The ruling All Progressives Congress’s failure to resolve the issue of consensus arrangement in choosing the leadership of the 10th National Assembly may be the first hurdle to be scaled by the incoming Bola Tinubu Administration.
Although many political analysts believe that the President-elect, Bola Tinubu, will help to find a solution to the problem, all attempts to persuade aspirants for leadership positions in the National Assembly, who rejected the party’s zoning arrangement, to back down on their agitation failed to yield positive results.
It would be recalled that the National Chairman of the party, Senator Abdullahi Adamu, told the agitating aspirants that the party would have to wait for Tinubu’s input before reviewing the zoning and consensus arrangements.
So, unless there is an agreement by all the candidates later to toe the party line, with less than two weeks to the inauguration of the 10th Senate, the APC may face a repeat of what happened in 2015 when Senator Bukola Saraki, with support from the main opposition party, the PDP, emerged as Senate President instead of Senator Ahmad Lawan who was the APC’s choice.
The APC has picked former Akwa Ibom State Governor, Senator Godswill Akpabio, as its preferred Senate President and Senator Barau Jibrin from Kano as Deputy Senate President.
But the APC’s position has been rejected by some aspirants, including the current Senate Chief Whip and former Governor of Abia State, Senator Orji Uzor Kalu; former Governor of Zamfara State, Senator Abdualzeez Yari, Senator Mohammed Musa Sani from Niger State, and Senator Osita Izunaso from Imo State.
These senators have vowed to trudge on and realize their ambition. If the party fails to agree and these aspiring leaders of the 10th Senate go for election on inauguration day, how will they fare? One fact is that most of these aspirants were at one time or the other members of the PDP and they will have to struggle to get the support of the PDP, as well as the other members of the opposition, in the election. This may result in a crisis within the ruling party and if not well handled, it may spell doom for the party.
Godswill Akpabio
Godswill Akpabio, who was a former Senate Minority Leader on the platform of the PDP before defecting to the ruling APC, is the choice of the President-elect and the APC for the position of Senate President. He therefore leads the pack among the aspirants for the number one seat in the Senate.
Akpabio and the Stability Group have also been on the roads in the past weeks trying to get the endorsement of fellow senators and leaders of thought in the country in order to realise his ambition of leading the next Senate.
The manner of his choice by Tinubu as the party’s choice for the position of Senate President is quite understandable to the political analysts. They cited his withdrawal for Tinubu during the APC presidential primary election.
Aside that, the APC has made a comparable good showing in the South-South where Akpabio comes from, particularly in the presidential election, in which analysts had initially predicted a landslide for the Labour Party (L.P).
The APC not only won a senatorial seat in Akwa Ibom, but also won in Cross Rivers and Edo States.
Akpabio, with his long time and experience in politics, has built political relationships and a network that transcends party lines and this may come handy for him when the election to pick the next Senate President comes up on the floor of the Senate in a few days.
He has also solidified his position in the party enough to win Tinubu’s support for the coveted position of Senate President.
Little wonder the group known as Arewa Professionals in the United Kingdom (AP-UK) has backed Akpabio’s ambition and described Abdulazeez Yari’s aspiration as selfish and greedy.
A statement issued by the 654-member Arewa think-tank and signed by its President, Mr Yunana Shibkau, expressed reservations on Yari’s aspiration for the office of Senate President.
In the statement, Shibkau called on Senator Yari to drop his ambition and accept the position of his party, the All Progressives Congress (APC), which has adopted Senator Godswill Akpabio as the next Senate President.
Shibkau, who was a Special Assistant to former Governor of Zamfara State, Alhaji Sani Yerima, between 2001 and 2003, said it is common knowledge that the basis for any viable democracy, especially in a diverse and complex country like Nigeria, is fair and equitable sharing of critical political offices.
“It will therefore be in the best interest of the nation and our democracy to ensure that the next Senate President of Nigeria in 2023 emerges from the South as agreed upon by the APC leadership.
