SOKOTO GUBER: PDP IN OVERDRIVE

BY ABDALLAH EL-KUREBE
THE Peoples Democratic Party, PDP is overdriving its campaign for the reelection of its candidate, Aliyu Wamakko in tomorrow's gubernatorial election. Does the party really have a reason to fear given the party's saturation of the structures and system of government in Sokoto State?

THE Sokoto governorship election holding tomorrow promises to be a more stiff challenge for the ruling Peoples' Democratic Party, PDP than the walkover it did in Bayelsa last weekend. The party is seriously divided within and is challenged outside by a resurgent opposition that has been boosted by the return of the immediate past substantive Governor of the state, Alhaji Attahiru Bafarawa to the former ruling All Nigeria Peoples Party, ANPP.

Even with the internal and external challenges against it, the PDP is, however, expected to pull through. The PDP's candidate is the former Governor, Alhaji Aliyu Wamakko. The major opposition to the PDP is coming from the ANPP, Congress for Progressive Change and the Democratic Peoples Party, DPP.

On his way to obtaining the PDP ticket Wamakko overcame serious challenges from Senator Abubakar Umar Gada and former Transport Minister, Yusuf Suleiman to pick the PDP ticket he polled 956 of the 961 votes at the primary election despite earlier apprehensions raised by the ferocity of the opposition within the PDP.  Wamakko has working to his advantage the structures of the PDP at ward and district levels.

The Association of Local Government Councilors have particularly vouched to work for his success in the poll.

Closely working with them are Local government chairmen who are not making any pretence about their partisanship. The chairmen at a meeting towards the end of last year vowed that they would use their grassroots-based support to garner votes for Wamakko. As local government administrators, their influence would be crucial for the success of Wamakko during the election.

All thirty members of the state House of Assembly including the de facto Speaker and Acting Governor are equally not hiding their support for Wamakko using the structure of government to push the PDP's candidate.  They have constituted independent campaign committees, visiting and talking to their people on the need to reelect Wamakko as Governor of Sokoto State.

Members of the House of Representatives from Sokoto State, who are eleven in number, including Speaker of the House, Alhaji Aminu Waziri Tambuwal and the three Senators, including Umar Dahiru Tambuwal, Ahmed Maccido and Abdullahi Gobir last year wrote to the National Headquarters of the PDP, stating categorically that they stand by Wamakko. These are equally working hard to ensure that Wamakko wins election on February 18.

Gov Wamakko
Acting Governor
The Acting governor of Sokoto state, Lawali Zayyana has persistently stated that the PDP as a family would be victorious as well as assured that the entire membership of the party in the state would work to ensure the return of Wamakko.

The assumption to office of Hon. Zayyana as Acting Governor of Sokoto State is an advantage for Wamakko. Zayyana was a Commissioner of Environment in Wamakko administration. He is assessed as an amiable, humble, simple, and has pledged to work for the return of Wamakko as governor.

Significant meaning
This has a significant meaning in that it confers the advantage of incumbency on the PDP candidate.

Abuja factor: Assertions that the presidency was working to sabotage Wamakko's return were rubbished penultimate Thursday when President Goodluck Jonathan led the machinery of government in Abuja to campaign for the PDP candidate.

Local political enemies of Wamakko had prior to the primaries allegedly passed on to the presidency that Wamakko was against Jonathan during the PDP presidential primaries last year and as such the loss to Atiku Abubakar by Jonathan of the Sokoto votes. However, such assertions were countered by others who alleged a long standing relationship between the president and Wamakko when both were deputy governors in the period between 1999 and 2005.

The other candidates:
ANPP: Alhaji Yusha'u Mohammed Ahmed Kebbe
Kebbe is a retired banker, who worked with the Union Bank of Nigeria Plc and rose through the ranks to become a Senior Manager. He resigned to float a successful discount house and is now regarded as a successful businessman. As a new entrant into politics, Kebbe was not very well known before now causing him to lean on the shoulders of Bafarawa to pull through.

Under the tutelage of Bafarawa and the party chairman, Alhaji Ibrahim Milgoma; with the support of his other well-to-do siblings, philanthropist and oil dealer, Abdul-Rahman and Zayyanu Bashar, who runs Rahamaniyya, Kebbe seems to have built a good political clout. In truth, within the short time that Bafarawa returned to the ANPP, it has become the major opposition party, one that is now more ready to give the PDP a good fight.

Congress for Progressive Change, CPC
Engineer Abubakar Aliyu Yabo is CPC's governorship candidate. He was a federal civil servant who rose to become General Manager of the Federal Housing Authority during the Babangida administration.

Comfort to other parties
The seeming absence of Hurricane Buhari which once gripped PDP stakeholders in the North is now a comfort to other parties. The CPC candidate has not been helped by the internal divisions within the party following the discontentment that arose after the party's primary in 2011. The divisions have done so much damage to the party's political strength.

Democratic Peoples Party, DPP
Alhaji Garba Ila Gada is the governorship candidate of the DPP. He was Sokoto State Commissioner of Economic Planning in the second republic and Senator of the Federal Republic of Nigeria during the Babangida administration. Though he is highly reputed as a major political force, his party's poor support base and the lack of resources seems to have turned many away from the party.

The DPP seems to be on its own now that its founder Bafarawa first decamped to the ACN and then to the ANPP. Again, the only financial giant that remained in the DPP and who was also its State Chairman, Alhaji Ummarun Kwabo recently decamped to the PDP.