That Amaechi may not end up a tragic hero, By Majeed Dahiru

Following the successful conclusion of the opposition African Democratic Congress’ (ADC) presidential primary election, which expectedly threw up former vice President Atiku Abubakar from northern Nigeria as candidate, the party has announced Rotimi Chibuike Amaechi, from the south, as his running mate. And for the second time in a row Atiku Abubakar is set to run against the tide of zoning and rotation principle of Nigeria’s apex office between the north and south of the country, at a time that it is generally accepted to be the turn of the south till 2031 after an eight year northern presidency of Muhammadu Buhari between 2015 and 2023. The attempt by Atiku Abubakar to violate zoning by running on the platform of the PDP in 2023 in order to unjustly elongate a Hausa speaking, Fulani Muslim northern presidency beyond eight years was resisted firmly by a united Nigerian front (north and south), which resulted into not just a personal loss for the former vice president but sinking into oblivion of the PDP as collateral damage.

Atiku Abubakar was himself a beneficiary of zoning in 1999 and 2007, when he emerged as vice president in the Olusegun Obasanjo administration and presidential candidate of the Ahmed Bola Tinubu led Action Congress party in 2027, when it was the turn of the north after eight years in the south. And he will go on to protest the violation of zoning when he returned to PDP by in 2011 by Goodluck Jonathan after the death of Umar Musa Yar’Adua from northern Nigeria in 2010. On this occasion, the northern wing of the PDP under the leadership of Adamu Ciroma, had vehemently insisted that southerners stay off the presidency of Nigeria on the platform of the party including the sitting southern president Goodluck Jonathan who was Yar’Adua’s vice; a northern position that was strongly backed bysome southern politicians like then chairman of the party, Vincent Ogbulafor and Rotimi Amaechi, who was then governor of Rivers state and later chairman of Nigerian governor’s forum. But when majority of northern governors decided to bend the rules of zoning to accommodate the unforeseen and unfortunate circumstance that was the time, Amaechi mobilised Rivers state people behind Goodluck Jonathan.

But not so for Atiku Abubakar. The former vice president will later emerge as the northern consensus candidate ahead of former military president Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida, Bukola Saraki and General Aliyu Gusau to challenge Goodluck Jonathan at the PDP presidential primaries going into the 2011 general election. In an unprecedented move in a presidential primary involving a sitting president, Atiku Abubakar defeated Goodluck Jonathan in the five northern states of Kano, Sokoto, Zamfara, Niger and Kebbi. Usually such exercises are a coronation of the incumbent but not in the contest between Atiku Abubakar and Goodluck Jonathan. Even though Goodluck Emerged victorious, the crack that will eventually widen in the PDP and lead to its defeat in 2015 was created by Atiku Abubakar’s protestation and rightly so against Goodluck Jonathan’s violation of the principles of zoning in then ruling party.

And four years later in 2015, when Goodluck Jonathan attempted to violate zoning a second time, Atiku Abubakar it was who led five sitting PDP governors including Rotimi Amaechi to walk out on the party and join forces with Ahmed Bola Tinubu’s ACN, Muhammadu Buhari’s CPC and Rochas Okorocha’s faction of APGA to form the grand political alliance that is the APC. In this new arrangement, southern politicians like Rotimi Amaechi, Bola Tinubu, Bisi Akande, Timipriye Silva, Chris Ngige, Adams Oshiomhole and all others did not hesitate on the need to correct the mistake of the PDP by opting for a zoning of the presidential candidacy of the APC to the north. And in the Lagos presidential convention of the party, southern members of the APC filed behind their preferred northern aspirants as clearly reflected in the results that threw up Muhammadu Buhari as winner with Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso as first runner and Atiku Abubakar as second runner up. Similarly, when the PDP decided to correct its mistake of violating zoning in 2015 going into the 2019 presidential election, Atiku Abubakar became the beneficiary of this political repentance when he was overwhelmingly endorsed as the party’s candidate after he ditched the APC to pursue his ambition. Therefore, for a man who had benefited from zoning to variously emerge vice president and presidential candidates of major political parties and protested its violation by others to brazenly and unashamedly violate zoning habitually is not only morally reprehensible as even among bandits there is honour, but poses a threat to whatever is left of Nigeria’s national unity.