“We want to remind these disgruntled senators that the North had the country’s President for eight years, as well as the Senate President. In the spirit of oneness, the next Senate President should come from the South.
“We have uncovered a grand design and a dangerous plot by some disgruntled and uncivilised politicians from the North to destabilise the incoming administration of Bola Ahmed Tinubu. This is a warning to those politicians that we will mobilise discerning northern youths against them.
“We need a Senate President that possesses instinct, diligence and national interest, a refusal to be bound by the parochial concerns of one’s own personal gain, unfortunately all these are lacking in Yari and fully possessed by Akpabio.
“At this moment in our nation, the 10th Senate President should be a person representing known schools of thought on societal transformation. He should be a person who can express ideas with a sound understanding of the various differences in the various aspects of economic, political and social life”, the group said in the statement.
Shibkau said that the leadership of the Senate requires intellectual disposition and sagacity to be in a position to come up with and discuss solutions to various national problems.
“The Senate President should be able to provide solutions to the upsurge in insecurity and disunity, growing inflation and unemployment, providing alternatives to borrowing for developments whilst paying up overdue debts”, he added.
However, Akpabio is facing charges from the Economic and financial Crimes Commission(EFCC). He has been on the radar of the EFCC for a long time for allegations dating back to his time as governor.
Orji Uzor Kalu
Orji Uzor Kalu, a former Governor of Abia State, is a force to reckon with in the ruling APC. He is also the current Chief Whip in the Senate. Although he comes from a region dominated by the opposition, he has not only been the face of APC in the region but also went on to build strong relationships in the party, becoming a close ally of outgoing Senate President Ahmed Lawan.
Many watchers of political developments in the country believe the South-East deserves to produce the next Senate President and Kalu should be the man from the region for the position. Kalu, as a Christian, they argued, would balance the APC’s Muslim-Muslim ticket.
While Orji Kalu is influential within the party, particularly in the legislature, he is burdened by the weight of corruption cases and allegations that hang around his neck.
Osita Izunaso
Senator Osita Izunaso is a Christian from the South-East. He also possesses the requisite experience, being a ranking senator.
Political analysts believe that unlike Akpabio and Kalu, Izunaso has a clean record, with regard to the issue of corruption.
This Imo West lawmaker has paid his dues in the APC. He was a member of the merger committee that mid-wived APC and became the founding National Organising Secretary. He has the best and most robust understanding of the National Assembly, having served as an aide to both presiding officers of the assembly before being elected into both the green and red chambers.
The only disadvantaged for Izunaso is that he is contesting against big names that have been dominant in the nation’s political and legislative landscape in the past four years.
Senator Sani Musa
He is a two-term Senator from Niger State in the North-Central geopolitical zone, a sub-region that is also accusing the APC of marginalisation in the current zoning formula.
However, Musa, being a Muslim like the President-elect and Vice President-elect, enjoys tremendous support from his party members.
However, the North-Central, where he comes from, has been subsumed by its close alliance with the far North.
The North-central seems to have been forgotten in the scheme of things and Sani Musa, who has enjoyed a good stay in the National Assembly as the current Chairman of the Senate Services Committee, wields great influence within the red chamber, even vying for the position of party chairman in 2022 before stepping down for the National Chairman of the party, Abdullahi Adamu, in compliance with the party’s directive.
Abdulazeez Yari
Yari is a former Governor of Zamfara State and he was instrumental to the formation of the APC. In 2015, he became the Chairman of the Nigerian Governors’ Forum.
Yari has been a big player in APC, even gunning for the party’s Chairmanship position during the last special convention of the party.
Yari, who is believed to possess huge financial resources to back his ambition, is however considered to be controversial, particularly within the APC, as many members cited the disqualification of the party from governance in the state in 2019 largely blamed on the crisis between him and Kabiru Marafa.
AYO ESAN, has been actively reporting and analyzing political events for different newspapers for over 18 years. He has also successfully covered national and state elections in Nigeria since the inception of this democracy in 1999.
