GOOLUCK JONATHAN AS A CANDIDATE – 1

GOOLUCK JONATHAN AS A CANDIDATE – 1
By Onesimus Enesi
Until Professor Jega and his electoral commission say otherwise, it is assumed that there will be a general election by next year. There is muted news in the air that President Jonathan is likely to be a candidate in the election – that is, if his party nominates him as its candidate. The Peoples Democratic Party will soon conduct its primaries which will supposedly give all aspirants equal opportunity to vie. All these are so far, mere assumptions.
For one, President Jonathan has not declared his intention to run. For another, his party is already squabbling over a so-called gentleman’s agreement on zoning. For selfish political expediency, power rotation is now touted as zoning, whereas zoning is simply a distribution of high political offices in constituencies so as to ensure an acceptable spread – so that no area or people suffers undue disadvantage.
Rotation of power was called power-shift following the annulment of a validly won election in 1993. Chief M.K.O. Abiola from the South West won the election but annulled by General Ibrahim Babangida from the North West. Power shift therefore, is confined to the office of the President only and in the states, the office of the Governor. But in the on-going debate as to the merits and demerits of power rotation, everyone seems to forget that zoning and rotation is not exactly the same thing.
Why, if we may ask, must a Party’s arrangement become a national policy? Is it because the PDP is the current ruling Party? If so, is the current debate based on the assumption that what is good for the PDP is good for all political parties or the whole country? The way the Northern Governors and political leaders are going about the debate, it would appear as if the PDP’s internal agreement is superior to the provisions of the Constitution which gives every Nigerian the right to contest for any public office of their choice.
The PDP and its Northern leaders ought to remember that they supposed to be for all Nigerians and not a section. The proponents of power rotation could not see far as to know that the power-shift crusade of 1993 to 1999 is not the same as power rotation of 1999 to 2010. Power shift was achieved when power shifted to the South West in 1999. Power rotation commenced in 2007 and was disrupted by Umaru Yar’Adua’s death in May 2010. If power rotation turned out to be shortsighted, there is no one to be blamed but its authors, death and the Constitution. Its authors because they did not envisage that if the President is impeached or dies in office, the vice president automatically steps in.
Death is to be blamed for it gives no notice that it will come to take away the President before his term of office expires. The 1999 constitution takes its own blame for stipulating that the offices of the President and Vice President must come from different geo-political zones. As it is, the North must come to terms with fate and so, her attempt to elevate a Party’s internal policy over and above the country’s constitution will not auger well for the country. If the constitution is superior to other laws or conventions, it follows that PDP’s power rotation agreement is inferior, more so when that agreement is its internal affairs.
However, there is the genuine argument that every member of the PDP who are privy to that rotational arrangement is bound by honour to abide by it. And President Jonathan is a member of the party. The issue here, to my mind, is not a moral one, since power is not the patrimony of any section of the country. The issue is if Jonathan will differ to his party and forgo his constitutional rights. In facts, much more than that is the fundamental rights of choice. Put on a scale, I would say that President Jonathan’s fundamental human and constitutional rights weigh more than mere party expedient policies or agreement.
As it is, the two sides to the agreement cannot change the constitution nor can they impose it on the whole country. It is therefore left to the PDP either to bend its policy to accommodate all contestants, or expel those who insist on contesting as against the party’s internal agreement. The easiest way out for the PDP is to kick out Jonathan and nominate a Northerner as its presidential candidate in order to preserve its rotational agreement. Whether they have the nerve to sanction a sitting president by stopping him from the contest remain to be seen.
From the history of the PDP, internal democracy is inferior to consensual ‘agreement’. No one is on record to have won any primaries except those ordained by godfathers. Even when the party or their government initiates reform, they are always dead on arrival. Remember the local government reforms, the economic reforms and the latest electoral reform? It means there must be some other means or method by which the party wins elections since it is so pervasively averse to democratic practice; but this is a subject for another day.
On the other hand, the ability of Candidate Jonathan to insist on running – if and when he so decides – is yet to be seen. He has his immediate constituency to think about. He helped to bring about the appeasement and amnesty in the Niger Delta. He is saddled with the responsibility of making the amnesty work. He has such a short time to do so, given his other enormous responsibility to the country. Those against his candidature may adduce the foregoing and more popular reasons, but it does not mean that they are right or wrong. After all, there is no way he can achieve adequate national security, sustainable power supply, ensure free and fair polls, implement the amnesty programme – all in a space of one year!
But we must also ask whether Jonathan has the nerve to run and risk expulsion by his party. Can he afford to dump the PDP and seek election via another party? Has the PDP what it taxes to fight from the outside? We shall find out soon.
