By Johnbosco   Agbakwuru
Calabar — Ahead of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, Presidential primaries slated for January 12, 2011, the camps of President Goodluck Jonathan and Alhaji Atiku Abubakar have engaged in supremacy tussle over which camp wins the majority vote in Cross River State.

Interestingly, most of the political gladiators squaring up to undo each other are political heavy weights, some serving in the state and at the federal levels.

While the Jonathan camp believes that the President, within few months in office, has imparted positively on the lives of Nigerians and should be encouraged by being re-elected in the 2011 Presidential election, the Atiku camp believes that it will be unfair to rub the North of their tenure going by the zoning arrangement in the PDP.

Some of the Atiku supporters in the state who spoke on condition of anonymity boasted that they had done everything possible to ensure victory for the former vice president in the forthcoming PDP primaries.

According to them, the zoning arrangement was enshrined in the party’s constitution to protect the minority and give equal opportunity to all the six geographical zones, claiming that for someone to come at the middle of the game to change the agreement would drastically affect the minority in the country.

Besides, the group said it was laughable for someone to think that President Jonathan will win all the votes in the South-South, stressing that even in Bayelsa State, which is the home of Jonathan, he should not be sure of securing 100 percent victory.

The group also claimed that the democracy must be preserved and everything must be done to keep all agreements reached, adding that doing something contrary would tantamount to heating up the system which may have a negative effect on the unity of the country.

Atiku, the group further claimed, has rich credentials and had joined in the struggle to stop former President Olusegun Obasanjo from achieving his third term bid, pointing out that after the granting of waiver to the former vice president, he has helped some politicians from the state that were aggrieved and left the party to get waiver.

The waiver, according to them, facilitated by Atiku has assisted some of the credible politicians from the state to aspire to serve either the state or the country in any capacity.

Some of the members who claimed to be coordinating for the Turaki of Adamawa said they had been going to the party’s delegates and have been having discussions with them and expressed optimism that their candidate will emerge at the end of the primaries.

They also said that they have reached out to the General Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida’s camp and were now working together to give Atiku the presidential ticket, adding that they  have also reached out to some of the delegates in the South Eastern zone.

The Atiku group said with the long standing good relationship between the state Governor, Liyel Imoke and the erstwhile Vice President, they hope that there will be a level playing ground during the primaries.

It was gathered that some notable politicians from the state having been working secretly for the success of the former Vice president.