Let them do their worst, but we in the Southern and Middle Belt Leaders Forum have already expressed our views. We have no power to compel any party but we have spoken to the people,” he stated.
Alex Ogbonnia, spokesman for Ohanaeze Ndigbo, the Igbos’ primary socio-cultural organization, responded by emphasizing the importance of allowing the Southeast to produce the president in 2023.
“We will not relent in talking about the implications of giving the presidency to the Southeast. You cannot have unity, peace and sustainable national development without equity and justice. If you don’t have equity and justice, Nigeria cannot stand,” he said.
“Throwing the ticket open is well and good because it does not exclude the people of the Southeast, but if ultimately they (PDP) gives it to the North, we will no longer support them. If they give it to the North thinking that it is a way of getting more votes, we will not support them in the election.”
Ogbonnia stated in a statement: “For purpose of clarity, rotation and zoning principle was engrained into the PDP Constitution in 2009. Article 7 (2) (c) of the PDP Constitution states: ‘In pursuance of the principle of equity, justice and fairness, the party shall adhere to the policy of rotation and zoning of party and public elective offices, and it shall be enforced by the appropriate executive committee at all levels.”
He lamented the inexcusable repositioning of the goal post in the midst of the game. “Such unscrupulous violation of the zoning principle that has been well entrenched in the PDP Constitution simply changes the rules of the game to deprive Ndigbo the opportunity to produce a president for Nigeria.”
“It is a political blunder and betrayal given what Ndigbo have suffered in our own country and most recently for supporting the PDP. History has never been kind to betrayers and the treacherous. The machinations and conspiracies to deny Ndigbo their due place in Nigeria is an ingratitude that daily cries to God.”
Chief Chekwas Okorie, another Ndigbo elder statesman, criticized the abolition of zoning as “political suicide.”
Ndigbo had urged the PDP on multiple occasions to repay the region’s support by allocating its ticket to the Southeast, a zone that had not had a president since the return of democracy in 1999.
“I am not surprised,” he stated.
“I had said it over two years ago that the PDP and APC would not give their presidential tickets to the Southeast region. This is because after the 2015 general elections, the PDP met through the Ekweremadu committee and ceded the ticket for 2019 to the North. That development gave the North four good years to prepare for the office.”
“Now after the 2019 general elections, I made a call for the PDP to do the same, but when they started dilly-dallying, I knew that something was about to happen. APC is waiting for the PDP to make a move and now that they have thrown the contest open, watch and see that the APC would do the same. APC will never surrender its control of the North to the South,” he declared.
Okorie argued that the only way forward for Ndigbo was for them to unify behind the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA), claiming that the party was the only one that could guarantee Ndigbo a presidential ticket in 2023.
“This is the only window left for us. Minority parts of the country are looking on the Igbo to provide leadership for the country. We have 30 days window to raise a candidate, not the one that has paid for ticket in another political party.
“We need to rally round Soludo to reposition APGA. There is a major existential problem facing Ndigbo and he needs to come out to face it. If we continue to dilly-dally, we will miss it all. Let Ndigbo embrace APGA. We don’t have to surrender. We must find alternative to the issue,” he remarked.
Former Ekiti State governor and PDP presidential hopeful Thursday chastised the party for abandoning zoning of its presidential ticket.
Fayose, who was a member of the 37-member zoning committee led by Ortom before he declared his intention to run, said it was wrong for the party to make this race open to everyone, noting that southern members of the party did not contest at the convention held in Port Harcourt because it was zoned to the North.
Fayose stated on Channels Television’s Politics Today that the North’s failure to win the presidential election in 2019 was not the fault of the Southern PDP members.
“The more reason I obtained nomination form today is not to give impression that we are not ready because might come back to tell us it is a southern affair,” he explained.
He thought it would be unfair to continue to rig the system in favor of the North until they won. Additionally, he expressed his opposition to the party’s consensus candidate, claiming that he would not step down for anyone.
However, Governor of Benue State and Chairman of the peoples Democratic Party’s (PDP) Zoning Committee, Samuel Ortom, has denied media allegations that his committee has abandoned zoning and begun to fight over the party’s presidential ticket. The governor argued that his committee’s words were taken out of context during an appearance on AriseTV’s ‘Morning Show’ on Wednesday.
He questioned why those who were not present at the meeting of the committee would seek to “force words into the committee’s mouth.”
“So, I want to clear the insinuation that the zoning committee has thrown open the presidential ticket. I did inform the media that the committee had adopted a unanimous position to be presented to the National Executive Committee (NEC) of the party. It is NEC that has the final authority on the zoning of positions.”
“As far as the committee was concerned, there were arguments that the presidential ticket should go to the South. Some said it should go to the North. There were others who were of the opinion that it should be thrown open to allow the best candidate that would deliver good governance and make Nigerians feel like human beings again, contest.”
“At the end of the day, the most important thing to the PDP is what the party can do to bring the economy and security situation back to normalcy, because if something drastic is not done about the present situation in the country, a time will come when even the Presidential Villa and other government houses will be taken over by terrorists,” he explained.
Similarly, former National Vice Chairman of the People’s Democratic Party’s Southwest Zone, Dr Eddy Olafeso, past Chairman of the BoT, Chief Ebenezer Babatope, and a former Minister of Health, Prof. Adenike Grange, same Wednesday said party leaders should handle the issue of zoning with understanding of the political situation in the country.
According to Babatope, the committee had submitted its report to the party’s highest decision-making body, and all stakeholders are eagerly awaiting the final ruling.
“As a loyal party man, we cannot preempt the NEC, so it is necessary we all wait to see what the decision of the leadership would be, he stated.”
Olafeso said he would not want to comment on whether the party should automatically zone the presidential ticket to the South because he is a member of NEC. However, he added that it would be best for the members of the party to consider what zoning has done for the country.
“I don’t think zoning has done any part of this nation any good. Not at all. For example, if we say President Buhari is from the North, what has his leadership done to advance the course of his people in the last seven years? Is it the war-ravaged Northeast and Northwest? Even the leadership from the South has not done anything to improve the lots of the area since Nigeria returned to democratic rule in 1999. I think we only need to present our best, a God-fearing person and someone that has a vision to develop the country,” he remarked.
According to him, the more we dwell on zoning, the more we crave division.
Grange, for her part, questioned what the PDP’s leadership is supposed to do in light of the fact that numerous aspirants across the six geopolitical zones had purchased nomination forms.
During their meeting in Port Harcourt on Wednesday, PDP presidential candidates met behind closed doors. Former Vice President Atiku Abubakar, however, was absent from the meeting. Nyesom Wike, the host, said they were interested in ensuring unity within the party.
AFRICA TODAY NEWS, NEW YORK