Date: 2013-12-28

The battle for 2015 general elections is gaining momentum on daily basis and all hands are on deck by political gladiators and their political parties to ensure that they outsmart one another in the contest.

If the ongoing scenario in the political system is anything to go by, the 2015 elections is going to be a straight fight between the ruling People’s Democratic Party (PDP) and the leading opposition party, the All Progressives Congress (APC). In the last few weeks, APC has been expanding its tentacles beyond its ruling states and getting stronger in preparations for 2015.

APC, which has 11 governors at its inception now has 16 governors in its fold with the recent defection of five out of the seven PDP governors, that formed the New PDP.

The alliance between the APC and the nPDP to work together to send the PDP parking from Aso Rock in 2015 has also made the opposition party to be stronger in their quest to oust the ruling party.

The recent defection of 37 PDP House of Representatives members to the APC on the floor of the House without any iota of doubt has changed the political calculation in the House.

It would be recalled that on Wednesday December 18 some PDP lawmakers in the House defected to APC. The decision was announced on the floor of the House in a letter read by the Speaker, Rt. Hon. Aminu Tambuwal. The defecting members in their letter, cited factionalisation and division in PDP as the reasons for their action.

They said that their action was in line with the provisions of Section 68 (1g) of the 1999 Constitution as amended. “Our 37 colleagues elected under the platform of PDP have decided to join APC as a result of the problems in our party and we have merged with APC according to Section 68 of our 1999 constitution,” Tambuwal told the House.

Those that defected to APC in the House include Abdulahi Balarabe (Sokoto), Abudulmumin Jibrin (Kano), Ali Ahmad (PDP), Kwara, Abudulahi Wamako (Sokoto), Aliyu Pategi (Kwara), Ahmed Zerewa, Aishatu Ahmed (Adamawa), Aiyedun Olayinka (Kwara), Alhassan Garba (Kano), Aliyu Madaki (Kano), Aliyu Shehu (Sokoto), Musa Sarkin-Adar (Sokoto), Aminu Shagari (Sokoto), Sa’ad Nabunkari (Sokoto), Sani Aliyu (Kano), Shuaibu Gobir (Sokoto), Aminu Suleiman (Kano), Aminu Tukur (Adamawa), Andrew Uchendu (Rivers), Asita Honourable (Rivers) and Bashir Babale (Kano).

Others are Blessing Usiegbe (Rivers), Dakuku Peterside (Rivers), Dawari George (Rivers), Gibson Nathaniel (Adamawa), Gogo Bright Tamuno (Rivers), Isa Bashir (Sokoto), Kabiru Achida (Sokoto), Maurice Pronen (Rivers), Sabo Mohammed, Mpigi Barinada (Rivers), Mukhtari Muhammad, Musa Ado (Kano), Mustapha Dawaki (Kano), Mustapha Mashood (Kwara), Ogbonna Nwuke (Rivers), Rafiu Ibrahim (Kwara), Sokonte Davies (Rivers), Umar Bature (Sokoto), Yusuph Dunari Sule (Jigawa) and Zakari Mohammed (Kwara).

Apart from the 37 lawmakers that defected to APC, Saturday Mirror also gathered from a reliable source that in a bid for APC to grab the leadership of the lower chamber of the National Assembly, APC’s chieftains and some of the defected PDP members in the House are working seriously to woo some principal officers of the House, who are currently in PDP to APC to increase the APC members in the House.

And if the move sees the light of the day APC, which now has majority in the House, may take over the leadership of the House and the change would definitely affect the present leadership of the House, a development that may portend danger to President Goodluck Jonathan-led PDP administration.

Prior to the defection of the 37 PDP lawmakers to APC, out of the 360 members of the House of Representatives, PDP has the majority in the House with 208 members while APC has 135 lawmakers.

Others are All Progressives Grand Alliance, APGA (5), Labour Party (8) and Accord Party (4). But with the recent development in the House, APC now has 172 members while PDP members have reduced to 171.

The numbers of Labour Party, Accord Party and APGA members remain as they were before the defection of the 37 lawmakers. While PDP was still battling with the defection of its members to APC and threatening to recall them , 79 PDP members in the National Assembly, which comprised of about 57 federal lawmakers and 22 senators obtained an order from the Federal High Court sitting in Abuja restraining PDP National Chairman, Alhaji Bamangar Tukur; Senate President, David Mark; Speaker, House of Representatives, Aminu Tambuwal and the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) from declaring their seats vacant when they eventually defect to another political party.

Commenting on the defection of the lawmakers while speaking at an empowerment programme in Kwara State, former governor of Kwara State and a Senator representing Kwara Central, Senator Bukola Saraki, described the defection of the lawmakers as a necessary action that would change the polity positively and provide good governance.

Apart from Saraki, many Nigerians are also of the view that the development in the House of Representatives is healthy for Nigeria’s democracy and provide robust representative at the floor of the House since the PDP nor APC constitute majority in the House, campared to when PDP was dominating with 208 members against 135 of APC.

No matter what the reaction of the PDP may be to the current issue, political analysts are of the view that the PDP is presently deadly hit with a devastating blow with the defection of the 37 lawmakers.

That, it is believed, is likely bound to shake it to its foundation, especially if some of the remaining PDP members in the House of Representatives and the Senate carry out their threat to defect to APC next month.

As part of the measures to prevent more PDP lawmakers from defecting to the APC, Saturday Mirror gathered that the PDP leadership is presently talking to the lawmakers promising them automatic ticket in 2015 if they remain in the PDP.

APC is also not resting on its oars as it is also allegedly promising those they are wooing with automatic tickets.

Irrespective of the step taken by the two political parties, one thing that is certain is that the lawmakers will dictate the tune in the current situation.

Considering the fact that PDP in the last few months have been badly hit by the defection of its members to the opposition party, PDP leaders are not presently comfortable. That is expected, anyway.

Some of them are working day and night to ensure that they do not lose more members of the party, having lost some of its founding members, chieftains and five governors, who were formerly members of the Alhaji Kawu Baraje-led New PDP to the APC. Speaking to Saturday Mirror, a PDP chieftain, Chief Taiwo Kuye, said that the defection of PDP lawmakers to APC is not going to have more effect on the PDP because APC does not produce majority anywhere.

His words: “It is not yet uhuru. The most publicised and acclaimed defection of PDP lawmakers to APC is not going to have more effect on the PDP because it does not produce majority anywhere.

If 37 defected from the ranks of the PDP that does not mean that APC is going to have majority in the House because we still have members of Labour Party, APGA and Accord Party in the House and they are friends of the PDP.

“What is happening is just political jamboree and I know that the 37 lawmakers and the five PDP governors that defected to APC at the end of the day will bite their finger. They will bite their fingers because majority of them played to the gallery and political foolishness.

I am sure that many of them going to APC will not even get return tickets. I don’t see the defection of the lawmakers as a threat to PDP.” Senator Gyang Pwajok, a PDP senator representing Plateau North said PDP would launch an aggressive campaign to regain the grounds it has lost to the massive onslaught by the APC.

“No doubt, the PDP has lost so much to the APC; we have maintained some studious silence and shall react like a wounded lion beginning from early 2014,” he said.

Deputy Majority Leader, Hon Leo Ogor, also believed that PDP would bounce back stronger, stressing that the party was ready for any showdown that might arise from the defection of lawmakers. “PDP will bounce back stronger than before. All the noise they are making is a mere storm in a tea cup; we are ready for any showdown,” he said.