A governor of one of the South-south states once told a group of journalists that he started preparing for his second term the day he was sworn-in for the first. He was quick to add, however, that he was not preparing for second term in open campaign but going by his programmes and policies and how he planned to positively impact the lives of those who voted him to power.
This was over 20 years ago. Since then, a lot has evolved in the Nigeria’s democratic practice to the extent that the only thing elected officials know how to do most is politicking. Naked politicking. It is not hidden. It is not concealed. There are no pretensions: a governor that had just been sworn-in would have, within few months, started making moves that even a toddler in his state would know such are to prepare ground for his second term.
The politics of second term in Nigeria is always a very deadly and high-stake one.
Since President Bola Tinubu was sworn-in as the president and commander-in-chief of the armed forces of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, high stake politicking about 2027 has been going on even when he had not marked first year in office. During the ruthless horse trading that preceded the presidential primaries of the ruling All Progressives Congress, APC, in May 2022, one of the permutations thrown up was the push by some northern elements for the candidature of the then Senate President, Ahmad Lawan, when it was becoming increasingly obvious that the then President, Mohammadu Buhari, did not want Tinubu to succeed him. In other words, he did not want him to pick the presidential ticket of the party. But Tinubu had gone very far in trying to ‘win’ over delegates (and even other presidential aspirants) so they could vote for him.
It was later to transpire that Buhari actually gave his words to the likes of former Rivers State governor and later Minister of Transportation, Rotimi Amaechi, Vice-President Yemi Osibajo, and cleric and his former running-mate in the 2011 presidential election, Pastor Tunde Bakare. The reason for this, only the former president could say. And there were also unconfirmed reports that there was a gentleman agreement between Tinubu and Buhari that the latter would hand over to him after the expiration of constitutionally allowed second term. The reports further had it that that was why Tinubu threw his weight behind Buhari un 2019 even when he knew he had not really done well enough to earn a second term in office.
On the eve of the presidential primaries, Buhari was said to be making overtures to Tinubu to step down. It was not clear who he was to step down for. But Tinubu was said to have turned down the overtures while some of the northern governors who were on their second terms were also working for him (Tinubu) with the belief that one of them would be picked as his running-mate. At the fore-front of this were the likes of Kaduna State governor, Nasir El-Rufai, and his Kano State counterpart, Abdullahi Ganduje. In fact, El-Rufai was very vehement in his campaign that power must return to the South. It was in the midst of this that the governors met and resolved that they would back Tinubu and someone leaked the resolution to the press even before they could present it to the President. That was what effectively killed the proposed candidature of Lawan.
The primaries took place and Tinubu garnered 1,271 votes while his closest rival was Amaechi who got 316 votes while then Vice-President, Osibajo, 235 votes. In fact, a host of other contestants like Bakare, Ogbonnaya Onu, Ikeobasi Mokelu and Rochas Okorocha got zero votes each.
At the election proper, the division in the PDP that led to the exit of former Anambra State governor, Peter Obi, from the opposition People’s Democratic Party, PDP, to Labour Party played no little role in Tinubu’s victory. Tinubu’s tally of 8,794,726 votes made it the lowest of any winner of a presidential election since 1983. It was also the first time the combined votes of the candidates that came second and third would be more than the votes of the actual winner. Atiku Abubakar of the PDP polled a total of 6,994,520 while Obi of the Labour Party polled 6,101,533. The votes of these two came to 13,096,053. Besides, Tinubu polled a paltry 36.61% of the votes while Atiku polled 29.07% and Obi had 25.40. Meaning: Obi and Atiku polled 54.47 of the total votes.
It was these results that made many pundits conclude that but for the crisis within the PDP which was worsened by the call for power to return to the South after eight years of Buhari, Tinubu would probably not have won the election.
And it is on this that many are already looking at what lies ahead concerning 2027. The Nigerian power equation places so much power and influence in the hands of a sitting president. The only president who was never allowed to deploy that power into a devastating effect was Goodluck Jonathan. Buhari came in with a lot of goodwill and had the backing of the South-west political as well as media intelligentsia. Tinubu is a master of the game and knows not just about power acquisition, but its consolidation and deployment for retention.
The North has been grumbling since Tinubu came in. Some of his policies have been seen, by the North, as direct attack on them. In fact, the relocation of some federal agencies back to Lagos is generating a lot of furore and underground grumblings. In the same vein, some ministerial slots that many have hitherto come to see as an exclusive preserve of the North have been taken from them. Number one among this is the Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, FCT, which was given to former Rivers State governor, Nyesom Wike, which was more or less a compensation for working against his party, PDP, in favour of the rival APC.
Sources indicate that the North has been meeting and strategising. This is a region who’s some of its leaders can practically not live outside government patronage and the influence peddling that comes with it. It was same reason they could not stand another four years of Jonathan. In fact, ahead of the 2015 presidential elections, partisan lines in the North became blurred as both PDP and APC worked together to ensure the emergence of Buhari.
Can the North present same common front again? A former editor and one-time presidential spokesperson who does not want his name in print believes that Tinubu might have further demystified the North and that idea of one North is gradually fading away. According to him, Tinubu did not really have to negotiate with the Northern Establishment before he acquired power which means he is not beholding to them. Secondly, he was the first president to emerge without any so-called political godfather who played major role in his emergence.
“The guy simply spent his way to power and exploited to a devastating effect the intractable division within the PDP. Secondly, no governor or any group of power brokers could say they raised money for his campaign. He spent his own funds. How he came about those funds is a different question entirely. But he didn’t rely on anyone to back him in any way. And don’t forget the fact that the outgoing president then did not want him to succeed him. His picking of a Kanuri man as his running-mate was another bold move to stare the North in the face and tell them he was in charge. I admit that he would need the northern votes for his second term. But he is holding the longer end of the stick,” the former editor explained.
But it might not be as easy as he makes it look. It is not yet confirmed, but sources say the North might be willing to ‘do business’ with the South-east in 2027 knowing that a direct call for power return to the North might not be popular across the South.
With age on his part and his popularity still very much on the higher side among young Nigerians, will Obi be the biggest beneficiary of the rumuored political handshake across the Niger? It remains to be seen.