Who cares about structure? — by Demola Olanrewaju
Seeing reactions to the NDC candidacy processes, I have thoughts but I must first confess regrets on Aisha Yesufu failing to clinch the FCT ticket.
Politics aside, I saw secondhand her devotion when she served as Deputy Chair of the ADC membership process. Chairman Kashim Imam had only good things to say about her work.
I salute her because I believe political activists must recognise and cross the thin line between political activism and political participation. The line is thin, but the work to be done in that crossing is huge. She made the cross, and it is rueful that NDC did not select her or give her a chance to contest. May the future be kind to her.
Her experience should provoke a look into the political journey of Mr. Peter Obi who rode an unbelievable wave in 2023 and came third in the presidential election, but consequently failed to harness that wave by doing the work to build LP into a viable political platform of Obidients, by Obidients and for Obidients. It is this political laziness that led to the sojourn from LP to the ADC coalition and then to NDC when it became obvious he wasn’t going to win the coalition ticket, despite insisting he wouldn’t join ADC officially until the party took a position on zoning. ADC instead chose to focus on removing Bola Tinubu’s failed APC Govt rather than dwell on rotation politics as an opposition party not in power. Obi joined ADC anyway, but his continued mantra was “I will be on the ballot”.
And so the NDC…
A party which acronym reminds one of the Niger Delta Congress led by Harold Dappa-Biriye in 1956. This time, Sen. Henry Seriake Dickson had snubbed the coalition and instead chose to do the political work to push NDC into viability. Obi found the platform as home but this is not a house he built, he is yet again a tenant. Dickson did the political work and Obi looks quite grateful to just have a platform to run his ambition on.
But what about his followers? Start first with a Dr. Mo who obviously knew Obi’s next step and positioned to pick an LGA ticket in FCT on the platform of ADC, while Obi was yet insisting to followers that he wouldn’t join a coalition just to vote out Bola Tinubu’s misgovernance. Dr. Mo enjoyed campaign funding and support from Atiku, Amaechi and other ADC bigwigs. I know of at least one Atiku supporter who had convened some of us friends in a meeting over one year ago and declared to run for the same office. Obi had his way in ADC with Dr. Mo, and ADC rallied around him. Obi’s top followers were well integrated in ADC.
Then a follower like GRV in Lagos – his trajectory started from the KOWA party awakening of 2015 and he ran for Ikeja LGA Chairman, coming second behind the ruling party and then for Senate in Lagos with PDP in 2019, garnering 243,516 votes.
His 2023 gubernatorial run with Peter Obi added less than 100k to his Senate votes from 2019, giving him 313,329 in total this time.
GRV after 2023 started mobilising members for Labour Party in Lagos, Akintollgate was also calling for the same. And so many others too. Everyone was mobilising for LP except Obi who was by then meeting with other leaders to form a coalition.
When I hinted GRV that AA, Obi and CPC were in talks, he had no idea. Yet when time came, he followed Obi into ADC. Another round of work and contact-building gone into ADC but Obi suddenly defected again to NDC, no consultations.
Aisha Yesufu’s matter is therefore not entirely her fault, she perhaps believed Obi would protect her interest but leaders cannot always do that especially when a larger interest is at play. Dickson knows Obi cannot now defect anywhere and that as long as he is guaranteed to be on the ballot, easier for Obi to appease Aisha than lose the platform. Dickson built NDC right from his sitting-room.
The real problem then is Obi’s seeming comfortability with political nomadism. This refusal to do the work of building a party platform, brick by brick.
Well, who cares about “structure” anyway?
