ISAAC SHOBAYO looks at the views expressed over the choice of the Plateau State governor, Simon Lalong, as the Director-general of the APC Presidential Campaign Council and the burden it places on the governor.
This is not the best of time for Governor Simon Bako Lalong of Plateau State, particular since his appointment as the Director General of the All Progressives Congress Presidential Campaign Council. Not only have strong criticisms trailed the announcement, he has also been pilloried for daring to accept such a Herculean responsibility from the party.
Many were taken aback that the governor is not fighting against his party’s choice of same-faith ticket for its presidential and vice presidential candidates. People were expecting he would be in the vanguard of the campaign against the decision, especially in the Middle Belt, considering the outcry against the policy.
The choice of Lalong as the Director General and his acceptance is viewed from different perspectives among the Christians in the North, precisely in the Middle Belt. The deluge of reactions currently trailing the appointment has clearly shown that the governor will have his hands full on the matter and some related issues to contend with when campaign commences in September.
There are those who believe, for reasons of satisfying the Christians in the North and the South and not to paint the APC as a party of religious bigots, that Lalong being a Christian from the North ought to have turned down the offer, especially with the APC presidential candidate, Senator Bola Tinubu, having failed to factor him into consideration while scouting the North for a running mate.
A social commentator, Ibrahim Alhassan, opined that Governor Lalong would have distanced himself from such appointment having being betrayed by his colleagues from the North.
He posited that the governor being a chairman Northern Governors Forum led the push for the presidential ticket to be zoned to the southern part of the country when it was obvious that some cabal within the APC were attempting to circumvent the zoning arrangement.
According to him, the choice of a southern candidate was to pave the way for Christian in the North to be presidential running mate.
But in spite of the barrage of condemnations, Governor Lalong seems unruffled. In a recent statement by his director of press affairs, Dr Makut Simon Macham, the governor defended his appointment as a plus and not a minus to Plateau and the ruling party.
He pointed out that those kicking against his appointment on account of religion never threw their weight behind the aspiration of the Christians during the primary nor championed the choice of a North-Central to be vice president.
“Some people who are shouting on top of their voices never supported Christian aspirants during the primary and also sidelined the North-Central zone and prospective nominees for the vice presidency from the zone and Plateau State because of selfishness,” he said.
Miffed by the governor’s comment, a group christened North-Central APC Forum recently described the appointment as an insult, degrading and making the region irrelevant in the political calculations of the country.
The group, in a statement by its spokesman. Saleh Zazzaga, said if the North-Central zone is not good or qualified enough for the presidential ticket because the party thinks nobody from the region has the political weight to pull votes from the Northern region for the party come 2023, how come then has the party or presidential candidate in the person of Tinubu become so trustful of someone from the regions to become the presidential campaign organisation Director General?
«Our concern in the 2023 elections is that of North-Central zone has either the president or vice president, but we were denied because they consider us either not qualified or competent enough. But as soon as it comes to Director General of the presidential campaign we suddenly become the most qualified.
Also, a group under the aegis of Concern Christians on the Plateau (CCP), had staged the rally in Abuja, threatening that Plateau Christians will not support Lalong in “the suspicious engagement or assignment.”
The group said it was completely out of place for the same APC that rejected Lalong as vice-presidential candidate allegedly based on incompetence to appoint him as campaign DG in order to seek Christian votes.
In his response, the governor urged Nigerians to grow above ethnic or religious sentiments, saying he has accepted the job and there was nothing anybody could do to dissuade him from continuing to work for his party.
Amidst the pressure on him to reject the appointment, Governor Lalong, while addressing the State House correspondents after his visit to President Muhammadu Buhari last Wednesday, declared that as a devout Catholic, the Pope has not told him that accepting to lead the Muslim-Muslim ticket was wrong.
He said being an ardent member of the Catholic faith, baptized and confirmed, and with the highest award from the papacy, Knight of Saint Gregory the Great, the Pope has not told him that it was wrong for him to be the DG of a Muslim-Muslim presidential campaign team.
“As a Catholic, everything we do, we send the advice to the Pope. The Pope has not told me that what I’m doing is bad to accept the Director-General. As a Catholic, we take that direction,” Lalong said.
He told State House Correspondents that the Pleateau State Chapter of the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) came to the Yakubu Gowon Airport, Jos to welcome him after his appointment as the APC presidential campaign DG.
Lalong explained that the appointment was strictly a party affair and had nothing to do with religion. He denied the allegation that he lobbied to become the running mate of the APC presidential candidate.
He said: “Some people said because I was denied VP. I did not lobby for VP. Yes, many people were lobbying and writing on my behalf. But what I have always wanted to be is to obtain form for is Senate, which I have done. I have a senatorial ticket that I am waiting for. So, if at any time some people who wanted to be VP lost out and they’re using religion, they should not use me to help them.
“We are already far. We are talking about leadership. We are talking about addressing the problems of Nigeria, and all we are talking about is good leadership that can come from any region.”
However his reference to Pope did not go down well with Catholics. In a swift reaction, angry members of the Roman Catholic Church condemned Governor Simon Lalong’s reference to the Pope in defence of his acceptance to serve as Director General of APC presidential campaign for the 2023 election.
But the governor in a swift reaction Friday, said his reference to the Pope was a mark of reverence, not ridicule as perceived by some Nigerians.
From all indications, Governor Lalong has made up his mind and there is no going back over the appointment. The question is: how will he pacify and assuage the feelings of the Christians in the North or rather convince the church, especially within the Middle Belt to fall for the Muslim-Muslim ticket of his party.
An observer, David Sheme, posited that the governor did not adequately gauge mood and the feelings of the Christians in the North before taking up the offer, adding that he was appointed for damage control which is an uphill task for the moment.
Said he: “Though his primary assignment is to coordinate the campaign all over the country, he is likely to encounter more problem in the course of this assignment withing the Christian communities in the North, especially from the North Central.”
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