As Adamawa state gets set for another round of polls and the two major political parties yet to announce their flag bearers for the Saturday, October 11, 2014 election, politicians have entered advanced stages of consultations and lobbying with former vice president Atiku Abubakar emerging as a chieftain who might hold the keys to the Adamawa state government house.
Atiku who decamped from the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) to the All Progressives Congress (APC) hasreportedly become the man to meet as politicians across both sides of the divide have engaged in advanced consultation with him to proffer a candidate.
There is sure to be more drama in the offing with former chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), Mallam Nuhu Ribadu decamping to the PDP from the APC and looking very likely to get the nod from the ruling party with considerable support from Alhaji Adamu Mu’azu, the PDP national chairman and Hassan Tukur, the principal personal secretary to the president, who happens to be an indigene of the state.
Nigerian Tribune reports:
It was gathered that already, the stakeholders and the concerned elders in the state had been approaching Atiku, urging him to lead the way and give a sense of belonging to the generality of the people of the state, including Muslims and Christians.
According to investigation, before now, the state which has Christians as majority, but which were divided along religious lines were said to be looking forward to a situation in which the governorship seat would be rotated between the two dominant religions in the state after the exit of the impeached Governor Murtala Nyako.
It was gathered that with the present confusion in the PDP and the demands of the stakeholders, the former vice president was believed to have quietly cashed in on the development and was believed to have thrown his weight behind Mr Boss Mustapha, a Christian from Kilba ethnic group for the governorship race in the state.
Meanwhile, a close associate of the former vice president told the Nigerian Tribune in confidence on Thursday, in Abuja, that various interest groups had been approaching Atiku over the Adamawa governorship by election in recent time.
According to him, “the best interest of the party lies in an open, free and fair primary.”
Atiku is determined to allow the choice of the party members to prevail. APC will not engage in imposition. If it does, people will not know the difference between it and the PDP”.
The Nigerian Tribune also learnt that Atiku’s position was seen as a decisive move aimed at pacifying the Christians in the state, who were said to be angry over having sacrificed former deputy governor, Bala James Ngilari, in order to allow for the successful impeachment of Murtala Nyako, with the hope that there would be a level playing field in the PDP, which is now being thwarted by the party’s leadership and some hawks within the presidency.
It was also gathered that the resolve of Atiku to support Mustapha was based on some Christian leaders who met and pleaded with him to give them a Christian candidate as a form of compensation for their commitment and steadfastness maintenance of the peace and progress of the state.
This was just as it was gathered in Yola on Thursday, that the governorship candidate of the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) in the 2011 governorship election in the state, Mr Marcus Gundiri, also a Christian from Hong, who recently defected to the PDP to run for its governorship ticket, is said to have commenced consultation on the possibility of his returning to the APC should Ribadu be granted waiver to contest the race without according him the same privilege since he defected to the PDP before him.
The trio of Ribadu,Gundiri and Buba Marwa, it was gathered, had applied to the PDP for waiver to qualify them for its primaries for the selection of its candidate for the governorship bye election in Adamawa state and the party is yet to make any pronouncement on the applications as at the press time on thursday.
