Former vice president and Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) presidential aspirant, Atiku Abubakar has warned that a violent change in the leadership of Nigeria might occur if the current political leaders fail to encourage peaceful change.
He also warned the PDP leadership to embrace reforms in the party or risk becoming irrelevant in the nation's polity.
Mr Abubakar spoke in Abuja at a national stakeholders conference convened by the Northern Political Leaders Forum, Igbo Political Forum, South South Unity Forum and Yoruba Redemption Group. The theme of the conference was ‘Building Consensus for National Unity." The former vice president, during his brief remarks, said the conference was not about him, but about the unity and stability of the country, adding that the conveners were determined to bring the country back to the path of honour and integrity.
"If the PDP does not bring reform, it stands the risk of making itself irrelevant. Let me again send another message to the leadership of our country, especially our political leadership - those who make peaceful change impossible, make violent change inevitable. But that is not what we want for our country," Mr Abubakar said.
Zoning and Nigeria's future
The chairman of the occasion and former military president, Ibrahim Babangida, in his opening remarks, lamented that some political actors are not only trying to put the question of national unity in the back burner, but are actively trying to undermine it by jettisoning measures that are deliberately designed to promote and guarantee it.
He said the insistence of some presidential aspirants and their supporters to maintain zoning and rotation of power between the component parts of Nigeria is in the long term interest of the country and its people.
Mr Babangida recalled that when the PDP was formed, it was conceived as a big tent that would house the diverse sections, groupings and interest of the country in an amicable and orderly power sharing arrangement, stressing that dumping the arrangement will affect the electoral fortune of the party.
"The critical balancing fulcrum sustaining that arrangement is the principle of zoning and rotation of public and party offices," he said. "This is, without any doubt, what is responsible for the remarkable successes that the party was able to register in successive elections in the country. Any attempt to disrupt this arrangement therefore portends ominous prospect to the electoral fortunes of the party, but seriously endangers orderly political transition in the nation." A former Senate President, Ken Nnamani, who was the guest speaker at the occasion, said zoning and rotation of public offices are not limited to Nigeria, noting that it is practiced in other countries, like Switzerland as well as organisations like the European Union and United Nations.
According to him, those condemning the principle of rotation and zoning are merely endangering the unity of the country.
Noting that the concept of zoning was a concession to the south by the northern part of Nigeria, Mr Nnamani said the latter holds the aces because 61 per cent of the delegates to the national convention of the PDP are from that part of the country, while the south constitutes only 39 per cent.
PDP politics
He insisted that the PDP has a clause that recognises zoning in its constitution, adding that rather than implementing that clause, some people are overheating the polity.
Criticizing the position of Ohana eze Ndigbo, the socio-cultural organisation for endorsing the ambition of President Goodluck Jonathan to succeed himself, Mr. Nnamani said, "What if that individual endorsed fails to win the primaries? So, if you read such things, disregard it. To make matters worse, these people endorsing are not delegates."
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