| | | |---|

Beyond the APC primaries in 2015, Amaechi was going to play a crucial role in the emergence of Muhammadu Buhari, from northern Nigeria ahead of Goodluck Jonathan from southern Nigeria as the Director General of the party’s presidential campaign. Rotimi Amaechi, a veteran establishment politician with a touch of pro-people activism, administrative capabilities, bold, audacious and most importantly, a distinction for being a highly detribalised, non-provincial pan Nigerian nationalist, who always rise up above nativist considerations in his dealings as a politician, was the knife that ripped the umbrella of the PDP. In addition to his deployment of resources to power the electoral war chest of the APC, His bold and audacious stand against his kinsman, in support of Muhammadu Buhari, helped galvanised the north against the PDP, because Amaechi’s revolt revealed Goodluck Jonathan’s vulnerability in a divided house. It can be said that without Amaechi’s efforts, northern Nigeria would not have been able to reclaim the presidency through APC’s Muhammadu Buhari in 2015; something the people of the region, including Atiku Abubakar should have remained grateful to him for being the hero of their electoral victory.

Appointed minister of transport by President Buhari, Amaechi will go on to serve the interest of his principal and his northern region, faithfully and loyally. Apart from completing the Abuja/Kaduna rail line, Amaechi inaugurated the controversial Kano/Katsina/Maradi rail line even when the eastern corridor that links his native Rivers state and other parts of the country did not receive as much attention. And when he had the opportunity to locate the university of transportation that was donated to Nigeria by the Peoples Republic of China, it wasn’t in his native Ubima village in Ikwere local government area of Rivers state, southern Nigeria, but in President Buhari’s home town of Daura, Katsina state northern Nigeria. Some may argue that he did all that to curry the favour of President Buhari and the north going into the 2023 presidential election and my answer is that one good turn should deserve another.

But this doesn’t seem to be the case in the relationship between Rotimi Amaechi and northern Nigeria. Whereas, he lost to Ahmed Bola Tinubu, fellow southerner who equally played a pivotal role in the 2015 electoral effort of northern Nigeria’s Muhammadu Buhari on the platform of the APC, Amaechi’s dismal performance in the ADC presidential primaries in northern Nigerian states resulting into his loss to the region’s Atiku Abubakar should make him pause and ponder on his sacrifices and services for northern Nigerian’s political interests on the national stage, considering his the immense personal loss that came with him being politically ostracised by his own people to the ultimate advantage of his nemesis, Ezenwo Nyesom Wike.

I have always insisted that if the north is tired of President Tinubu, his substitute has to come from the south and not the north. And if any lesson is to be learned from the history of Nigeria’s 4th Democratic Republic, it is that violation of zoning is a costly mistake that diminishes the offending political party. Until Nigeria becomes socially cohesive and nationally integrated enough for it to be possible to be Igbo and Lagos, Yoruba and Kaduna, Hausa and Anambra, Fulani and Benue, zoning and rotation of presidential power between the north and south will remain the irreducible requirement for inclusion, equity, fairness and justice, which guarantees Nigeria’s unity, no matter how fragile.

Following the recent misadventure of Atiku Abubakar in the PDP, which has resulted into the sinking of the party into oblivion, one would have thought that the ADC would have made effort to correct this mistake by sticking to a southern alternative as its candidate to challenge President Tinubu going into the 2027 presidential election. Sadly, blinded by ambition and raw rage, the northern flank of the party has foisted Atiku Abubakar on the party against a credible and trusted alternative like Amaechi. By now it should be clear to Amaechi that for this section of the north, one good turn does not deserve another and that his only reward for his support for northern Nigeria seems to be the title of Dan Amana that was bestowed on him by the Emir of Daura.

Rotimi Amaechi deserves the support of northern Nigeria to vie for the presidency of Nigeria otherwise this betrayal will set an ugly precedence on why not to go the “Amaechi way” in Nigerian politics. And if Amaechi goes ahead to accept to deputise a northern candidate with the prospect of truncating a southern presidency will be akin to loving your neighbour more than yourself and he will be like a fisherman who used an elephant as a bait to catch a piece of fish. His acceptance of a second fiddle position will unravel his long standing pan Nigerian reputation as nothing but “bad belle” for Goodluck Jonathan his kinsman then and portray as an anti-southern Nigerian northern stooge who is an enemy of southern Nigerian political progress. That Rotimi Amaechi may not end up a tragic hero will be for him to decline the offer of running mate Atiku Abubakar and just “siddon dey look’’ if he chooses not to support any other candidate from the south.

Majeed Dahiru, a public affairs analyst, writes from Abuja and can be reached through [email protected].