Wachor Zakks-Manuel

"OUTFLANKING" IN THE NORTH By Ademola Olarewaju Every Governor in power in the North is always at risk of being outflanked by another politician who projects himself as more Islamic than the incumbent Governor and everything is thrown at the incumbent in the process. Why isn't he doing full Sharia? I'll do it if you vote me. He appointed a woman commissioner? It is anti-Islam. He's building Western schools...that is Haram. And so on. This point is important to this thread to understand how Buhari grew his base in the North towards 2003. Because prior to that time when the North wanted power back from OBJ, nobody really thought of Buhari as a fundamentalist: that image was carefully contrived in the APP/ANPP structure, first positioning as the Sharia party and then positioning Buhari as rallying point. Attempts had initially been made to project Atiku from within the PDP to replace OBJ in 2003 and OBJ himself flirted with the idea of picking a more radical Muslim as running mate...Rimi was in play. But all that failed and North looked towards replacing PDP with ANPP in 2003. On a norm: Buhari doesn't really care about almost everything, an essentially dour and no-personality character (no offense intended). For '03 though: this man started championing the Northern cause, leading delegations to Oyo to defend herdsmen, openly committing to Sharia etc. OBJ running with Atiku was quite easy to outflank in the North: Wasn't Atiku the one who allowed Adamawa to have the first (and only) Xtian Governor when he insisted Boni Haruna should govern rather than resign in an elaborate political arrangement and then come back as Deputy? The plan from hegemonists in PDP Adamawa then was that since Atiku had gone to be VP instead of Gov, someone's son would become VP to Gov-elect Haruna, Haruna then resigns, son becomes Gov., reappoints Haruna as Dep. Gov. and all would be well. It became used against Atiku. Outflanking in the North is easy with religion for politics but OBJ further had another breed in the North: the technocrat-politicians. He played the likes of Hell-Ruffy and Ribadu as a new breed that were futuristic and trust Hell-Ruffy, he accepted and played it to the hilt. So, OBJ competed hard in the North and didn't believe in any fool's gold of a Southern/Middle-Belt alliance against Buhari. He could zoom in and zoom out and even despite the moves he made in the North, he still zoomed in to the SW where he had lost terribly before in 1999. OBJ was never the candidate of the Yorubas in 1999 - he was considered a sellout against Awolowo and further against MKO Abiola but he wasn't deterred and he wooed the then leading political elite of the SW, the Afenifere, almost shamelessly but very assiduously. Meeting after meeting, OBJ agreed with them that PDP would not make serious bids for the AD gubernatorial seats in the SW if they did not field a presidential candidate against him so that Yorubas could vote for him this time. Once they conceded, Ebora Owu switched it up. The very first meeting after the INEC deadline for candidate submission had passed, OBJ welcomed them to his Otta Farm wearing native buba on farmer-shorts. According to Egbon Yinka Odumakin, his balls were literally hanging out as he spoke with them almost condescendingly 😅😅 Trust the elders, they decoded the implication of this slight shift in demeanour: one of the elders wisely pointed out in Yoruba that "his balls were literally smiling at us" and that the man had something up his sleeves. The rest of that SW capture by OBJ is history. History is a guide as to what can happen: I can hope my chicken flies as high as an eagle and some science may even support it happening but have chickens flown so high before for my belief to be anchored? (Yes, I know it once happened in your village but beside the point...) What can happen is very different from what might happen. 1/6