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Dozie Ikem Ezeife, Esq

Attorney-At-Law
Oakland, California

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Chief Audu Ogbe: The Mikhail Gorbachev of the PDP
by Dozie Ikem Ezeife, Esq

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History is replete with amazing accounts of the heroic failures of man. It is quite interesting, nay, distressing, how often these incidents are soon lost upon us and are shortly reenacted many times in our very lives: the same God-like personalities and their mammoth achievements, the same soporific ambiance and success-mania, the same lame mistakes, the same madness and the same ultimate crash] – Eziuche Nwosu in PDP: The “Titanic” Crash.

 

Mikhail Gorbachev has the unenviable distinction of being the Communist Party Secretary who presided over the disintegration of the mighty Soviet Union. There is an uncanny parallel between Mikhail Gorbachev and Chief Audu Ogbeh of the PDP.

Mikhail Gorbachev was “elected” secretary general of the Soviet Communist Party and was expected to move the Soviet Union forward and consolidate the gains of the soviet revolution and modernize the soviet system. He initiated the perestroika and set in motion a series of economic and social reforms that was to stabilize the Soviet economy and modernize its social infrastructure. The wheel of the radical reforms he instituted spun out of control and resulted in the implosion of the great Soviet Socialist Republic.

Chief Audu Ogbeh was similarly “selected” by the PDP “leadership” to steer a party that was rudderless and to manage it to sweeping success in the 2003 national elections. On the heels of his selection as chairman of PDP in November of 2001, Chief Audu Ogbeh declared that his singular most important challenge was to unite the party and instill discipline among its ranks. What a challenge. He was expected to manage the crisis and conflicts that bedevil the various State branches of the PDP and to move the party forward after the disaster that was Chief Bernabas Germade’s stewardship. Chief Audu Ogbeh’s heralded saviour status is fast turning into a mirage and a fad. The PDP is fast disintegrating under his stewardship. The party is totally engulfed in genocidal intra-party deadly feuds. The PDP Governors are pitched against Abuja forces; Anyim against Obasanjo; Orji Uzor Kalu versus Olusegun Obasanjo; Na’abba against Obasanjo; Ogbulafor against Ogbeh; etc.

Joseph Ushigiale in his PDP: The Road to self Destruction, chides the PDP for its delight in changing her leadership team even when it has a stream of wins. A typical case of “if it ain’t broke, fix it until it is”. This, he observes led to the loss of several prominent founding fathers, who now anchor the ranks of the new parties that are waiting in the wings to spank the PDP in 2003. Ushigiale believes that Party Primaries that ideally should be an avenue for the selection of the party flag bearers who will eventually win elections are rigged and unpopular candidates imposed against the popular wishes of the people. This has happened in several states including Anambra, Ebonyi, Enugu, and Delta, to name a few.

Ogbeh’s PDP’s greatest problem seems to be her inability to manage success. A party in which people of divergent views and geometrically opposed political ideas were thrown together in a makeshift arrangement to win an impending election cannot realistically survive after the object of their parlay was achieved. The only bond that held the PDP together in 1999 was the quest to capture the presidency. Once that was achieved, the members’ primordial instincts to scramble for the spoils of battle took over. The greater party interest was consequently lost in the shuffle.

The PDP has thus lost total control of its members in the National Assembly and in majority of the various State Houses of Assembly of states that are governed by PDP. The national executive seems not to have control over its members. Conflicting instructions and opinions are emanating from members of the national working committee further fueling the confusion. There is a general wait-and-see attitude pervading the entire membership of the PDP. Most party members are anxiously waiting for the national convention to see if their faction would gain ascendancy; if not they would decamp to one of the other five political parties. In some states events have forced the hands of some factions and sped up their decision to move to greener pastures. In Benue and Plateau States, PDP is at the brink of losing their hold on the states to ANPP and AD respectively on account of mass decamping of a majority of big name politicians from PDP in anticipation of losing to the incumbent governors at the state conventions. States such as Abia, Ebonyi, Anambra, Enugu, Kano, Niger, Delta, Bayelsa and Rivers are likely to witness mass decamping of powerful local politicians from PDP to the newly registered political parties. If that happens, PDP is very likely to loose all those states. In all these states Audu Ogbeh is facing a catch 22: whether to throw the national executive’s support to the incumbent governors or to the Abuja based powerful political forces fighting to deny the Governors a second term. Whatever side wins, there will still be hell to pay.

Feuding groups in PDP have turned Plateau, Enugu, Anambra, Ebonyi, Benue and Delta states into killing fields. The Niger State PDP is in crises with the governor battling President Obasanjo’s ministers from his state. Several political bigwigs in Plateau State have decamped to rival AD with their supporters. There is a real likelihood that Plateau State will fall to AD in 2003. Bayelsa State House of Assembly has shut down indefinitely. Abia State House of Assembly has split into two camps. Enugu State House of Assembly is in complete chaos. The National Assembly may likely take over their functions in a matter of weeks. That will not bode well for the governor’s faction for obvious reasons.

