Intrigues in Race to Succeed Masari in Katsina

As 13 governorship candidates  battle  to succeed Governor Aminu Bello Masari of Katsina State in 2023, Francis Sardauna, chronicles the intrigues and chances of some candidates in the race.

As the battle to occupy the Katsina State Government House in 2023 rages on, hordes of governorship candidates from different political parties are angling and realigning their political strategies and manifestos to succeed Governor Aminu Bello Masari whose second tenure would end by May 29 next year.

The governorship candidates who clinched the tickets of their respective parties at separate governorship primaries conducted in the state, are advancing reasons they should be given the opportunity to govern the historic state that has so far produced two presidents of the federal Republic of Nigeria.

There are permutations as to which of the three zones in the state should be considered for the plum job. Popular opinion in the polity suggests the central zone as most favoured in tandem with the initial zoning formula the current democratic setting stands on. Coincidentally, most of the guber candidates are from Katsina Central and Southern zones.

According to the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) in Katsina,13 registered political parties in the state out of 18, had fielded candidates for the 2023 governorship election which political pundits said wouldn’t be “business as usual” because of the electronic transmission of results as encapsulated in the nation’s newly amended Electoral Act.

The commission, in a data made available to THISDAY by the Head of Department, Election and Party Monitoring, Abdullahi Ibrahim Usman, listed the guber candidates to include Dr. Muhammad Bara’u Tanimu, Accord (A) party; Mustapha Ahmed, African Action Congress (AAC); Ibrahim Aminu, African Democratic Congress (ADC); Murtala Ahmed, Action Democratic Party (ADP).

Others are Dr. Dikko Umar Radda, All Progressives Congress (APC); Nura Haruna, Allied Peoples Movement (APM); Kabir Kado, Boot Party (BP); Abdu Ibrahim Habu Musawa, Labour Party (LP); Muhammad Nura Khalid, New Nigeria Peoples Party (NNPP); Yakubu Garba Lado, Peoples Democratic Party (PDP); Imrana Jino, People’s Redemption Party (PRP); Bello Adamu Safana, Social Democratic Party (SDP) and Ibrahim Turkur Saude, Zenith Labour Party (ZLP).

However, where the pendulum of victory will swing is a question of time, but from all indications, the contest for the soul of Katsina State will be between the candidates of the APC,

Radda, Lado of the PDP and Khalid of the NNPP

 as the remaining 10 candidates are considered as political greenhorns by analysts of the ancient game in the state.

The candidate of the ruling APC (Radda), who is from Katsina Central, is considered by political observers and the party’s stalwarts as a widely acceptable candidate in the state irrespective of religious or senatorial differences. The candidate has better chances of winning the governorship seat because of his humanitarian services rendered to thousands of  vulnerable households across the 34 local government areas of the state through his life-changing Gwagware Foundation.

Also, the ability of the former Director-General and Chief Executive Officer of the Small and Medium Enterprises Development Agency of Nigeria (SMEDAN), to defeat the incumbent Deputy Governor of the state, Mannir Yakubu, the former Secretary to the State Government (SSG), Dr. Mustapha Muhammed Inuwa and six other APC bigwigs in the state to win the party’s guber ticket with 506 votes, may navigate his political antecedents to victory.

Some analysts believed that his emergence had changed the political narrative and mindset of APC members who hitherto doubted his political capacity and experience. But Radda’s emergence did not go down well with some chieftains of the party in the state who have since defected to other opposition parties while some are still in the party but may apparently do anti-party judging from their public outcry.

However, there is a general belief among political stalwarts in the state that the incumbency factor may help the ruling APC to return to power in 2023, even as many agree the party must put its seeming loose broom in order, beginning from resolving the brewing crisis that emanated from  the emergence of the former chairman of Charanchi local government as its governorship candidate.

More importantly, the party’s leadership, through the newly inaugurated reconciliation committee, should bring all aggrieved aspirants to a round table, where they would jointly chart the way forward, in addition to others who contested for various National and State Assembly seats during the primaries.

Governor Masari, who has performed credibly well in the areas of health, education and agriculture and is looking forward to an APC successor, is also leaving no stone unturned to ensure that all the aggrieved members of the party bury their grievances before the 2023 poll. The leader of the party and  political gladiator, is doing everything humanly possible not to relinquish power to the opposition unless proven otherwise by the electorate.

Lado, the 2023 candidate of the main opposition PDP, whose political pedigree has made him gain unflinching support from electorate at the grassroot, is a serial contestant of the governorship seat. He was among the 2011 governorship aspirants of the defunct Congress for Progressive Change (CPC), 2015 and 2019 governorship candidates of the People’s Democratic Movement (PDM) and the PDP respectively.

The former Senator, House of Representatives member and Chairman of Kankara Local Government Area, is a quiet achiever but considered an old-timer on the political turf. His emergence is bringing excitement and apprehension, being a strong PDP guber candidate with age and sustainable economic track records on his side.

Key political stakeholders, including members of the business community, are said to be rallying support for him to chart a way forward for his 2023 victory. But his disparagers say he is one of the Abuja-based politicians who only visit the state whenever political embargo is lifted.

Also, the agitation for the rotation of power from the southern zone where Senator Lado and Governor Masari hails from to the Northern or Central zones, is also another factor militating against the victory of the PDP governorship candidate.

But his choice of the former Managing Director of the National Inland Waterways Authority (NIWA),  Ahmed Yar’Adua, from the Katsina Central as his running mate, is considered by pundits as a wise political strategy that will bring more votes for the PDP during the forthcoming election. Besides, Yar’Adua is a student of the late President Yar’Adua’s political school and his close ties with the aristocrats in the state will help the party.

The PDP may not be the only beneficiary of the alleged sloppiness in the APC, especially as the Katsina NNPP, by virtue of the clout of its Presidential Candidate, Senator Rabiu Musa Kwakwanso, it also received defectors from the ruling party and the PDP in the state.

This, analysts believe, is complemented by the personality of Khalid, who many believe is neither a political neophyte nor a pushover in the political terrain across the state, having contested with the then late President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua for the governorship seat on the platform of the All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP) in 1999 and lost.

He, however, fizzled into political oblivion afterwards, resurfacing in the NNPP this time (2022) to contest elections again for the number one seat in the state. Although his party has no formidable structures across the 34 local government areas of the state, his revolving political strategies are factors to be considered in the political space.

With eight months to the gubernatorial battle, there are many questions on the lips of many Katsina citizens begging for answers. Therefore, many eventualities are still possible, and the electorate can still be swayed depending on what happens in the race to the Katsina Government House within the period.