After losing its bid for the presidency in three consecutive election cycles, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) is facing the challenge of resurrection and resurgence. Deputy Political Editor RAYMOND MORDI examines the woes of the former ruling and why it is not likely to get it right in the next election cycle.
Following the outcome of last Thursday’s Supreme Court ruling, the dream of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) of upturning the victory of President Bola Tinubu in the February 25, 2023, presidential election, has ended. As the court of the last resort, it means that the PDP must wait for the next four years for another bid to return to power at the centre.
After losing its bid for the presidency in three consecutive election cycles, the PDP is facing the challenge of resurrection and resurgence. From all indications, Thursday’s Supreme Court verdict is a major setback for the party; it now finds itself in a tight corner, with little room to manoeuvre. Observers believe that it must put its house in order if it is to make any headway during the next election cycle in 2027. Following its defeat in the just concluded election, there are indications that the party stakeholders are interested in rebuilding it, to go back to its winning ways.
As victory became elusive, things fell apart within the party. For instance, the erstwhile PDP National Chairman, Dr Iyorchia Ayu, who was at the centre of the crisis that undermined its performance in the recent general election, was suspended by his ward executives. He was subsequently sacked from office, after the gamble to return to power on February 25, 2023, failed. This is a signal that the rebuilding process is underway. In that development, members of Igyorov Ward, Gboko Local Government of Benue State, passed a vote of no confidence on Dr Ayu over alleged anti-party activities during the March 18, 2023, governorship and state assembly elections. The executives allege that the former national chairman did not vote during the election and that he worked for the success of his party in the election.
With last Thursday’s Supreme Court verdict, it is now inevitable for the party to get its acts together, otherwise, it stands to lose what amounts to its last strongholds, after it was dislodged from some of its erstwhile domains in the last general elections. The first step is to get a new national chairman who can rally the support of the aggrieved members and work for the repositioning of the party.
However, observers believe that reconciling the warring factions would not be an easy task because of the vested interests of the disparate groups tearing the party apart. Some of the party’s leaders complain that there are moles planted by the ruling party in some PDP state chapters. One such leader who does not want his name in print said: “I think some people are just working for the APC and pretending to be with us. These people worked for the APC during the election, after pretending to be with us all through the campaign. All because we’ve been out of power for a long time and our people are languishing for lack of patronage. Many are buffeted and demoralised. If the party must survive, there is a need for everyone to be involved.”
In the same vein, former Minister of Aviation and a chieftain of the party from Anambra State, Osita Chidoka has warned his colleagues that the party could become extinct if reforms are not made urgently. Chidoka expressed concern that the PDP lost some of its strongholds to the Labour Party (LP) in the last general election and that the PDP needs to do something to avoid going into extinction.
The former minister said: “Now, we are beginning to see that the PDP needs to be reformed. It needs to renew and reinvent itself to be able to begin to play the role of opposition, knowing full well that we have a politician as president. If the PDP doesn’t get its acts together, it will be an extinct party.”
One of the names being touted for the position is that of the former Senate president and ex-governor of Kwara State, Dr Bukola Saraki. One of his close associates and the National Coordinator of the Saraki Support Group for the 2023 presidential election, Osaro Onaiwu, has already indicated that there is a lot of pressure from the people of the North Central, urging him to come and rebuild the party. “A lot of the people in the country, particularly those from the North Central and across other zones want him to come and rebuild the party,” he was quoted as saying.
He added: “As it stands, he is the only one that can bring everyone back to the table; he is a unifying factor; the bridge between the old and the young, the South and the North. He has done it before during the reconciliation of the party; he went round the country, so he will do it if he accepts the job.”
A former presidential aspirant on the platform of the PDP, Dr Nwachukwu Anakwenze, has also hailed the choice of Senator Saraki to replace Dr Ayu as national chairman. In a statement, Anakwenze, however, urged the leadership of the party to pick a southern candidate if Saraki eventually emerges as the new national chairman. He said Saraki is eminently qualified to lead the party at “this crucial time and reconcile all the aggrieved members and groups within the party”.
In addition, a video that recently went viral on social media, of the former Rivers State governor and current Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Nyesom Wike cooking for Saraki and a group of people suggests that the former Senate president paid a courtesy visit to the minister’s house in Abuja. There is no indication as to when the video was recorded, but it gave the impression that the former Rivers governor and Saraki enjoy a cordial relationship. Wike is the leader of a faction of the PDP that is at loggerheads with the leadership of the party headed by the former vice president and presidential flag bearer in the recent election, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar.
Those rooting for Saraki to become the party’s next national chairman may have their reasons for doing so and it may not be unconnected with calculations ahead of the 2027 general elections. Similarly, a source close to the Atiku camp said associates of the former vice president are pushing for former Senate president, David Mark, also from North Central like Saraki, as the next PDP chairman. The source said the Atiku camp is pushing for Mark, to assume the chairmanship of the party. He said the Atiku camp is not comfortable with the leadership of Umar Damagum who assumed the role of acting national chairman following Ayu’s suspension. He said the group perceives Damagum to be closely associated with Wike who is currently serving as minister in the Bola Tinubu-led APC government.
