By Abdullahi Yusuf
Interesting developments never cease to flourish in Nigerian politics, especially when general elections are approaching.The happenings often amuse, and sometimes, challenge both discerning minds and idle beings in the polity.
When Malam Ibrahim Shekarau, the Senator representing Kano Central in the National Assembly, defected from the APC to the NNPP sometime in the middle of 2022, many analysts and commentators thought that he had done an incualculable damage to his former party, the APC.
They thought that the former Governor of Kano State had bungled the chances of the APC to win the Governorship election in the State, come 2023.
That he had depleted the number of votes that his supporters and the supporters of His Excellency, Governor Abdullahi Umar Ganduje, would have collectively given to the APC to enable to form Government again in 2023.
These insinuations and/or expectations were, however, not to be as the APC took the due advantage of Shekarau’s exit to embark on a deliberate Stock Taking to ascertain its bonafide members and faithful, the result of which made the party stronger, more focused and purposeful.
The party now re-strategised and re-focused its activities and became better-placed to confront and defeat the NNPP and the other opposition party in the state, the PDP, come 2023 polls.This is a big Plus for the APC.
And it has been established that multitudes of Malam Shekarau’s followers refused to follow him to the NNPP and stayed in the APC, which also boosted the party’s stocks and chances ahead of the all-important polls. Another gain for the party.
Now, all these issues evolved at a time when Shekarau was struggling to settle down in the NNPP, and alongside his Host, Senator Rabi’u Kwankwaso, chart ways of overcoming the APC in the 2023 elections.Again, that was not to be.
Because the celebration of this union between the duo had hardly died down when Shekarau began to sing, yet another defection tune, alleging unfair treatment of himself and supporters, as well as non-honouring of the agreement reached between the two sides, by the leadership of the NNPP.
The tune became louder when the former Governor summoned a meeting of the highest decision-making body of his political structure,the Shurah Council, to advise him on what to do, in view of the latest “unfavourable” development in the NNPP as it affectes him and his followers.
Malam Shekarau said the Shurah Council had met and deliberated on the issues at stake, after which it submitted its report to him on the way forward, and that after a careful consideration of the body’s recommendation, he decided to defect to the PDP.
And then came Monday, August 29, when the Senator formally dumped the NNPP and rejoined the PDP at a ceremony held at his Mundubawa Road residence in Kano.
He was received by PDP’s Presidential Candidate, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, in the presence of hundreds of his followers and supporters of the PDP.
However, even at the reception venue and some other places, dissenting voices were heard of aggrieved supporters of the former Governor, rejecting his exit from the NNPP and vowing to stay in the party.
And a day after his reception into the PDP, many of his staunch followers, including the candidate of the NNPP for the Kano South Senatorial seat,Kawu Sumaila, made good their threat by announcing that they had stayed back in the NNPP.
Elsewhere in the state, the Senator’s followers were also reported to have sworn that they would not defect to the PDP along with him; with and a large number of them angrily saying:”We are switching our loyalty back to the APC.”
Now, the sum total of all these permutations means that Shekarau’s two recent defections i.e. from APC to NNPP, and then to the PDP, have deflated his political structure and consequently depleted the number of his followers whose votes he would have joined with those of Kwankwaso’s deciples to attempt to give the APC a good fight in 2023.
And as Shekarau and his remaining followers struggle to re-discover themselves in the PDP, the coast is becoming clearer for the APC to sustain its winning streak in the State,come 2023 elections.