Anamcadabra: Magic of the Anambra PDP Governorship Primary
Tony Amadi explains what happened during the Peoples Democratic Party Anambra State governorship selection process at the Dora Akinyili Women Development Centre, Awka
In the course of my years of reporting the politics of Nigeria and writing the epic The Making of the PDP’ book in 2000, I have observed many party primaries, the most important being the 1999 presidential primaries in Jos. I am afraid that none of those primaries would out-match the recently concluded ‘Anamcadabra’ in the Anambra State capital, Awka on June 26, 2021.
Awka was boiling as the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) held its primaries for the next governor of the state for the November 6 gubernatorial elections. The city was locked down in a fierce political battle as the 16 aspirants, the highest in the state’s electoral history sought to win the prized gubernatorial primary. Multiple political Intrigues reigned supreme as aspirants tried to outfox each other as the leading aspirants Dr. Godwin Maduka, Chris Azubogu, Valentine Ozigbo, Senator Uche Ekwunife and Dr Obiora Okonkwo dug in for a fight to finish.
Unfortunately, Ekwunife and Okonkwo who are from the Central Senatorial district were boxed into a zoning controversy as the generality of Anambra people wanted the southern senatorial district to be favoured in the zoning which has gone round since the advent of the 1999 return to democracy and after 15 years of military interregnum.
A gun shot had rang out at 9.09am at the Dora AkunyIli Women Development Center Awka, venue of the primaries, signaling signs of an impending shootout that hopefully would not materialize at the end of the day. But nothing of the sort had happened, instead what was going on was a series of changes to the goal post as the rules were changed several times for understandably no reason.
Anambra state like most states in Nigeria is usually politically charged during elections but the southern senatorial zone in their attempt to show a united front to orchestrate their zoning demand, had all their aspirants actively meeting in solidarity to their course. I must have counted more than 10 meetings in Abuja or Awka where they often met in a hotel room in the Area 11 part of the Federal Capital City. Dr. Obiora Okonkwo, The Dikeora didn’t give a damn about the zoning to the south because as the story goes, the Central zone where he comes from has the biggest slice of the voters, followed by the North where the current Governor Obiano hails from.
However, Senator Uche Ekwunife, the abrasive and tough talking ‘Iron Lady’ member of the Upper Chamber reminded all that apart from being married to the Central Zone which she represents in the Senate, she is a southerner by birth; a question of having it both ways. The Senator was reported to have dared the 13 male aspirants not to forget her capacity to crush the men that come across her political path in apparently reminding everyone how she trounced the
former Central Senator Victor Umeh and once chairman of All Progressive Grand Alliance, the governing party in Anambra state.
As the primaries drew nearer, most analysts agreed that a political rooky and a United States’ based pain doctor, Dr. Godwin Maduka was far ahead in polls among grass roots primary voters, a situation that worried the party grandees who usually decided who should occupy Agu Awka, the local White House. The billionaire medical doctor was seen as the spoiler who was making the King Makers lose control of their pecks and use the people’s money to work for them and not the political elite.
Dr. Maduka is also a top philanthropist who had done a lot for his Umuchukwu people and promised the extension of his development of his town to the rest of Anambra if elected governor. Despite his extension of largesse to the political leadership of the PDP in the state and at the national level, he was seen by them as the man that will bring their political career to an end should they endorse his project. So a cabal had to be set up to ensure that his quest for the governorship of Anambra was scuttled before damage was done to their own political wellbeing.
And so the 2021 primaries were the best opportunity to hit back at the triple professor of Medicine, Surgery and Pharmacy. By the close of the pimaries in the wee hours of the 26th June, the results showed that Maduka had only five votes against the winning Valentine Ozigbo, the former Managing Director of Hilton Hotel, Abuja scoring a whopping 62 votes, followed closely by Dr. Obiora Okonkwo with 58, and Senator Uche Ekwunife with 44 votes.
