Though Obi may present the mien of a quiet and humble politician, when the push comes to shove nobody can predict what power can do to Obi.
The Obi/Kwankwaso ticket is the revelation of the 2027 election cycle, one that might not bode well for Nigeria. When Peter Obi ran in the 2023 election, he ran with Datti Baba Ahmed, who was almost unknown until Obi made him his running mate when no northerner would look his way. Although Datti Baba Ahmed had a short stint in the Senate, he is still a dark horse. Datti is also the founder of Baze University in Abuja.
The man Obi wanted to run with was Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso, the swashbuckling politician from Kano State, one of the most politically astute states in the north. But Kwankwaso told Obi the blunt truth: the North would not vote for him. Reason: Obi is Igbo. The North did not, even though Obi employed electoral magicians who told him he had won the presidency in 2023. Datti was belligerent and confrontational, but he could not pull any weight in the North of 2023. Obi is the nonaggressive politican who wants to perform magic in Nigeria’s politics - a style some of his followers are denouncing. They want him to be tough, politics is not a field for the humble, those who were with him keep saying. Combative activist, Dele Farotimi who joined Obi, said he would not follow Obi in 2023. Meaning, if Obi shows more agression, he’ll still work for him in 2027.
Kwankwaso will now run with Obi in 2027, all things being equal. They have to win the ticket of their new chosen party, the African Democratic Congress (ADC), which is having leadership crisis and several court cases to contend with. Atiku Abubakar, the colossus in Nigerian politics who wants the presidency so badly but has been unable to get it after six attempts at it, is waiting like a rock of Gibraltar for Obi and Kwankwaso at the ADC. Atiku got to ADC before Obi and Kwankwaso and has captured all the structures of the party while Obi and Kwankwaso were negotiating their ego away.
Atiku is very rich and a free spender, Obi is also rich but does not give away his money anyhow. Some of his associates have accused him of being stingy. Kwankwaso is not that rich but he is a heavyweight in the politics of the north. Kwankwaso is limited to Kano, where his New Nigerian Peoples Party (NNPP) won overwhelmingly in 2023. But he faces a problem now, the Hausa youths in the North are angry, they lost their territory and kingdoms to the invading Fulanis who promised them Eldorado but rather gave them poverty and slavery. They will no longer vote for any party that will not choose a Hausa as its candidate. They want a separate identity and not a joint Hausa-Fulani identity which they alleged the Fulani had used only to their advantage. The Hausa hold the population ace and they want to employ it to win a good future for themselves. The youths supported by their intellectuals are becoming more determined in their crusade. If they succeed, they will limit Kwankwaso and his Kwankwasiya movement in Kano and other parts of the North.
Atiku Abubakar’s huge cash is a threat. The man knows how to deploy it for political victory. His possible running mate Seyi Makinde, governor of Oyo State, has reportedly promised Atiku a whooping 10 billion naira donation as contribution to their anticipated joint ticket. Well deployed in a nation whose politics is run by money, they are likely going to take the ticket in ADC. ADC is talking of a consensus candidate which is not likely to be acceptable to Atiku. He has never been known to lose in such games. If Atiku takes the ticket, Nigeria will be saved from a calamity which an Obi/Kwankwaso ticket might mean. What is this calamity?
Former president Olusegun Obasanjo who was responsible for making possible the Obi/ Kwankwaso coalition saw ahead a problem of ego between the two. It was ego that did not allow them to come together in 2023. And when the results of the presidential election of that year came out it was obvious that if Obi and Kwankwaso had not split the votes of the opposition, President Bola Tinubu might not have won. So Obasanjo called the two to his presidential library in Abeokuta, Ogun State, and ironed that out. Kwankwaso was too big, in his reckoning, to run behind Obi. Obasanjo got Kwankwaso to cut down on his ego and agree to be running mate to Obi. But at a cost. Obi will only run for a term of four years. For the calculation of the power-hungry North, who finds it difficult to yield power to the south even for a day, that arrangement will satisfy its quest for power. Even after their public presentation, Kwankwaso is still saying he’s bigger than Obi in politics.
But that is the undoing of the coalition, and may well be the undoing of the nation. Not even Obasanjo was able to keep to his promise of only one term when he won the presidency in 1999. Not only did he do the second term he also wanted a third term which was denied him by the watchfulness of the Senate. The Igbos whom Peter Obi represents in real terms and who constitute the bulk of his supporters have been out of power for so long in Nigeria that they will never agree to leave power after only one term. None of Obi’s promises to turn the nation around can be accomplished in one term of four years. Kwankwaso comes with the typical Fulani arrogance. He said the North would be able to use its numerical strength to remove Obi if he refused to leave after four years. But that is easier said than done. That is where the problem is, and that is where the traditional hostility between the Igbo and the Fulani may come to the surface again. Kwankwaso will be difficult to manage as number two to Igbo man Obi in a situation where the number two man is no more than a spare tyre. Though Obi may present the mien of a quiet and humble politician, when the push comes to shove nobody can predict what power can do to Obi. The possibility of the pair not being well managed and spinning into another civil war because of old hostilities and rivalries cannot be ruled out.
First Published in METRO
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Tunde Akande is both a journalist and pastor. He earned a Master's degree in Mass Communication from the University of Lagos.
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