Makinde and the Tirade against Atiku

Kemi Olaitan reports that with Governor Seyi Makinde of Oyo State openly berating former Vice President Atiku Abubakar, over the recent Ibadan explosion, an end may not be in sight to the imbroglio between Atiku and the erstwhile ‘G5 Governors’.

So much has happened within the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) before, during and after the last general elections in 2023 particularly since the emergence of former Vice President, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, as the presidential candidate of the party.

Indeed, the emergence of the Turaki Adamawa then threw up a crisis that pitched the leadership of the party against a group tagged, “Integrity Group”, comprising of G5 Governors led by the former governor of Rivers State and now Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Nyesom Wike.

Others were former Governors Samuel Ortom of Benue State; Okezie Ikpeazu of Abia State;  Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi of Enugu State and Governor Seyi Makinde of Oyo State.

The crisis within the party which once claimed to be the largest in Africa saw members of the Integrity Group working against the party most especially during the presidential election with the party losing the states governed by the G5 Governors.

For political observers between the last general elections and now nothing has changed on the part of the members of ‘G5 Governors’ as they continued to seize every opportunity to get at the presidential candidate of the party, Atiku Abubakar.

While the leader of the group, Wike is a prominent member of the administration of President Bola Tinubu of the All Progressives Congress (APC), former Governor Ortom on his part, has openly said the G5 Governors would support the Presidential and second-term ambition of President Tinubu in 2027.

Ortom, while speaking during a luncheon hosted by Wike, in Port Harcourt, Rivers State capital, claimed that the G5 had no regret for supporting Tinubu’s victory in the 2023 presidential election, saying, “If we work to ensure Bola Tinubu succeeds, there will be tomorrow for anybody to even contest the election at all. Our leader, Nyesom Wike, has already made a declaration that in 2027, we are supporting President Bola Tinubu. We have nowhere to go because that is what Nigerians believe. Even in the past administration that took Nigeria from top to bottom, we allowed them to work for eight years. So, why can’t a seasoned administrator in the person of President Tinubu rule us for eight years.”

Makinde who is the only serving governor among the G5 Governors has however taken the beef against Atiku to another level when he openly berated him for what he described as his insensitivity over the explosion that rocked Ibadan, the Oyo state capital some weeks ago.

The governor who played host to the  presidential candidate of Labour Party (LP) in the 2023 general election, Mr. Peter Obi, who paid a condolence visit to the state over the explosion, while thanking Obi for visiting the state and prioritising the wellbeing of the citizens over political gain, came hard on Atiku for failing to reach out and offer condolences to the government, victims, and people of the state following the explosion.

He said Obi was unlike his own party’s, Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), presidential candidate in the 2023 general election, Atiku, who had yet to visit the state, stating that there were three major presidential candidates in the 2023 elections with two of them President Tinubu of APC and Obi of LP reaching out to commiserate with him and the people of Oyo State, while Atiku of PDP was yet to extend such sympathy.

According to him, “I should use this opportunity on behalf of the good people of Oyo State to thank His Excellency, Peter Obi, former governor of Anambra State and also the presidential candidate of the Labour Party in the last election.

“I thank you because politics didn’t sip into this; you came to commiserate with us over the explosion. Actually, investigation is still going on, it was simply illegal miners storing explosives in an environment where they shouldn’t be, a place meant for people to live, it’s not a mining site.

“So, all the lapses that allowed such to happen are being looked into. I’m particularly grateful because the president called me, we have three musketeers that went for that election. The president has reached out to me, you have reached out to me, but my own party candidate, not even a call or text message.

“I’m saying this openly so that our leaders would know that, yeah, you have time for politics, you have time for governance, and you have time for humanity. So, we want to say thank you so much. We appreciate this visit.”

But Atiku was to swiftly counter the statement by Makinde, describing his position as not true. Atiku in a statement by his Media Adviser, Paul Ibe, said, “With due respect to Governor Seyi Makinde, we wish to correct his expression about the response of Atiku Abubakar to the recent explosion in the city of Ibadan.

“Atiku Abubakar made a condolence message about the Ibadan explosion, less than 24 hours of its occurrence, where he shared his commiseration and empathy with the good people and government of Oyo State over the incident.

“Perhaps, the governor has been too busy to take track of media reports on the incident. But we wish to put on record that on the 17th of January, 2024, Atiku Abubakar did make a widely available message on the Ibadan incident, which reads as follows:

‘‘I wish to express my condolences to the good people and government of Oyo State over the explosion that rocked the capital city of Ibadan late yesterday night.

‘‘While the government continues to provide humanitarian support to victims of the explosion, I commiserate with the families of those who might have lost their lives and property to the explosion.”

However, with Makinde and other members of the Integrity Group led by the erstwhile ‘G5-Governors’ still strident in lampooning Atiku rightly or wrongly at every given opportunity, many observers believed that there is no end in sight to the crisis bedevilling the PDP.

In the thinking of some political analysts, for Makinde to attack Atiku openly when he can easily do this behind the scene points to the fact that members of the Integrity Group are yet to let go of the political crisis that emanated from the presidential primaries of the party that produced Atiku.

For political observers, time would indeed tell whether this open display of criticism of Atiku by prominent members of the PDP including Makinde would help the interest of the party as it marches towards off season elections in some states of the country and the 2027 general elections.