By Dirisu Yakubu

It was one hell of a week for the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) following the defection of its high-profile members into the main opposition political party, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).

Oshiomhole

Senate President, Bukola Saraki whose defection was only a question of time given the frosty relationship between him and the Presidency, initiated the move that was to be replicated by others in tow.

On Tuesday, Saraki announced on his personal Twitter Handle that his habitation in the APC was no longer tenable; adding that after “intensive consultations,” he had chosen to resign his membership. A couple of minutes later, the Kwara State governor and political godson of Saraki, Abdulfatah Ahmed followed suit, justifying his decision to join the PDP on the failure of the ruling party to provide the needed development-driven governance for his people.

Before then, it was the turn of his Benue State counterpart, Samuel Ortom who shunned all peace entreaties extended to him by the leadership of the APC to return to the PDP alongside some members of the State House of Assembly. The circle of defection was completed with the movement to the PDP of 18 out of the 30 members of the Sokoto House of Assembly, alongside their governor, Aminu Waziri Tambuwal.

Saturday Vanguard  had reported on this page last week that many chieftains of the APC, including serving governors were growing weary of the APC platform and were set to test fresh grounds but the weeks ahead are no different. With yet another batch of defectors set to leave the APC in the next few weeks, the question on the lips of Nigerians largely centres on whether the President Muhammadu Buhari-led government has what is takes to reverse the fortune with barely seven months to the 2019 elections.

Speaking exclusively with this medium on Thursday, Presidential hopeful on the platform of the PDP and former Minister of Special Duties and Inter-Governmental Relations, Kabiru Tanimu Turaki expressed optimism in the readiness of Nigerians to vote for a paradigm shift in 2019. According to him, the failure of APC-led government to consolidate on the democratic experience is a big tragedy too difficult to gloss over.

Saraki

He told our correspondent, “Democracy has never been this endangered in Nigeria like it has under the Buhari Presidency. All democratic institutions are under siege; all democratic core values and tenets are being violently assaulted. Nigerians have been deceived into entering a one-chance vehicle and today, they have realised that the only party that can salvage our country and save it from imminent collapse is the PDP.

“Today, all other parties in opposition have resolved to team up with PDP as the flagship of ‘Operation Save Nigeria’ from the twin maladies of hunger and poverty, from despotism and nepotism and from the wanton killings and chronic unemployment that we have been treated to in the past three years. Let me also add that rules of decency that govern civilized nations are observed in the breach in Nigeria of today and this must come to an end.”

Can the APC turn this dangerous bend around in good time to realise its bid for yet another fresh mandate of four years?

Intrigues in Benue

Moves by Terkimbi Ikyange, the impeached Speaker of the Benue State House of Assembly to rally a tiny minority of his colleagues to commence impeachment proceedings against governor Ortom earlier in the week, were truncated by aMakurdi High Court, which promptly   gave him and others, a 7-day notice to appear before it next week.

But the biggest relief for Ortom as it were, is the decision of the Benue heavyweights to rally round him and make life uncomfortable for Senator George Akume, the leader of the APC in the State. Findings by this medium revealed that the quartet of former Senate President, David Mark, ex-governor of the state, Gabriel Suswam, former Minister of Interior, Abba Moro and Senator Barnabas Gemade have all resolved to team up and counter whatever measures Akume may come up with to take Benue back to the APC.

Gemade, it would be recalled fell out with Suswam in the build up to the 2015 federal parliamentary election in the State with both then nursing intent to contest the Benue North-East Senatorial District seat. With Suswam firmly in control of the PDP structure in the district, Gemade swiftly defected to the APC, whose ticket he secured with ease. He later defeated Suswam in the election to extend his tenancy of the Senate for another four years. This time, the two are back together in the party Gemade   once presided over as national chairman. However, it is not clear yet if Suswam has agreed to cede the ticket to him this time or if the engineer-turned politician has chosen to take a back seat in the interest of peace in the party.

Governor Aminu Tambuwal of Sokoto

A member of the PDP Benue state chapter told our correspondent that come 2019, PDP would continue in office, saying the state has rejected APC and all it stands for. “We are not accusing anybody of responsibility in the killings going on in Benue but we are disappointed at the lack of capacity of the Buhari-led government to stop the bloodletting in this part of the country. Do you know that sometimes, these killers carry out sustained killings for hours without a challenge by the security agencies? So, we keep asking ourselves, is this government brave enough to protect us? What shall we be telling our people in the campaigns for 2019?” That they should vote for people who could not arrest and prosecute those who killed their fathers, mothers, children and relations?” he asked.

Who gets PDP Presidential ticket?

The big guns have joined the fray and thus, the race to the Presidential ticket of the PDP is getting all the more intense. Tambuwal and Saraki are expected to formally make a bold statement in the weeks ahead concerning their political future. When the news of Saraki’s imminent defection became rife only a fortnight ago, former Presidential aide, Doyin Okupe, tasked him to join the Presidential race without suggesting a platform. As for Tambuwal, Vanguard recently reported that top traditional and religious leaders were prompting him to seek the plum seat on the platform of the PDP.

Wherever the pendulum swings, the PDP which currently has a number of aspirants for the highest elective office including former Vice President, Atiku Abubakar, former governors of Kaduna, Kano, Sokoto and Jigawa States-Ahmed Makarfi, Ibrahim Shekarau, Attahiru Bafarawa and Sule Lamido as well as former Minister of Special Duties, Tanimu Turaki, Gombe State governor, Ibrahim Dankwambo and Senator Datti Baba-Ahmed, have vowed to come out stronger at the end of its Presidential primaries, expected to hold before the end of 2018.