By Mahmud Jega
http://dailytrust.com.ng/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=157886:what-will-be-will-be&catid=6:daily-columns&Itemid=6

I remember seeing Alhaji Bamanga Mohamed Tukur [BMT, he was called in the Second Republic] for the first time ever in July 1992. It was at the National Republican Convention’s [NRC] national secretariat in Abuja, the building now occupied by the ICPC. There was feverish political activity all around because the two parties of that era were about to commence their staggered presidential primaries, and Bamanga was one of the NRC’s leading aspirants.

When he emerged from the building and headed for his car, at least two dozen reporters abandoned other politicians who were all over the yard and flocked to him. They were falling over themselves to be seen, and were pushing microphones, tape recorders and notebooks virtually into his mouth. I stood at some distance and watched. Their eagerness to interview Bamanga, I thought, was not so much due to his news value but due to the perception of him in those days as a very wealthy man. “Bamanga Naira,” some politicians called him in those days. To his credit, on that particular occasion, I saw him walk away after the interview without dishing out any money.

As the big winner at this weekend’s PDP convention, the new national chairman came in with many strengths and not a few weaknesses as well. Let’s begin with the strengths. Bamanga comes from one of Nigeria’s most prominent families; his equally awesome brothers include Dr. Mahmud Tukur, former Vice Chancellor and former Minister of Commerce, and Engineer Hamman Tukur, former Rector of Kaduna Polytechnic, former managing director of NEPA and lately former Chairman of the Revenue Mobilisation, Allocation and Fiscal Commission [RMAFC].

On his own, Bamanga is an awesome man who has featured prominently on the national scene since 1975, when he was appointed General Manager of the Nigeria Ports Authority. He took over NPA at the height of the “cement armada,” when this country’s seaports were choked by ships bringing in cement imported by the Ministry of Defence to build army barracks. He presided over the clearing of the armada and the building of new ports.

It was in 1982-83 that Bamanga Tukur burst onto the political scene in his native Gongola State and created a phenomenon not seen in Nigeria up to that time. In pursuit of his governorship ambition, he created the BMT Organisation, with Dr. Raymond Dokpesi as its director general. Within months, BMT was more powerful, more sprawling and more ruthlessly efficient than even NPN, whose flag he flew. NPN had finished third in Gongola State in the 1979 elections, behind GNPP and UPN [with only one senator out of five], but in 1983 BMT made mincemeat of the GNPP/NPP alliance and the UPN. Bamanga’s stay in the Yola Government House however lasted only three months.

In the Third Republic, Bamanga was a late entrant into the NRC presidential race. He went in when Malam Adamu Ciroma and Alhaji Umaru Shinkafi had already split the party between them, but he still made a big splash. He however failed to make it into the runoff, which incidentally was never held.

Compared to his eight predecessors as PDP national chairmen, Bamanga arrives at the post with one of the biggest personal and political stature. One of his predecessors [Solomon Lar] was a former governor while six [Lar, Barnabas Gemade, Audu Ogbeh, Vincent Ogbulafor, Okwesilieze Nwodo and Bello Haliru Mohamed] were former ministers. Bamanga was both a former governor and a former minister. With his age and stature, he appears to stand beyond intimidation by the PDP’s scheming governors, especially.

Yet, Bamanga came in with several weaknesses as well. Counting against him now is age. Although he looks younger and fitter than his 77 years suggests, Alhaji Bamanga will be 80 years old by the time PDP holds its next round of usually acrimonious election primaries in 2015.

In his previous political escapades Bamanga was always his own man, but this time he rode to the post entirely on the back of President Goodluck Jonathan. It is not a very comfortable position; back in the Second Republic, NPN national chairman Chief Adisa Akinloye did not get his post due to President Shehu Shagari and it showed in his power and independence.

As a result of this tight clinging to presidential coat tails, Bamanga suffered a big embarrassment last week when he was defeated at the North East caucus’ straw polling in Bauchi. He followed up with another blunder when he joined ten other losers to reject the caucus’ vote, thus throwing into question his own democratic temperament.

The democratic quality [or more properly, lack of it] of the PDP convention also robbed Bamanga’s victory of some shine. On television at least, the PDP convention looked orderly and well organized, but the evidently forced line up of dozens of candidates to withdraw from contests at the last minute sent a troubling message to observers. What was the point of collecting 4,500 delegates at Eagle Square, only to hear that 11 out of 12 candidates for national chairman were withdrawing at the last minute for what they themselves called “the anointed candidate”?

The fact that only one of them, Dr. Shettima Mustapha went up to the podium to make the announcement said a lot. This is not to mention Chief Ebenezer Babatope’s angry and tearful withdrawal speech. With good reason I think, because Babatope was one of the most successful party officers in Nigeria’s history back in the Second Republic, when he was UPN’s Director of Organisation. The other all-time great was UPN’s Director of Research and Publicity, M.C.K. Ajuluchukwu.

In the end, behind all the glitz, glitter and façade of democratic order, all that happened at the PDP convention was the party’s most powerful leaders sat down and shared all the key posts among themselves. No more, no less.

Why did Jonathan insist on Bamanga as the chairman, at great cost to the party’s democratic pretenses? Apart from the need to reward him for his loyalty last year, many pundits said Jonathan’s gambit consists of trying to upstage Atiku Abubakar’s 2015 presidential ambitions by appointing a national chairman from his home state.

Not a smart move, if you ask me, because we have travelled that path before. As a rookie political reporter in 1990, I was present at the NRC’s first national convention at Abuja’s Sheraton Hotel. A big fight took place there between a Northern caucus led by Alhaji Ahmadu Kurfi and Chief Emmanuel Iwuanyanwu. Each side tried to push the party chairmanship to the other in order to position itself for the presidency; Iwuanyanwu sponsored Alhaji Ibrahim Mantu while the Northerners sponsored Chief Tom Ikimi. I don’t think it mattered, because Ambassador Babagana Kingibe’s chairmanship of SDP did not stop General Shehu Yar’adua from grabbing its presidential ticket on the first ballot.

Apart from installing Bamanga, President Jonathan executed another manoeuvre at the convention by amending the party constitution to enlarge its National Executive Committee [NEC] with the addition of two National Assembly members from each state. The clear purpose, mooted since last year, is to dilute the power of state governors in the NEC.

Again that could be in vain. Most senators and Reps are actually loyal to their state governors, who often anointed them and are best placed to help them secure re-election. Last year’s attempt by the legislators to write into the Electoral Act a patently undemocratic “right of first refusal” for themselves during party primaries cannot survive beyond the first legal hurdle.

What is the use of all this undemocratic scheming with a view to rig a future outcome that we are all not sure of? It reminds me of the old English song:

When I was just a little girl

I asked my mother what I will be

Will I be pretty, will I be rich

Here is what she said to me

Que sera, sera

Whatever will be, will be

The future’s not ours to see