LEON USIGBE reviews the issues leading to the poor performance of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in the just concluded Ekiti State gubernatorial election and highlights its implications for the forthcoming Osun exercise.
The attempt by Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) to reclaim the governorship seat of Ekiti State ended in a spectacular failure earlier this month when its candidate was thrashed by Biodun Oyebanji of the All Progressives Congress (APC).
For the former ruling party in the state, the election was not even close as its de facto faction, the Social Democratic Party (SDP), whose candidate, Chief Segun Oni, joined barely a few months earlier, came second with an impressive haul of votes that confirmed the relegation of the Ekiti PDP to the doldrums. But the outcome of the election was not exactly unexpected.
The build-up suggested that the PDP was in no position to return to power in Ekiti, despite the braggadocios disposition of the acclaimed leader of the party and former two-term governor, Ayo Fayose, who, as far as the party national hierarchy of the party is concerned, appropriated its structure unduly and brought it to the level of asphyxiation.
Fayose was seen as overbearing and not given to brooking internal dissent in the Ekiti chapter of the PDP such that whoever had a contrary view to his position was considered a rebel that must be cast aside.
Senator Biodun Olujimi, a senator representing Ekiti Central and veteran of the internal war of attrition in Ekiti PDP, had on occasions accused Fayose of taking advantage of her gender to try to run her out of the scheme of things in the party after the former governor had accused her of being an APC mole.
“We don’t have time for a loser who is being used by APC to destabilise the Ekiti PDP. If she wants to leave PDP, she can leave. She has the right to ventilate her frustration having failed to take over PDP so that she can become the party’s standard-bearer in 2022,” Fayose had said through his spokesman, Lere Olayinka.
Convinced by his popularity among the people, Chief Oni thought that the Fayose machine had skewed everything against his emergence as the preferred candidate of the party in its governorship primary election and had to leave the PDP to actualize his aspiration to become the governor again under a new banner. “I do not like cheating. I don’t cheating and don’t like people to cheat. If I see a party that has no respect for its own rules, I see it as not my type of party,” Oni rationalised his exit from the PDP just before the last poll, adding: “I contested the PDP primary and it was supposed to be a secret ballot and the world saw how it became open to the extent that one man was being shown every ballot. I believe if the party meant business, it should have said no. If it aspires to rule Nigeria and put confidence in people, it would have said no. I detest cheating and don’t collaborate with cheats.”
Oni moved together with his supporters who were thought to be mainly PDP sympathizers to the SDP. Observers who sought a sign that the PDP was in trouble as far as the Ekiti gubernatorial poll was concerned did not need to look further. With Oni out and Olujimi unlikely to give 100 per cent backing to the Fayose anointed candidate, Bisi Kolawole, the PDP was doomed against the APC fighting force commanded by the incumbent state governor, Kayode Fayemi. Indeed, Olujimi betrayed her non-committal to the candidate when she said after casting her ballot that “whoever wins, wins.”
Again, an unhappy PDP national hierarchy showed little interest in the Ekiti governorship election because its effort to control the process had been hampered. Beyond raising the Oyo State governor, Seyi Makinde-led 83-member campaign council for the state, nothing else was done in real times to canvass for the support of the people. The national leadership led by Dr Iyorchia Ayu and even the presidential candidate of the party and former vice president, Atiku Abubakar, who ought to lead the campaign to retrieve the state from the APC, stood aloof in apparent contempt, while Fayose exercised full control over the process.
It is no wonder, therefore, that there was no reaction from the PDP national leadership to the outcome of the election, unlike what it usually does whenever it loses or wins an election. Fayose has now blamed Ayu for the electoral defeat in Ekiti State.
Osun State governorship election is next and there are fears in some sections of the PDP that the outcome of the Ekiti exercise may impact negatively on its performance at the poll. Already, Fayose is threatening fire and brimstone over his snub in the composition of the national campaign council for the state headed by Governor Duoye Diri of Bayelsa State. He has described the council in very strong and unflattering terms, including that it is made up of “political charlatans” who cannot win election for the PDP. “Among the listed charlatans, none of them has achieved political status like myself, since I was the only one standing in Nigeria who has won an incumbent two times. So, my non-inclusions can only spell doom for the party in Osun,” he blurted.
Obviously aware of his current standing with the main opposition party, the former Ekiti State governor is also suggesting that, beyond the Osun election, the PDP cannot win the 2023 presidential election without himself and Governor Nyesom Wike of Rivers State, who he is trying to drag into the matter, despite the first runners-up in the just concluded PDP presidential primary not yet publicly voicing his intentions. Political watchers say Fayose also feels betrayed by the attitude of the Ayu-led national leadership of the PDP and may be spoiling to exact his pound of flesh. The Osun poll may be his first opportunity.
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