Muslim-Muslim Ticket: Political Gamble or Winning Strategy?

The nomination of former Borno State Governor, Senator Kashim Shettima, as the vice presidential candidate of All Progressives Congress depicts a slippery political decision for the critics of the Muslim-Muslim ticket and a victory strategy as its advocates suggest, Gboyega Akinsanmi writes

The flagbearer of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Senator Bola Ahmed Tinubu announced a former Governor of Borno State, Senator Kashim Shettima as his running mate last Sunday. He ascribed this decision to the competence of the running mate above any political expediency and religious consideration that had for long defined such critical political decisions in the federation.

He, specifically, justified Shettima’s choice, which according to him, was “not to please one community or the other.” Rather, he argued, the choice was informed by the need “to bring the best governance to all Nigerians, regardless of their religious affiliation or considerations of ethnicity or region.”

Obviously, for Tinubu, the same-faith ticket is a strategy to garner majority votes in the north, where most people  believe Christians are in the minority. How did the APC candidate arrive at this decision, which most Christians considered insensitive to their interests nationwide? Was he motivated by the antecedents of the 1993 presidential election to which he alluded in his Sunday address?

Former Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Mr. Babachir Lawal provided some insight into these political conundrums in an article he wrote against the Tinubu-Shettima ticket last Wednesday. In the article, Lawal attested to how some northern governors misled Tinubu to settle for Muslim-Muslim ticket without taking cognisance of the country’s ethno-religious realities.

Lawal also explained how some northern governors, especially those of the North-west extraction, had argued for the Muslim-Muslim ticket on two grounds. First, they claimed, it would be difficult for them to defend the nomination of a northern Christain as the APC vice presidential candidate. Second, the voting strength of the north is significant with the North-west alone accounting 23.99 per cent of the registered voters based on the 2019 voters’ register

They deployed the 2019 voters’ register to defend their quest to secure the vice presidential nomination. Compared with the North-west, as the register showed, the North-east accounted for 13.44 per cent of the total registered voters; North-central 15.91 per cent; South-east 11.97 per cent; South-south 15.28 per cent and South-west 19.39 per cent. In aggregate, the north had a 53.34 per cent share of the total registered voters while the south accounted for 46.66 per cent.

Despite the empirical evidence they strongly deployed to make a case for the North-west, Tinubu settled for Shettima, a vice presidential nominee from the North-east and a serving senator governor representing Borno Central. Is this choice informed by Tinubu’s respect for regional balance? Was it in due regard to the federal character principle clause as enshrined in Section 14(3) of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, 1999?

Tinubu never justified his preference for Shettima based on any constitutional provisions. Rather, the adherents of the Tinubu-Shettima ticket have defended the decision armed with Section 10 of the 1999 Constitution. In specific terms, the section stipulates: “The Government of the Federation or of a State shall not adopt any religion as state religion.”

As Ondo State Governor, Mr. Rotimi Akeredolu and other adherents of the Tinubu-Shettima ticket have argued, the APC National Chairman, Senator Abdullahi Adamu likened it to the current political reality of the federation, which according to him, would not determine the performance of the team if they eventually won the 2023 contest.

What actually makes the ticket the country’s current political reality as Adamu put it? Does it suggest that Muslims are in the majority in the north? Can Tinubu’s choice foster peaceful co-existence among Nigerians of diverse religious inclination? Or will it compound the growing culture of religious intolerance and inter-faith suspicion that has now become the character of the federation?

While Adamu did not convincingly explain what the current political reality of the federation suggests, critics of the Muslim-Muslim ticket have been faulting Tinubu’s choice, using constitutional, political and socio-economic evidence. The choice, they argued, has compounded their apprehension for the future of Nigeria.

The northern Christians first punched the decision in the light of Section 1(2) of the Constitution. The section states that Nigeria “shall not be governed, nor shall any persons or group of persons take control of the Government of Nigeria or any part thereof, except in accordance with the provisions of this Constitution.” The Tinubu-Shettima, according to them, will amount to an infringement of this provision if they eventually win the 2023 presidential election.

