The saying that “a week is too long in politics” (attributed
to the former British Prime Minister, Harold Wilson) was justified last week
when Ondo state’s Governor Olusegun Mimiko left the Labour Party (LP) and
returned to the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). That singular act shredded
every calculation that had consigned the certain amount of votes that would
pour from the electorates in the 2015 presidential election.
To those who had painted the South-West electoral
fortunes in All Progressives Congress (APC) colours, there is now a critical need
to do a re-painting. Or better still, they would need to do a rethinking.
Yet, what is it that actually makes Mimiko’s joining
the PDP that remarkable? It has to be stated from the outset that unlike what appeared
in some newspapers when APC was cobbled together from several parties, that
there was no monolithic West really. The excitement many felt at APC’s
evolution was that a strong party had come that could rally the entire South-West
geo-political zone, and make of it a formidable unified political entity. Conventional
wisdom even held that with time, Ondo state, which had voted in L P’s Mimiko as
governor would switch to APC, thus making the APC strong man in the South West,
Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, the new Awo of the new West.
Since then, the South-West geo-political zone has
been metamorphosing very fast. Instead of the hold which APC had on it to be
growing stronger, it has actually been unraveling. The first real test of
strength came with the Ekiti governorship election of June 21, 2014, and the result showed that
while APC had been on the retreat there, the PDP had gaining political turf there
as Ayo Fayose, the PDP candidate swept the polls.
Was the victory a fluke? It was hardly so as another
test of strength, the Osun elections of August 9, 2014 showed. Though the PDP lost to the APC
candidate, there was a real fight for the votes and the APC victory was not a
landslide. Instead, the PDP had an impressive showing. The real result is that even
now that the governor bears the APC party card, many would not be easily tempted
to consign the entire state to the APC in any public or private discourse as
the PDP actually controls some large swathes of the state.
In Ogun state too, the calculations have changed
considerably. Though an APC Governor occupies the Government House at Abeokuta,
it is common knowledge that a large portion of the state would likely vote for
the PDP in future elections, especially with Chief Segun Osoba’s having dumped
the APC for the PDP. Osoba was a former governor of the state (from 1999 - 2003)
when he was a member of the defunct Alliance for Democracy (AD).
Yet, if there was a tipping point in the PDP and APC
electoral chances in the South West for next year’s election, it came with Gov.
Mimiko’s declaration for the PDP. He not only left his former party for a new
one, he also publicly announced his support for President Goodluck Jonathan;
that for PDP was the icing on the cake.
First, it was preceded by rumours and speculations which built up into a
crescendo as the APC strove mightily to ensnare him into that party’s embrace –
but all their efforts failed to score.
Then the real event came; right inside the inner sanctum of President
Jonathan’s office, Aso Rock Presidential Villa, Mimiko declared there and then
that his immediate target was to help
President Jonathan’s re-election in the 2015 presidential poll. He was not only
issuing a statement of intent to the APC, no it was more than that; with that
statement Mimiko served notice to APC that it had got another challenge to
contend with.
Announcing his return
to PDP, Mimiko who noted that the Labour Party had always been in support of
Jonathan’s presidential project said members of the National Assembly and House
of Assembly under the platform of Labour Party in Ondo State have also followed
him to the PDP.
He said he consulted
widely with major stakeholders in Ondo State, including traditional and
religious leaders, market men and women, artisans, trade unions, community
leaders as well as party leaders before joining the PDP.
Mimiko said, “We hope
to be part of a process of creating, especially in the South West, a solid and
robust platform of involvement in the election of the president, governors and
legislators and post-election governance structure which will help to engender
rapid socio-economic development”.
“But this decision to
return to the PDP, we have taken in the overall interest of our people and our
nation, and its democracy which for those who are perceptive enough to notice,
is now mortally endangered by a constellation of forces which must be
confronted”.
The import, the
essence really, of the events of those crucial moments was not lost on Vice-President Namadi
Sambo. Receiving Mimiko into the PDP fold, he noted that the singular
event of the governor return to the party would raise PDP to a higher level in
the South-West and the entire country. Then,
becoming more specific, Sambo said: with the defection, issues in the South
West would be resolved.
Mimiko had declared he
was not coming alone:, “It is in the light of the foregoing that I, Dr. Olusegun
Mimiko, following extensive consultations across the land, today formally
announce the decision of members of National Assembly from the LP in Ondo
State, members of the LP in the Ondo State House of Assembly, members of the
State Executive Council and indeed all those who share our aspirations, to join
the PDP.
‘I must confess that it surely was tempting and perhaps more
fulfilling to continue as a national leader in our smaller, calmer and quite
promising ocean represented by the Labour Party.
“But this decision to return to the PDP, we have taken in the overall
interest of our people and our nation, and its democracy which for those who
are perceptive enough to notice, is now mortally endangered by a constellation
of forces which must be confronted.
“May I then add, that we take this epochal decision conscious of the
fact that no political party in Nigeria today is anywhere near the point of
perfection. But we are persuaded that joining hands with other Nigerians,
committed as they are at repositioning the PDP on a continual basis, is the
appropriate thing to do today.
“And considering that it was under this same PDP that I was privileged
to serve, first as Secretary to the Government of Ondo State and later as
Minister of Housing and Urban Development from July 2005 – December 2006, this
is for us a homecoming of sort”, he said.
Fine words no doubt, yet there is a single statement there that many
may have failed to notice; it is this: “But this decision to return to the PDP,
we have taken in the overall interest of our people and our nation, and its
democracy which for those who are perceptive enough to notice, is now mortally
endangered by a constellation of forces which must be confronted”.
In those few, well-chosen words, Mimiko has laid out his reason for
returning to PDP; to join hands with real nationalists inspired by something
noble and wise to build a pan-Nigerian party and government instead of a
sectional one. Though he may be called names in some circles, his stance is
that of a true nationalist. And needless to say, it buoys up PDP’s chances in
the 2015 general elections.
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