By this day, May 29, 2023, a newly elected President of the Federal Republic would have been sworn in. Which would mean the third successful transition of power from civillian to civillian had taken place, thereby firmly placing Nigeria among the world’s leading democracies.
I am an optimist with a faith stronger than that of steel that our dear country will pull through the current challenges of political machinations by a few rabble rousers trying to heat up the polity for the advantage of their 2023 aspiration.
These “basket of deplorables”, to borrow the phrase from former US democratic presidential candidate, Hillary Clinton, do not have strong political base in their constituencies, let alone nationwide support.
In their low-gumptioned antic, playing the ethnic and religious cards is the surest way for them to gain political traction and hence the noise about herders in the South, restructuring and regional security outfit.
Surpringly, some of these low-grade politicians who have become advocates of doom that have been clandestinely supporting sescessionist groups are in fact bonafide members of the ruling party, the APC, in the Southwest with their main objective being to scuttle the ambition of their son and the party’s best potential candidate, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu.
It is no secret that over 50 percent of those who matter today in the Sothwest APC are his mentees that directly benefited from his magnanimity. Yet, they chose to show their ingratitude by not only rebelling against him, but are allegedly behind the #EndSARS riot in Lagos that principally targeted his assets and those of government for destruction.
I have said this before and will repeat it again – APC cannot run away from zoning. The Southwest APC under the able leadership of Tinubu has been largely instrumental to the success of the Party both in 2015 and 2019. Therefore, the gesture should be reciprocated for the sake of fairplay.
I have also mentioned somewhere in my previous write-ups that during the talks that led to the formation of the APC, I personally witnessed the Asiwaju in action. I represented former Adamawa Governor, Admiral Murtala Nyako, on the pre-merger high level meetings, including the ones that took place in his (Tinubu’s) Abuja home, the APC secretariat and elsewhere.
I have previously predicted and will continue to stand on it that, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu and a Northern christian as vice president will be a sure ticket to win, even if PDP put forward a Northern presidential candidate with a Southern runningmate or a Southern presidential candidate and a Northern running mate.
The Southwest deserves to produce the next President, with or without zoning. Politics is all about numbers and forged alliances. The APC as a Party is strong today because of the alliance between the North and the Southwest. It will only be fair, they (Southwest) produce the next presidential candidate. The North has to reciprocate the gesture.
Iyawa is Nigeria’s former Ambassador to Mexico