Meanwhile, Wike who openly supported the then APC candidate during the recent election has indicated that he would support Tinubu in the 2027 election for a second term. In an apparent reference to Atiku, he added that those who scored 2,000 in the 2023 elections (in Rivers State) would score next to nothing in 2027. The minister made the declaration while receiving leaders of the Rivers APC led by the National Vice Chairman (South-South), Victor Giadom.
The former Rivers governor also said he has no regrets about supporting President Tinubu in the last general election because he was out to ensure equity and justice. He said: “Let me say clearly and to the hearing of everyone: we owe a duty to continue to support Mr President irrespective of the political party we belong. My position is not hidden. I owe nobody no apologies that I stand firm with Tinubu. I stand for equity, fairness and justice.”
The party has itself to blame for its recent woes. During its 16-year reign, it was something of a behemoth. But, it fell from Olympian heights to an abysmal chasm, because those who called the shots within the party during those years were not interested in having a viable political platform with an enduring institutional framework. They were more interested in self-aggrandizing pursuits than the interest of the party.
Eight years after it first lost power at the centre, nothing has changed. For instance, indications are that the party lost the recent 2023 general elections because it discarded its power rotation arrangement or zoning, which ironically was one of the major reasons why it lost the presidency in 2015.
The Southeast used to be a stronghold of the party. However, its dominance in the region has been threatened by the emergence of the LP as a third force in Nigeria’s politics. The Southeast voted predominantly for the LP in the just concluded election. The region, which used to vote for the PDP in past elections chose to back the LP to protest against the injustice of giving its ticket to a northern in violation of the zoning agreement. In the same spirit, the presidential candidate of the LP in the 2023 general election, Peter Obi, dumped the PDP before the party’s presidential primary last year when it became obvious that the party bigwigs were not prepared to zone the presidency to the South, in accordance with the zoning formula enshrined in its constitution.
Obi’s defection from the PDP to the LP turned the hitherto insignificant political platform into a party capable of making an impact at the national level. It capitalised on the APC’s Muslim-Muslim ticket by appealing to voters in the dominant Christian South, the Middle Belt and parts of the Northeast. Besides, its aggressive campaign appealed to the youth who appeared to be fed up with the two major parties, the APC and the PDP.
With the benefit of hindsight, the participation of Obi in the 2023 presidential election on the platform of the LP caused more damage to the PDP, than the APC, because it easily made inroads into places hitherto considered as strongholds of the main opposition party.
Besides, before the 2023 election, the PDP was hit by a gale of defections. This is primarily because the PDP has not done well as an opposition party. Since it became an opposition party in 2015, efforts to challenge the ruling APC and regain power at the centre have been hampered by a serious internal rift among its leaders over how its affairs have been handled by those who call the shots within the fold. It was such an internal rift that led to the party’s defeat once again in the recent 2023 general election.
Going by the rotation or zoning, which had been in place since the return to civil rule in 1999, it was the turn of the South to produce the party’s presidential flag bearer. The immediate past President Muhammadu Buhari, who hails from Daura, Katsina State in the Northwest geopolitical zone, vacated the position after serving for the maximum two terms of four years each allowed by the constitution.
The PDP shot itself in the foot when it decided to throw its presidential ticket open to contestants from all parts of the country. It committed a blunder by reneging on the zoning principle enshrined in its constitution. This was caused by the desperation to return to power at the centre at all costs. The party was probably eyeing the kind of bulk votes from the Northwest and the Northeast that catapulted Buhari to victory in 2015 and 2019. The cash-strapped opposition party also used the no-zoning verdict to ensure that Atiku gets the ticket and bankrolls the project with his megabucks.
The emergence of Atiku as the PDP candidate in last year’s primary divided the party. The leadership crisis, which is yet to be resolved, is threatening to tear it apart. Ahead of the election, stakeholders dissipated energy trying to manage the crisis; instead of concentrating on the task ahead as a united family. Wike who came second in the party’s presidential primary was the arrowhead of the opposition against the PDP flag bearer and its leadership. He was backed by some fellow governors, including Seyi Makinde (Oyo), Okezie Ikpeazu (Abia), Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi (Enugu) and Samuel Ortom (Benue). Other governors, including Aminu Tambuwal (Sokoto), Ifeanyi Okowa (Delta), Duoye Diri (Bayelsa), Darius Ishaku (Taraba), Ahmadu Fintiri (Adamawa) and Godwin Obaseki (Edo) supported Atiku, while some chose to remain neutral.
The crisis was eventually narrowed down to the removal of Dr Ayu as national chairman, but the Atiku camp remained obdurate, saying invariably it doesn’t matter if both the party’s national chairman and presidential candidate come from the same region.