THE CANDIDATURE OF GOODLUCK JONATHAN - 2
By what other means did the Peoples Democratic Party won all these election or re-run election between 2007 & 2009? And by what means do they hope to win the next general elections? If the PDP cling to its zoning policy, it means President Jonathan will be out of contention in the party and a northerner is likely to emerge as its candidate. And here is a snag – a big one.
The PDP doesn’t have what it takes to complete in a free and fair contest. Apart from their dismal failure in all area of development and democratic practice, it knows only one way of winning; via Gerrymandering or power manipulation! Call it executive rigging – a sophisticated method of winning and knowing the exact result of an election ever before it takes place. It is that their patrons must be in power to conduct the election (as in 1999) or one of their own must be in charge (as in 2003 and 2007).
Power manipulation is a game in which all rules must be bent, all convention broken and time honoured practices dishonoured for the purpose of wining. To be absolutely sure of `success’, it must be the PDP’s man who must be the president and the chairman of INEC. Which is why they did not wait for their own initiated reform to appoint the new INEC executives? Having done so, they have boxed themselves into a corner: they must nominate Goodluck Jonathan whose hands are now at the levers of power or risk loosing the next election. Knowing the leaders of the PDP as we all do, they would endure to have Jonathan as their candidate and a President till 2015 when the North may then take another turn at the Presidency. Note that there is a continuous assumption that the PDP must win, never lose regardless of their abject poverty of ideas on development.
If by any squeak of chance, the Party stick to its zoning agreement, then President Jonathan is free to seek to actualize his ambition on the Platform of any other Party. He would breach no law and instead, will treat the path taken by others before him. After all, Atiku Abubakar, a veteran Presidential race-runner clutched to the mandate of the PDP and yet run the race with the ticket of AC in 2007. In the poverty development party, it is the norm to dine with the wolves and run with the hare at the same time.
On this score, Candidate Jonathan suffers no stigma, after all. He was not elected on any Party’s ticket as President but made so by the doctrine of necessity of the National Assembly. Electoral gerrymandering and power manipulation has served the ruling party so well that it appears they can only be defeated by the same instruments. When a party wins electoral contest by gang-raping democracy in public glare (the gang, comprising of the electoral umpire, the security and defense agencies and the Party in power) what hope is there that Nigeria will ever experience or enjoy democracy-with the PDP in the saddle?
So far, President Jonathan suffers no defect as a Presidential material except those inflicted on him by his membership of the PDP. If he chose to run as an independent candidate or on the platform of another Party, his chances of running a clean campaign and supervising a free election will be brighter. This is based on the general perception of the electorate that the ruling Party is incapable of conducting a fraud free election.
As if other aspirants are scared, none has come out of the East and the West yet. The field is left wide open to aspirants such as General Ibrahim Babangida, Muhammadu Buhari, Aliyu Gusau and Alh. Atiku Abubakar – all from the North. Except for Buhari who now has a brand new Party on which platform he will run his race, the three others are jostling for the PDP’s ticket – presumably against Goodluck Jonathan – a development that will brighten the chances of Buhari and Jonathan – should he run via another Party. Has he the courage to dump the PDP?
Analysts are of the view that of the five presidential aspirants, three are non-starters for various reasons. One is said to be a political leper across the country that, everyone seem ready to despoil. The second is believed to be a confirmed party prostitute who has offended the sensibilities of various parties by flirting. The third is reported to be incapable of running a presidential race, given his narrow electoral exposure and limited political savvy.
In effect, only two candidates may be said to be available so far for the race. All these factors are not against Goodluck Jonathan as infact, they are rather in his favour. If a claim to the leadership of the country is the issue, the South-South has more right to it than any other zone. Infact, the North ought not to be in contention as they have ruled Nigeria more than any other region. In terms of the resources which sustain the country, the South-South contributes more than 80% to the coffers of Nigeria.
Again, Nigeria is not only for the big three: the Hausa-Fulani, Yoruba and Igbo but for all ethnic nations in the country. President Goodluck Jonathan is a Nigerian of Ijaw ethnic nationality and one of the minority ethnic groups of the South. If he joins the race for the Presidency, he is likely to win the sympathy and support of most minority ethnic groups in the country. They would feel for one of their own – because combined, they are numerically in majority but for their lack of organization.
If numerically and economically, the candidature of Goodluck Jonathan is justified, he only needs courage and mobilizations to break the jinx and contest next year’s presidential election – and possibly win. Is Goodluck Jonathan bold? Time will tell.