Senate Minority Leader: Campaign against Tambuwal, Ploy to Have Captive Legislature 

By Olabisi Aina

Not unexpectedly, various news platforms have been reporting stories of frenzied contrivances, conspiracies and gang ups by a collaboration of otherwise strange bedfellows aimed at scuttling prospects of emergence as Senate Minority Leader, of Senator Aminu Waziri Tambuwal, a former Speaker of the House of Representatives and immediate past governor of Sokoto state.

Though a member of the PDP, former Ekiti state governor, Mr Ayodele Fayose literally went wild in celebrating the victory of the opposition APC candidate in the 2023 governorship election in Sokoto state. As he popped and guzzled champagne on the TV screen, he extolled the Sokoto electorate for what he described as their sound judgement at the poll. 

Fayose who had joined Nyesome Wike in the latter’s political feuding with Tambuwal, went on to passionately appeal to voters in the constituency of Tambuwal to ensure his defeat in the inconclusive senatorial election. To the disappointment and chagrin of Fayose and his ilk, Tambuwal roundly defeated his opponents in the contest.

What is the genesis of their animosity towards Tambuwal? What are the reasons behind their opposition to Tambuwal’s becoming the Minority Leader of the 10th Senate? Why do they loathe him so much? Why do  they seem so scared of him? Answers to these questions are not far-fetched.

Consequent on the role he played in the 2022 presidential convention of the PDP, where party delegates elected the party’s presidential standard bearer in the person of Waziri Atiku Abubakar, it is not surprising that Senator Tambuwal has ever since become the target of vendetta, subterfuge and venomous darts of certain cliques of political actors within and outside of the PDP.

They were irked and alarmed by the political astuteness, nimbleness and courage  displayed by Tambuwal through his decision to step down his aspiration to the presidential ticket of the party for Atiku Abubakar who eventually clinched the trophy. 

To those who felt that  singular action was wholly responsible for their failed ambition, Tambuwal had committed an unpardonable political sin over which they will not relent until they extract their pound of flesh. Pointedly, Nyesom Wike, erstwhile governor of River state, felt betrayed, that Tambuwal had stabbed him in the back in view of the political rapport that had long existed between the two.

Wike was further sorely enraged by his failure to go on the PDP presidential ticket as the running mate to Atiku. Again,, Wike’s grouse against Tambuwal was heightened because, he believed that with his  emergence as the Director General of the party’s presidential campaign organization, Aminu Tambuwal ought to have used his position to favour his , Wike, becoming the presidential running mate.

Wike along with four other PDP governors embarked on abrasive anti party activities under the dubious cloak of championing the principle of power rotation between the north and south of the country. The rhetorical question is: Would Wike have been orchestrating the doctrine of rotation of power between the north and the south, if he had been selected as the vice presidential candidate of the PDP in the 2023 elections?

Unabashedly, he worked against the electoral fortunes of the PDP in the 25th February presidential election in which the APC unprecedentedly won in Rivers state. Wike then shifted his attention to dealing with Tambuwal by massively providing material support to the opposition APC in the March 18th gubernatorial election in Sokoto state.  

Lately, Wike has been severally reported to be all over the National Assembly, spearheading the campaign against the emergence of Tambuwal as the Senate Minority Leader. In utter disregard for competence, experience and hierarchy, Wike’s reported preference for a Senator Jarigbe Agom Jarigbe from Cross River state.tells volumes of the vehemence of his disdain for  Tambuwal and, perhaps, all that he is seen to embody.

To justify the hanging of a dog, you give it a bad name. In the campaign by his adversaries, they have not said that he is lacking in the requisite political experience. This is because they cannot say so of a  former Speaker of the House of Representatives and a two term governor of a state. How could they have labelled him as inexperienced given his credentials as one that has held sway  in the  executive and legislative branches of government?

On the criteria of nationwide reach and clout, Tambuwal has the rare background of being  a former chairman of the PDP Governors Forum and then chairman of the Nigerian Governors Forum. This fact explains the meshwork  of friends, allies and admirers as well as the trust that he enjoys in all parts of the country and across partisan divides. They could not have therefore, labelled him a provincial ethnic, regional or religious bigot. 

In all the barrage of disparaging campaign of calumny and been mudslinging so far hauled at him, , they have not accused him of financial malfeasance or debauchery. Such will not fly in view of his decency of character, comportment and unblemished track records of diligence, prudence, probity and transparency in all the high profile positions he has held in his public service experience.

To the extent that experience, demonstrated capacity, proven democratic credentials, courage and patriotism,  among other traits,  should be the criteria considered in the choice of the leadership of the the National Assembly, to that extent is Senator Aminu Waziri Tambuwal eminently qualified and deserving to be elected the Minority Leader of the Senate.

It is crystal clear therefore,  that those  working against the emergence of Tambuwal as the next Minority Leader of the Senate are self-seeking individuals and cliques whose goals are not in consonance with the patriotic and democratic requirement for a vibrant, focused and courageous leadership of the opposition in a multiparty democracy

One cannot but read sinister motives to the  tragicomedy and brinkmanship unfolding over the aspiration of Aminu Waziri Tambuwal as the Minority Leader of the 10th Senate. To discerning minds, the rigmarole and horse trading are mere smokescreen behind which is the ultimate grand design to have an obsequious Legislature that is a feeble, complacent lapdog, a rubber stamp of the Executive arm. That is, the making of the phenomenon of a one-party state with all the tendencies of burgeoning into despotism.

Those scheming to foist on the minority political parties in the Senate, a spineless and inexperienced leadership, are consciously or unconsciously,  working to weaken the fibres and roots of the nation’s democracy. All because of parochial, pedestrian interest, vendetta, hatred and ego.

 By putting in place a captive Legislature with a compromised opposition, the nation will invariably, be embarking on the lane to a one-party state with the inevitable result of  dictatorship. History teaches that,  there is no guarantee that those whose handiwork led to the creation of a political Frankenstein will be spared when the monster begins to wreak havoc.

Is Nyesom Wike consciously or, inadvertently playing out a script towards the actualization of the catastrophic scenario? Is that yet another role he is expected to play for the reward of a ministerial slot?

• Dr Olabisi Aina writes from Lagos.