Chieftain of the All Progressives Congress, Osita Okechukwu, has dismissed as ‘wishful thinking’, calls by former presidential candidate, Atiku Abubakar and Professor Pat Utomi for a strong coalition against the ruling party in the next general elections.
Reacting to the victory of the new Senegalese President, Bassirou Faye, the former Vice President had said a coalition of opposition parties could dislodge the APC in 2027.
But reacting through a statement at the weekend, who recalled the implosion within the People’s Democratic Party over disagreement on zoning of the Presidency to the South declared that the opposition figures in Nigeria were bereft of the consensus spirit which worked for the counterpart in Senegal.
Okechukwu reminded merger canvassers to study the large-hearted political engineering that enabled opposition to take over in Senegal, recalling how in 2014, Ousmane Sonko invited his friend and fellow tax collector, Bassirou Diomaye Faye, and other emergent political actors to form a political party, PASTEF (African Patriots of Senegal for Work, Ethics and Fraternity).
Okechukwu noted that PASTEF or Patriots of Senegal, which was led by Sonko was dominated by young Senegalese with Faye serving as the Secretary General while Sonko was the leader.
He stated: “I want to inform the former Vice President that in 2017, although PASTEF only secured only one seat out of 165 in the Legislative election, in 2019, Sonko contested as the Presidential candidate, while Faye was his campaign manager.
“Then, three years later, PASTEF garnered 56 out of the 165 seats contested at the National Assembly election. The 2022 election showed that Sonko has emerged as a strong contender for the 2024 Presidential poll.
“Sonko and Faye were jailed and released by President Macky Sall less than 12 days to the election, Sanko endorsed Faye as his presidential candidate and Senegalese people joined to elect him as President.”
Okechukwu said he decided to tell” the long story so as to convince Atiku, Utomi and Co, who were with us during the APC’s merger in 2013 that the formation of broad-based political coalition is not a hundred metres dash neither can it be pulled off by leaders that insist on being on the ballot.
“Finally, unlike Sonko, who yielded space for Faye to take the Presidential ticket, Atiku’s breach of the rotation convention and blatant refusal to back either younger Peter Obi or Nyesom Wike; hence contested against the Southern Presidential aspirants in the 2023 poll showed that he cannot walk the talk of building strong coalition.”
On the possibility that the persistent calls for merger hyped by Atiku for opposition political parties to forge a formidable coalition to oust the APC like the PDP was defeated in 2015, Okechukwu said circumstances on the ground make that a tall order.
“Nigerians know that all the leading presidential candidates in 2023 were all neo-liberals. For instance, like Tinubu, Atiku and Obi agreed to remove fuel subsidy and to harmonise the foreign exchange rate. “Since they all belong to the neo-liberal school of thought and are capitalists, they better support Mr President, because the success of Tinubu’s economic reforms is better for such students more than those of us who subscribe to the belief that government has business in our welfare.”
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