In their editorial of August 15, 2002, the Nigerian Guardian observed:

 “the inability of the Peoples Democratic Party to rein in on its squabbling lawmakers in the states is another sad reminder of the indiscipline in the pre-existing political parties. Without discipline, a party is like a wild horse…. If a party cannot achieve internal discipline and order, it leaves little to imagination about the party’s capacity to run a government which caters for more diverse and complex interests.” I cannot agree more.

Eziuche Nwosu in his seminal piece – PDP: The “Titanic” Crash, accurately captured the mood in the PDP in the following terms”

“The PDP was once a party, now it is a house in exile: an amorphous parody of itself clawing desperately at its long extinguished past glory. Those who stay on are only prisoners of conscience. They are racing against the wind and I pity them for they know not their mission. There is nothing prophetic therefore in stating the obvious. In the present political firmament and consciousness of Nigeria, the PDP has become an unfortunate relic of history, all by its own making. In the days to come the captain will bale out leaving the bemused passengers to perish at the bottom of the sea and in the belly of hungry sharks, just as it was in the Titanic of yore.”

Olusegun Obasanjo and his henchmen, Atiku Abubakar and Chief Tony Anenih, has jointly and severally emasculated Audu Ogbeh and his executive committee and have thus made it impossible for them to command the respect of and obedience from the rank and file of the PDP. In his article in ThisDay Saturday of August 31, 2002, entitled “How Ogbeh Runs PDP” Ali M. Ali chronicled the overbearing and controlling attitude of the President towards Audu Ogbeh and the PDP. His sources told him that Obasanjo runs the PDP as a garrison command. No issues will be discussed at the PDP national working committee or even by the Board of Trustees without Audu Ogbeh taking directives from the Presidency. As a matter of fact, issues to be discussed by the PDP will have been discussed and decisions taken at Aso Rock before they are tabled before the Party. The Party apparatus merely ratify decisions already taken by the Presidency. In order words, the party plays a subsidiary role to the Presidency.

Furthermore, the presidency employs divide and rule in its dealings with the PDP. The presidency, according to Ali’s sources tries at all times to maintain personal relationship with some key members of the party hierarchy. How key each of these individuals are does not necessarily depend on their status in the party. A vice chairman such as Olabode George, for instance, draws more juice from the presidency than Audu Ogbeh himself. This sort of set up does not augur well for party discipline and administrative cohesion.

Another key destructive element is the strategy by the presidency to use party structure to pursue political vendetta against its perceived opponents. The presidency also uses the party structure to destabilize those within the party with whom it has disagreements. In the recent past, the so-called Abuja politicians were used by the presidency through the party national executive to destabilize State governors who had fallen out of favor with the President. When eventually reality set in and the President realized that State governors were better positioned than the Abuja crowd to help in his re-election bid, he did an about-face and pitched his camp with the governors and ditched the Abuja forces. This political move has sent the PDP into a tailspin that would result in its total disintegration.

Ibrahim Dan Halilu speaking of the PDP in his piece titled why I Think Obasanjo should be impeached: A rejoinder to Obi proclaimed

“Any family that has no elder to advise members and settle dispute such a family is heading for disaster, which is the state we find ourselves today under the PDP-led federal government. The Audu Ogbeh-led PDP executive has no teeth to bite offending members, no guts to check insubordination by those occupying elective offices, including the President and the Speaker.”

In conclusion, Shaka Momodu in his Ogbeh’s Many Troubles, assessed Audu Ogbeh’s stewardship in the following not too glowing terms:

“It is doubtful whether after nine months in office, Chief Audu Ogbeh will not be biting his finger in regret. Certainly, he can’t beat his chest to say that PDP is better than he met it. The truth today is that Ogbeh’s approach to solving the crisis in the party has failed not entirely due to his making but largely because of entrenched group interest which appears to supersede party interest.”

The Senate President, Chief Pius Anyim, equally echoed Momodu’s sentiments. While deploring the sustained level of indiscipline in the rank of the party, Chief Pius Anyim cautioned that if the PDP fails to stem the trend whereby individuals assume status that are higher than that of the party, PDP’s appeal to the common man would be lost. He was obviously referring to the overbearing postures the Presidency maintains vis a vis the PDP.

Speaking recently on the sorry state of the PDP at the National Executive Committee meeting of the PDP at Abuja, Chief Audu Ogbeh confessed that:

“Our party is still troubled by a variety of crises, new and fresh ones always emerging. Hardly has any matter been brought to the party’s notice than the front-page headlines announce it to the world. The desire for publicity and self-promotion seems to outweigh the need for party cohesion and national well-being. Violence and violent tendencies still tend to dominate the political landscape and the rest of society is petrified by the shadows of evil looming over us as the elections draw near. No party can survive with this kind of death wish.”

It is only a matter of time before Audu Ogbeh’s house of PDP will come crashing down. I predict the forthcoming national convention will be the final hurrah for the PDP, as we know it today. Chief Audu Ogbeh: what a man. What a task. What a monumental failure. What a pity.

 

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"I am inclined to define democracy in terms of efficacy of the government and its acceptability by the governed. If the government works to the satisfaction of the governed and the government enhance the quality of lives of its citizens, then it is a democratic government.

In the light of the foregoing premises the claim by some of our politicians that the worst civilian government is better than the best military government is arrant nonsense. This line of thinking ranks form ahead of substance."