Plateau APC needs deliverance from charlatans
By Ibrahim Dasuki Nakande
I’m not surprised at the obviously sponsored responses to the view I expressed about the attempt to pull the wool over the eyes of APC leadership and especially its presidential candidate, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu about how people who fought against his mandate are masquerading as his helper and were trying to reap where they did not show.
I had written without fear of contradiction, that contrary to claims that Governor Simon Lalong of Plateau State supported Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu to emerge as APC presidential candidate, that the former not only worked for another aspirant, Rotimi Amaechi but even tried to put spanner in the works to truncate Tinubu’s ambition.
For exposing this fraud and odious misdemeanor, a retired 2nd Republic politician who had never raised a finger to help or speak for his people in their times of trial was exhumed from political catacombs to be used as a willing factotum to get at me.
This is with the supposition that I may be restrained in my reaction since we are from the same community.
But how wrong they are because my intervention was not for personal gains but to save my party, the ruling APC and Nigeria from making the wrong choice in the sensitive decision of a possible vice president.
I did that with the strong conviction that the APC has so far got its coordinates for good leadership right and should not be allowed at this stage, to drift on the altar of selfish interests.
But those who assumed that the party was created only to serve their selfish interests and would rather it collapses once their interests are not served, have taken to name calling and ad hominem attacks; but that will not stop me from telling the truth.
In the attempt to respond to the issues o raised, the writers again exposed their lack of honour and integrity by claiming that Lalong has never shown interest in the running mate position. But they lie.
Perusing through the entire rejoinder, one cannot fail to see that the anger swelling from my intervention, was all about how it has dashed their hope of trying to play a fast one on Nigerians to achieve their selfish aim.
Almost every keen follower of political events know that the campaign for the running mate position has been on for a while now in the Lalong circle and his minions have been all over the place trying to sell the idea on the Governor’s behalf.
If the Governor is not interested in the position as claimed then why has he never done anything to stop them?
May be the person that wrote the rejoinder for Baba Akawu is not aware that top official s and serving cabinet members of the Lalong administration have even lately writen copiously to canvass this position and he had not called them to order.
One would have imagined what he would have been the Governor’s reaction if the campaign had been against his wish.
But on the whole, the writers missed the point about what I was particular about. I did not say that Lalong has no right to associate with whoever he wants; I was only concerned that he couldn’t even be honest about standing up for his friends when they’re no longer in a position to help him politically.
That was why I found it appalling that he would allow his aides to go town trying to create the impression that he supported Bola Tinubu at the primary when it was evident that he supported Rotimi Amaechi and despite the denial had frustrated his coming to Jos to speak with the delegates.
I’m sure even Amaechi would be disappointed by the revelation of Lalong’s fair weather friendship as I would soon prove.
Every citizen on the Plateau is aware that Lalong owes his rise politically to former governor, Joshua Dariye.
He was pivotal to his election as member of the House of Assembly and even made him speaker.
But what did he do immediately the man found himself in trouble? He quickly started giving the former governor a wide berth and even when Dariye was pardoned, he betrayed the true mark of friendship by being part of the conspiracy to encumber the process of his release simply because the Governor knows that the release of Dariye would expose how disconnected he is from the people.
Similarly, I will not be surprised if he stops picking Amaechi calls simply because the latter lost the presidential bid and concentrates all his efforts on Tinubu who he worked against.
Again, the writers, in the bid to disprove the fact he is a paper tiger, tried to ascribe some weights to the Governor by making some preposterous claims that cannot withstand the slightest scrutiny.
They claim for instance that it was his popularity that made him survive recall as member of the House of Assembly.
The question they should have asked is whether it was his popularity or allegations of misconduct that made him a subject of recall and the only one in the country for that matter.
Rather than his popularity, it was Dariye who used his power as a sitting governor to thwart the bid to recall him.
That not withstanding, Lalong still holds the record of being the first legislator that more than two-third of his constituency would willingly sign the process for his recall and make INEC to go the whole hog of conducting a referendum.
