by Tony Icheku
Having been the occupants of Abia Government House, Umuahia for 24 years by 2023, the PDP may actually be seeing itself as its permanent occupant. A mindset which now confers on the party certain arrogance that it can not be evicted by the rightful owners of Government House - the electorate. This 'arrogant mien, that 'We are invincible' signposts how PDP's gameplan to return to Government House in 2023 resembles a House of Cards.
How would this House of Cards crumble? Simple. Proposing to plan and build on a flimsy foundation, like the incumbent, Governor Okezie Ikpeazu is doing. He apparently is following a familiar route - if Orji Uzor Kalu, OUK anointed and produced T A Orji; And T A Orji did the same for Ikpeazu; Why can't Ikpeazu equally anoint and produce his successor?
Can he? Does he have the capacity? Lets review the route taken by his predecessors: from 1999-2007, OUK called the shots in Abia politics - in Government House, in the PDP and even in then opposition APP. He ran the House of Assembly. He was a benevolent dictator. Thus it was a walk in the park for him to produce his successor either within PDP or from a new party like the PPA which he quickly cobbled together to midwife his successor, T A Orji
From 2007-2011, OUK's ambition to continue his dictatorial ways quickly fizzled away as T A Orji fought like a trapped tiger to free himself from being a puppet. His second term - 2015-2019 saw him maturing as his own master, but his control of Abia affairs was not to the same dictatorial degree like OUK's regime, but he had capacity - to produce his successor and Gov Ikpeazu emerged
From 2015-2019, Abians saw a marionette in control of their affairs. The experience was similar to a ship fumbling and blundering through a storm. Would a puppet ever become less susceptible to manipulations? But in his second term, it appeared that the ship sailed more or less on calm waters, even if without any sense of urgency to arrive at any particular port.
Now 2023 beckons, whether he likes it or not, Gov Ikpeazu as the captain must berth the ship at a certain port. Now that is a tricky assignment, he has to sail through a storm, through a rocky route, and he is unfamiliar with the route
Nonetheless, Gov Ikpeazu has taken his assignment to produce his successor with all seriousness, even if he is progressing in with an arrogant swagger. So far, unlike his predecessors, he does not completely have the party machinery under his thumb.
In addition, his assertiveness level and authority is near zero: Compare Governor Udom Emmanuel of Akwa Ibom who invited stakeholders and party chieftains to a dinner and introduced his successor to them without batting an eye lid
Even when the so-called Abia Charter of Equity offered Ikpeazu an easy ride, he pussyfooted and finally lost the opportunity to ride the waves. By succumbing to the ambivalence of zoning the governorship ticket to two zones, he immediately lost the confidence of some tough minded members of his political family who would been his bulwark in midwiving a successor.
Then finally he played his joker - a weak hand that saw PDP's House of Cards inclining dangerously like the leaning Tower of Pisa
Ironically comparing the Abia PDP's House of Cards to the Tower of Pisa is imagination stretched too far: The former is a creation power drunk politicians while the latter is an engineering marvel by scientists.
Gov Ikpeazu's joker of a successor came in the form of Professor Uche Ikonne. It was a joke taken too far. Can the blind lead the blind?
From the unfolding activities around Prof Ikonne, it does not need a soothsayer to name the invisible band to whose music he, Ikonne is waltzing to.
And what a music! It is a funeral dirge. The requiem mass to draw the curtains on PDP's 24 years of partying in Abia Government House.
Prof Ikonne is a hard sale. Abians wont touch him with a six feet pole. Even within his Ngwaland constituency, he would be conspired against, by other guber hopefuls, for t instance, the likes of Nnanna Nwafor, an ally of Ikpeazu. Aspirants like Ncheta Nmerekpe who had toiled through months up to this moment would of course feel cheated. Now, Ikpeazu has completely lost the Northern Senatorial district. They had waited to take their turn again, and the likes of Prof Greg Ibe had toiled for years up to this moment. Aspirants like Alex Otti had watched and waited. Even Ikpeazu's deputy, Ude Oko Chukwu is expressing a sense of entitlement. They would not give up without a fight. The APC which already controls a significant portion of the zone would push its luck
Ikonne may be a sound academic, but he is no politician, he has neither structure nor financial muscle to do battle for the governorship. He is not the brand Abians desire. His salesman too lacks the marketing skill to prop him up as the desirable
Flipside, some may say T A orji was in similar street before the OUK anointing. Yes, do not forget OUK was calling the shots in Abia - he had the power of life and death, and never pretended he wouldnt use it if it pleases him. Does Ikpeazu wield similar powers? If the party chiefs unite against him, can he pull the rug off their feet like OUK did with PPA in 2007? Even Ikpeazu was an underdog in 2015,but his Ngwa brethren had waited years for that moment, T A Orji had the party structure lined up behind him. Today, the line up behind Ikpeazu is a ragged line of discontented party men and mercenaries.
My submission: I see a replay of 2007 all over: PDP losing the Abia governorship if Ikpeazu's joker of a guber candidate, Ikonne flys its flag in 2023. I see the political storm ahead blowing away like chaff, Ikpeazu's PDP House of Cards.
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