2015: PDP and APC battles for Obasanjo

Published by: punch nigeria The Peoples Democratic Party and the All Progressives Congress have begun what can be described as the last battle to woo former President Olusegun Obasanjo ahead of the presidential primaries. Investigations by our correspondents on Sunday showed that separate meetings the former president held with Senate President, David Mark, and an APC leader, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, marked the beginning of the last attempt to get Obasanjo’s support ahead of party primaries. Although the PDP has endorsed President Goodluck Jonathan as its sole presidential candidate, it presidential primary would hold on December 6, 2014 On its part, the APC will choose between former Vice-President Atiku Abubakar and an ex-Head of State, Maj.-Gen. Muhammadu Buhari (retd.) at its national convention on December 2, 2014. According to the Independent National Electoral Commission, party primaries will hold between October 2 and December 11, 2014. Our correspondents gathered that the meeting with Tinubu, which was also attended by the APC National Vice-Chairman, Segun Oni, centred on what should constitute the interest of the South-West in the forthcoming presidential election. It was gathered the APC leaders specifically solicited the support of the former president for the party. Obasanjo was said to have advised the opposition party to choose a presidential candidate with a clean record. A top APC chieftain in the South-West, who confided in one of our correspondents, said, “The two former governors said that the interest of the South-West should determine the candidate our people should support. “You will agree that our people have not been fairly treated by the present government at the centre, but Baba in his characteristic frankness advised the APC to choose a candidate with an untainted record.” It was learnt that the PDP and Jonathan chose Mark to head the reconciliation team because of his closeness to Obasanjo. The former president had on several occasions expressed his opposition to Jonathan’s second term ambition on the grounds that the President in 2011 promised not to re-contest. But a top PDP chieftain, who confided in one of correspondents, said, “The President has not lost hope. He still respects Obasanjo and believes the former president can still support him.” A source, who was part of the team that visited Obasanjo, confided in one of our correspondents, in Abuja on Sunday that Mark’s team arrived Obasanjo’s residence when the retired general was seeing off Tinubu and his team. The source, who pleaded for anonymity because he was not authorised to speak to the media, said the meeting between Mark and Obasanjo lasted for about four hours. According to him, the meeting centred principally on the need for the former President to lend his support to efforts being made by the party to fully re-integrate all aggrieved members back into its fold. He said, “The Senate President is playing a crucial rule in the current integration efforts by the leadership of the PDP to bring back the aggrieved leaders of our party into the mainstream again and Obasanjo is very key to the success of the team’s assignment. So, that is why we went to him. “The 2015 elections is around the corner and the leadership of the PDP is determined to ensure success in all the geo-political zones. This will be a little bit difficult if the aggrieved leaders and members are not integrated back to the system.” “Apart from the Senate President being the chairman of the South-West PDP reconciliation committee, he enjoys a father son relationship with Chief Obasanjo. He went to the see former President Obasanjo as part of his assignment.”