2023: Why PDP May lgnore Rotational Presidency – Wike |The Source

By Adesina Soyooye

This may make some zones uncomfortable.

But in 2023, the main opposition party, the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, may jettison the rotational Presidency, or Zoning.

The rotational Presidency is a gentleman’s agreement which says that the Presidency should rotate between the North and Southern parts of Nigeria.

Many people expect that the Presidency would shift to the South, in 2023, after President Buhari’s second term in office, Meaning that they expect the two biggest political parties in the country (for now),  –  the APC and the PDP  – to pick their presidential candidates from the South.

But that may not be the case in the PDP, the main opposition party, if the analysis by the Rivers State Governor, Nyesom Wike, is anything to go by.

In an interview with Channels Television, Tuesday morning,  Wike, obviously, the strongest voice in the PDP, said that the zoning of the presidency is a luxury only a ruling party can afford. An opposition party, he emphasised, may not be able to afford the luxury of zoning, as its main focus will be on a winning candidate.

Using himself as an example, he said  he was picked as the governorship candidate of the PDP, to battle the then Governor, Minister of Transportation, Chibuike Amaechi’s candidate, Dr Dakuku Peterside, even though he, Woke, is of the same zone with Amaechi, because the PDP was looking for a winning candidate.

On his opinion on zoning at the National level, he said: “As an opposition party, we look at all variables. What will make us win the election comes first. The ruling party can say zoning, but for the opposition party, there are variables.

“It depends. As an opposition party, we look at all variables. Forget about other parties. We look at all variables, and our own concern is, how do we win, how do we get back to power?

“So, it is not one factor that will influence decisions, many variables come into play. So it will be wrong for me, as an opposition person to say this must be done now.”

Wike seems to, partially, agree with both Mamman Daura, Buhari’s nephew, and Olisa Agbakoba, SAN, both of whom, recently, said that competence should be the watch-word in the choice of who becomes the president, not zoning, or, as Daura put it, “turn by turn.”

Their opinion is in sharp contrast with many groups – Afenifere, Ohanaeze, PANDEF, and former Secretary to the Government of the Federation, SGF, David Babachir Lawal, and many others who insist it would be unfair and immoral to deny the South the Presidency in 2023.