Hajiya Habibah Ireti Kingibe is many things rolled into one. The wife of a former Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Ambassador Babagana Kingibe, is an activist, a politician and a trained engineer. Hopefully, if everything goes as planned next year, she plans to expand her resume when she is elected to the Senate of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. Ironically, she hopes to achieve this feat on the platform of the Labour Party and what this means by extension is her open endorsement of the presidential ambition of former governor of Anambra State, Peter Obi.
Not a few Nigerians have applauded Hajiya Ireti Kingibe for the decision to achieve her political dreams on the platform of the Labour Party, especially as her husband has openly endorsed Bola Ahmed Tinubu, the presidential candidate of the All Progressives Congress.
That aside, Ireti, who is the younger sister to Nigeria’s former First Lady, Ajoke Muhammed, will have a tough hurdle to scale, defeating the incumbent of the constituency she hopes to represent, AMAC/Bwari Area Council, Federal Capital Territory. Philip Aduda of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), the lawmaker representing the constituency is said to be invincible to his political opponents.
Aduda has been a member of the National Assembly, first in the House of Representatives and later as a senator. Since then, he has straddled the landscape like a colossus and is currently serving his third term in the Senate. He got his party’s nod to run for a fourth term in 2023. If he wins, he would be the longest-serving lawmaker in the National Assembly. That is the person Ireti plans to battle at the general elections in 2023.
With feelers emerging from the electorate in the FCT projecting the Labour Party as the favoured party in the territory, Ireti’s candidacy is already disrupting the feathers of the old order. However, Aduda will not go down easily without a fight. One wonders if her diplomat husband will use his clout to help her achieve her desires against the old horse despite his opposing views.
Ivory Ukonu is a versatile journalist with many years of experience, with entertainment and society reporting as her area of core competence.
