The supposed ‘Badaru’s second term ambition’ and wishful thinking
My attention was drawn to a full page article in Daily Trust newspaper of Sunday 21, January 2018, by one Aliyu M. Hamagam, entitled ‘Badaru’s second term ambition faces internal threat’, in which it was alleged that a group of 370,000 PDP decampees that were received into Jigawa State APC in 2015, had now formed a group threatening the supposed second term ambition of His Excellency the Executive Governor of Jigawa State, Alhaji Muhammed Badaru Abubakar.
First, to my knowledge and to the awareness of every citizen of Jigawa State, Governor Badaru Abubakar had not to date, announced his intention to declare for second term in office. But it is generally known across the state and beyond that thousands of supporters are calling Governor Badaru to declare for the second bid as governor of Jigawa State; these include most of those prominent PDP decampees alleged to constitute internal ‘threat’ to Governor Badaru’s ambition.
What this writer failed to mention, which also is materially important to his piece, is for what reason are these decampees becoming a threat to Governor Badaru’s ambition? Do they have a candidate with similar ambition, who is he? This writer said the group wants to take over the party, for what reason? If it is for governorship contest, is it not too late as we are now counting (with our finger tips) the number of months to the gubernatorial primaries.
This writer puts it rightly in black and white, thus: ‘With barely a year to the next general elections, nobody from the leading opposition parties has indicated interest in the governorship position of the state.’ That includes the PDP and the APC where in his fertile imagination he dreamt of internal threat to Governor Badaru’s ambition.
Envious of the immense support Governor Badaru commands in the state, this writer, an ardent sympathiser of the PDP by most of his reports on the state, correctly observed that “the PDP in the state could only be noticed at the national level because of the presidential ambition of its leader, former Governor Sule Lamido. On many occasions, it is only when Lamido “is in town” that the PDP looks lively in Jigawa, and once he leaves for Abuja, it simply goes back to sleep like other parties.” But this is even an understatement, Jigawa State PDP is not in slumber, it went into coma since it was mortally wounded in the 2015 elections and died when over 370,000 of its prominent sons and daughters decamped to APC six months later.
Other political parties in the state are not ‘docile’ as the writer alleged, but they have rather joined hands in support of Governor Badaru’s immaculate methods of running the state: Though these parties, like the PDP, had lost a considerable percentage of their supporters to the APC, but they remained active partners of the government in developing the state, rather than wasting their precious time in political bickering in the name of opposition.
Similarly, the writer has erroneously mentioned that Governor Badaru has lost some strong political supporters in the persons of Ubale Hashim, Senator Ubale Shitu and a grassroots politician, one Aminu Abus. Hashim was never a supporter of Governor Badaru, not to talk of being an ‘ardent supporter’; he signified intention to contest for the gubernatorial seat in 2015; there was a consensus in which the present Deputy Governor, Barrister Ibrahim Hassan was generally endorsed as a candidate; Hashim bolted and opted for primaries and contrived the Hashimiya Movement, mostly from the PDP, which met it waterloo at the primary elections in Gumel that Governor Badaru won.
As for Senator Ubali Shitu’s grudge with Governor Badaru, the issue rests with the electorates of Jigawa NorthEast senatorial district, whom the senator offended: It is a case of party betrayal, the case of a man who rode on the crest of Buhari’s popularity to the senate, only to turn around, for a mess of porridge, to work against the interest of the party and vote PDP candidates in the leadership of the senate, against the APC’s. What more, this man was publicly seen escorting the Senate President to court to face criminal charges, despite the high ethical standards Hadejia people he is representing are known to uphold. Therefore his constituents decided to drop him, like many in different states decide to do their cash and carry politicians who betrayed President Buhari and the party. In this circumstance, the senator expected Governor Badaru to reconcile him with the leaders of his constituency, so as to allow him a free ride a gain, failure to do that on the side of the governor, Shitu went haywire attacking the governor alleging that he planned to substitute him with another candidate.
Still, one would expect this writer to point out how Governor Badaru failed in performing his constitutional duties as the governor of Jigawa State, or how he is losing support of average voter in the state. He rather resorted to an arm chair analysis putting his wishful thinking on the drive. Here, I advised that staying in Dutse to write stories from Monday to Friday and retire to Kano for the weekend does not give one insight into Jigawa State politics, rather going around the state and interacting with its people will enlighten a reporter.
Zaki is Special Assistant for Media and Publicity to the Jigawa State Governor.