So what happened at the Dora Akinyili Women Development centre, Awka, the venue of the PDP 2021 Anambra State primaries? One of the several voters disenfranchised at the primaries told me after the results were announced that “this, kain primary
na propa abracadabra”. He said that when the National Working Committee decided to announce the total figure of 197 delegate voters as the final number that should vote at the primaries when it was found that some people had doctored the local government list that should have had close to 2000 delegates on the final list to vote.
Security presence at the venue was visibly tight when I arrived the venue very early, with police in their various departments with Mobile Policemen dominating. One officer told me that his unit was dispatched from Port Harcourt but headed by a Deputy Inspector General based in the state. But as time went by, the main entrance was becoming chaotic as unauthorized men began to cluster around before the Chairman of the primaries, the Edo State Deputy Governor Philip Shuaibu came to take control of the entrance to the venue. Mr Shuaibu was clothed in an Oshomhole-fatigue type of khaki shirt and shorts with barely six months’ membership of the PDP, having joined with Governor Godwin Obaseki from the APC at the height of the last Edo governorship race which checkmated the ruling party’s dominance of the state.
When I asked the deputy governor what he thought of the proceedings so far, he put up a brave face and concluded that the primaries would go well and that the result would reflect on the high level of integrity that his team would impose on the event. However, the deputy governor’s hopes were going to be dashed ruthlessly by the determination of the state leadership to select rather than elect the winner. It had always been brandished by the PDP at all levels to win the Anambra governorship after languishing in obscurity for 16 years, largely winning all the state assembly seats but losing the priced governorship.
The South-east of Nigeria always had the PDP in total control and with 2023 national
elections two years away, the party had lost two states of Ebonyi and Imo to the ruling APC with rumours of Enugu and Abia governors following suit, no sane party man would concede another inch of South-east territory to the APC. The bungled Anambra primary was certain to become the party’s watershed as 2023 elections loomed large in the horizon. As political analysts pondered what was going on at the primaries, the delegate list continued to change, starting with the disenfranchising of voters with disability who had turned up in their numbers but were told to go home.
Meanwhile one Nnewi based former Chairman of the party in the state told me there was expectedly more changes to the list to come from Abuja where the party leaders were holed in at Wadata House, applying their carrot and stick formulae to ensure their predetermined winner emerges at the end at the Dora Akunyili Women center in Awka. Only God Almighty knew when the voting would start as the advanced rigging methodology had to be perfected.
So it emerged that another bout of shooting itself on the foot became the obvious result of the primaries with the PDP left with nothing else than to begin a major fence mending activity to paper through the deep cracks it has forced on itself. Peter Obi, the party leader in the state and the presumed winner of the primaries Valentine Ozigbo began their tour to assuage the losing candidates, particularly Dr. Godwin Maduka who was bruised and battered by the butchery at Awka. The Okwute man came as early as 10am to Maduka’s home just as he returned from Church, a stone throw to his home in the state capital where he spent over an hour to calm his nerves, followed immediately at midday by the winner of the primary, Val Ozigbo.
The PDP may well have felt the problem it has inflicted on itself with the bungled primaries as rumour mills have gone into overdrive that Maduka and Obiora may well switch parties to contest the main elections, counting that their wide popularity can still take them to Agu Awka on November 6 when the election proper would take place. Obiora gave an exhaustive interview with AIT where he kept his next move under wraps, while Maduka addressed thousands of his supporters in front of his foundation office on the highbrow business district on Onitsha/Enugu road.
With Maduka’s war chest still left with very huge balances and Obiora also said to be heavily loaded, the PDP chances in clinching the central South-east state now face serious difficulties ahead of a national election in 2023 where its own governors in safe states are moving towards the failed national government of APC. Not to mention APGA candidate Soludo, the former CBN Governor solidly set and a force to be reckoned with. What a tragic outcome for the leading opposition party in Anambra!
So it emerged that another bout of shooting itself on the foot became the obvious result of the primaries with the PDP left with nothing else than to begin a major fence mending activity to paper through the deep cracks it has forced on itself. Peter Obi, the party leader in the state and the presumed winner of the primaries Valentine Ozigbo began their tour to assuage the losing candidates, particularly Dr. Godwin Maduka who was bruised and battered by the butchery at Awka