PRESIDENT Goodluck Jonathan got a big boost to his 2015 re-election campaign over the weekend after his Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) governors decided to push for a consensus presidential candidate. Over recent months, political jostling has intensified within the PDP as the 2015 elections approach and the party plans to pick its presidential candidate at a special convention next month. President Jonathans campaigners have been touring the country seeking an automatic ticket for him but so far, Jigawa State governor Sule Lamido has signified that he will stand in the primaries. If Governor Lamido refuses to back down, it will mean there will be elections at the PDP primaries next month and President Jonathan will not get the unanimous endorsement he had been hoping for. However, if he can get the PDP governors to adopt him as a consensus candidate, it would make the elections a mere formality. State governors are the ones who select delegates to PDP conferences and conventions and if all of the partys governors adopt President Goodluck as their candidate, other contestants have little chance of getting votes. Governor Lamido for instance, would then only get the votes of Jigawa State delegates. Apparently, Akwa Ibom State governor Godswill Akpabio, who is the chairman of the PDP Governors Forum, has been trying to persuade his colleagues and party leaders towards adopting a consensus candidate. He added that the plan is to keep the PDP united to confront the opposition in 2015. Although President Goodluck is yet to formally declare his candidacy, zonal rallies in his support are being held up and down the country by the Transformation Ambassadors of Nigeria. Party sources say that the Governors Forum is using the rallies to gauge how much support there is for President Jonathan. One PDP source said: “With the exception of Governor Sule Lamido of Jigawa State, all the PDP governors are really working towards automatic adoption of the president for second term as PDP’s consensus candidate. They want to make the presidential primaries a mere formality at the national convention of the party. “In fact, the chairman of the PDP Governors Forum, Chief Godswill Akpabio, is the main driver of the consensus option. If you look at the trend, most PDP governors have stayed away from presidential ambitions and instead, some of them are only having aspirations for the office of vice president.” One PDP governor said that he and his colleagues have almost agreed that President Jonathan should continue in 2015. This consensus option may be part of the agenda of the PDP governors’ when they meet on Wednesday at the Akwa Ibom State Governor’s Lodge in Asokoro, Abuja. There has been pressure on the president to declare his re-election bid at a mini-summit holding in Abuja tomorrow. All pro-Jonathan groups are expected to converge on Abuja for a mini-summit, which is expected to be very much an endorsement of his presidency.
Posted on: Mon, 15 Sep 2014 21:53:41 +0000
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