Besides, is a claim that northern Muslims are in the majority true? Apparently, there is no empirical evidence to sufficiently address this question in the public domain perhaps because the National Population Commission (NPC) classified the ethno-religious data of the federation in its previous census exercises.

 In the north, largely, critical stakeholders are deeply divergent in response to this question, probably with the intention to defend their faiths. But they provided useful responses that to some extent delineated the ethno-religious demography of the north. For instance, President, Middle Belt Forum, Dr. Bitrus Pogu admitted that there was no empirical data to establish the ethno-religious demography of the 19 states that constitutes the north.

But Pogu explained how the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN), Northern Chapter, attempted the headcount of all Christians under the administration of former President Olusegun Obasanjo. The outcome of the headcount then, as the Middle Belt leader put it, was about 46 million. Contrary to the adherents of the Muslim-Muslim tickets, as Pogu claimed, northern Christians may not really be in the minority as being politically presented.

A study by Stefanos Foundation, a charity organisation that seeks protection of persecuted Christians worldwide, further offered clue to the ethno-religious demography of the north. In its study, the foundation revealed that apart from Hausa, Kanuri and Fulani, there were 670 other tribes across all the northern states with their own peculiar dialects and languages.

As indicated in a 2012 presentation by its Programme Coordinator, Mr. Mark Lipdo, the foundation attested that majority of the indigenes of the 670 tribes “are not Muslims. They are either Christians or practising their cultural traditional religion.” It thus identified supremacist ideology, especially with the introduction of Shari’a to 12 northern states, as one of the major challenges that most non-Muslims “are facing in the core north.”

While the foundation revealed its collaboration with all northern churches to conduct the headcount of all their members, Secretary, Northern CAN, Elder Sunday Oibe mapped religious demography of the north state by state based on his field experience as a northern Christain leader. Citing compelling instances, he claimed that there “is no northern state where there is no significant number of Christians -be it North-central, North-east or North-west.”

In the North-central, for instance, Oibe cited Benue, Plateau, Kwara and Kogi “as states where Christians are in the majority.” In the North-east, also, he cited Adamawa, Taraba, Gombe and even Borno “as states where non-Muslims constitute a significant proportion of their populations.”

 In the North-west, Oibe lamented misconception among Nigerians about the population of northern Christians. For him, most people do not even know that a huge population of indigenous people are Christians in Kaduna, Kano, Kebbi and  Zamfara.

With this ethno-religious configuration, Oibe argued that the decision of the APC candidate “is indefensible coupled with structural marginalisation that indigenous non-Muslims have been suffering in the north for decades. They have long been denied political offices. They have been economically decimated. For Christians in the north, it is absolutely a lie to justify the Tinubu-Shettima ticket on competence.”

Given the conviction of the northern Christians, it might be a political gamble for Tinubu to claim that the spirit of the 1993 presidential election had come upon the federation on different grounds. First, a number of its APC chieftains have resigned their membership of the APC as a result of Tinubu’s choice.

Second, northern Christians are suspicious of Tinubu’s choice. Hence, they are ready to embrace another presidential candidate that can protect their interests ethnically and religiously. Third, polling majority of the Muslim votes is equally uncertain for Tinubu. As Lawal put it, it is in the character of northern Muslims to vote for their sons. In 2019, they voted for their first son, President Muhammadu Buhari. In 2023, they will vote for their second, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar.

In this contentious debate, none of the divides is asking the big questions in the interest of socio-economic development.

 The big questions are: How will the APC candidate end needless killings nationwide? What are his plans to end the festering fiscal crises. How does he intend to restore the country’s distressed economy? What strategy do we adopt to pull over 12 million out-of-school children from the streets of Kano, Oyo, Niger, Bauchi, Ebonyi and Akwa Ibom?

Among others, the questions include: how will he revamp the country’s dysfunctional healthcare system and make it accessible to all Nigerians irrespective of their economic status? How does he want to bring the unemployment rate from 33.33 per cent to 10 per cent in four years? What plans does he have to break the vicious cycle of extreme poverty in the federation within the shortest time? These are critical questions that have compounded the country’s socio-economic and political woes in the last five decades.