Is this is not an indictment of his rejection by the people, I wonder what is!
Governor Lalong also holds the unenviable record of misguiding members of the Plateau State House of Assembly till they lost their seats in one fell swoop!
Some of them have not forgiven him for that costly misadventure even when he was also removed by his colleagues and even lost his seat in the house due to lack of performance and political pedestrianship.
If there’s anyone who has not won elections based on merit but rode on the back of others or using base sentiment it is Lalong.
He only won the APC governorship ticket at the time because not many politicians on the Plateau believed in the then new party and only went ahead to win in the general elections out of protest by the people because the then governor tried to impose his kinsman on the electorate and not because of any sound program or vision.
Even with that accidental goodwill, he couldn’t build the party but drove many party stalwarts away with his parochialism.
He made the APC to lose vibrant people like the former commissioner for justice in the state, Edward Pwajok; chairman of Quanpaan LGA, Kwalu; the state chairman of the party, Letep Dabang and many others.
The Governor was only saved from embarrassment in the senatorial by- election for Plateau South only because of votes from Wase, otherwise it would have been a disastrous end for him despite his claims to being popular.
Now due to imposition, 18 governorship aspirants of the APC including the deputy governor, have withdrawn from his sham primary and have expressed their grievances. Which again jeopardizes the chances of the party at the general elections unless something drastic is done.
The writers also claim that he has given two commissioner positions and deputy chief of staff to the Hausa-Muslims in Plateau.
Can you imagine? These are the same bloc that the governor admitted could not have won his election without their votes and all the got were some glorified clerks positions without influence and someone from that community would without shame try to defend.
How can that compare with the support the Hausa-MuslimMuslim community in Plateau have given him?
I am vindicated that as his associates try to put some things in his defense, none of them included physical projects.
While other governors like Babagana Zulum of Borno; Nasir El-Rufai of Kaduna; Dave Umahi of Ebonyi etc are always looking for opportunities like these to showcase their leadership with projects executed for the people, all the Lalong people advertise as making him suitable for vice presidency is that he was at one time or the other appointed as chairmanship of a peer group or that he won his ticket to the Senate!
The reasons are not farfetched.
His administration so far is the worst in terms of projects as he has not been able to start and complete any in his seven years of governance.
It was after realizing he will have nothing to show after eight years in Rayfield that he started building a bridge at British American junction in the twilight of his administration, long after the Jang administration which conceived the idea had completed and handed over the bridge at Laminga linking JUTH permanent site which the British junction bridge was supposed to complement for easy passage.
Yes I agree Governor Lalong was once vilified as ‘dancing to the Caliphate’ but it was because of his pretense to win Hausa-Muslim votes to enable him get a second term. Now the people have realised it was just a decoy after he won his second tenure and turned against them.
It is also a reflection of poor understanding of politics for anyone to argue that a former deputy governor who ran on a joint ticket with her principal had never won an election.
If pairing is not important in election why is Lalong trying so hard in the foisted write up to claim he can add value to the presidential ticket?
Amos Gizo had won election as chairman of a major political party, the defunct ACN, which was one of the legacy parties of the APC in Plateau State.
Those ignorant of the political history of Plateau can only impress those at the level of shallowness.
Like I said in my earlier piece, I do not have a problem with Lalong supporting any person he wants to for any position, but for him to claim working for another when all evidence show that he acted otherwise are unbecoming of a leader and I maintain my position on that.
People like Akawu should stop allowing those who have no guts use his name because that is cowardly. They should be bold enough to put their names on it if at all they are sincere because some of the factual errors contained in the rejoinder concerning the Hausa-Muslim community could not have been written by one of them.
I hope if at the end Lalong fails to catch the attention of the leaders of the APC to make him running mate to Tinubu, that he would not accuse me of demarketing him because those trying to defend him have so far done the worst damage to his reputation.
Nakande writes from Jos
