2027 presidency: Northern leaders want Jonathan to contest

SOME power brokers from the northern part of the country have initiated moves to draft former president, Dr Goodluck Jonathan, into the 2027 presidential race.

The permutation is that Jonathan is only eligible for a term of four years, having served as president between 2011 and 2015. The project is led by a North East state governor and a retired General from the North West.

Saturday Tribune learnt that the leaders weighed their options based on the collective interest of the North before electing to bank on the fact that the 1999 Constitution (as amended) allows a maximum of eight years of four years each for president.

The move is part of latest efforts by those described as members of the highly influential caucus in the northern power bloc to abort President Bola Tinubu’s second term ambition.

There is, however, a counter-group which includes some governors and influential politicians who are rooting for another southern politician for the top job. Both groups are against Tinubu’s re-election.

Although talks and consultations are still at the exploratory stage, the promoters of the Jonathan-for-2027 project recently launched intense lobbying of certain critical stakeholders in the Nigeria project to get them to join in the bid to convince the former governor of Bayelsa State, who has been mostly engaged in diplomatic and other activities to foster peace and democratic norms around the world.

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A source within the fold told Saturday Tribune that the northern leaders working behind the scenes on the Jonathan-for-2027-presidency lobby are bigwigs from across the political divide in the North who are united and determined to stop what they called Tinubu’s mismanagement of the country.

According to another inside source, to bolster the effort, forces within the coalition have reached out to like minds across the six geopolitical zones, civil and pro-democracy bodies and other pressure groups to rally their commitment and support for the project.

Jonathan, who served as the vice president from 2007 to 2010 under the administration of Umaru Yar’Adua, is said to be the choice of the northern leaders because he took the oath of office as president in 2011 after contesting and winning at the poll following his completion of the term of his boss, Yar’Adua, who died during a protracted illness.

The promoters of the move also believe that given the prevailing circumstances in the nation’s political space, Jonathan is sellable because of his goodwill across the three geopolitical zones in the South and because his candidature could galvanise maximum support in the 17 states in the axis.

The permutation is also that the southern support could complement the goodwill Jonathan still enjoys in most of the 19 states in the North nine years after his presidency.

It August this year, there was a report that certain leaders had tinkered with the possibility of persuading Jonathan to contest the 2027 race.

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The initiative coincided with the position canvassed by a former Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) under the Jonathan administration and current governor of Bauchi State, Bala Mohammed, that he would step down the possibility of running for president if Jonathan bowed to pressure to take a fresh shot at the presidency.

After an event organised by a pressure group, Save Africa Initiative (SAI), the governor was quoted as saying that Jonathan had more experience and would do a good job if he had another opportunity to lead the country.

“With regard to your call for me to present myself, I am still contemplating my chances as the leader of the opposition. I know there are good leaders within the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), especially my boss, Goodluck Jonathan.

“I have always said that as long as Jonathan is around, I will not present myself for the leadership of this country, unless he decides not to run. If we can persuade him to come forward, I will support him with my blood. Out of modesty, he is still not ready. I hope you will meet him and encourage him to run.

“He will do a better job because he has the experience. We know the prices of things; we know the level of inflation. His leadership recruitment was exemplary. We need leaders like him – young people with energy, foresight and drive,” Mohammed argued.

Besides, there were attempts by certain individuals and groups to drag the former president into last year’s presidential race, especially under the banner of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC).

However, on February 4, 2023, the APC denied the widespread rumour that it was planning to field Jonathan as its candidate for the election.

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This followed reports that some governors from the North were working hard to guarantee the former president the APC ticket, which the party said was a figment of imagination.

Also, Jonathan declared that he was interested in the APC ticket after months of speculations and after a group of his supporters from North had paid for the nomination forms for him to contest in the APC primary.

But his spokesman, Ikechukwu Eze, said in a statement that Jonathan did not authorise the purchase of the nomination forms for the contest.

Jonathan was president between 2010 and 2015 under the PDP, now in the opposition.

“While we appreciate the overwhelming request by a cross section of Nigerians for Dr Jonathan to make himself available for the 2023 presidential election, we wish to state that he has not in any way committed himself to this request.

“We wish to categorically state that Dr Jonathan was not aware of this bid and did not authorise it,” Eze stated.

Interim national committee chairman of the APC then, the governor of Yobe State, Mai Mala Buni, during a BBC Hausa Service interview, dismissed insinuations to drag Jonathan into the race for the party’s ticket.

He said: “Those peddling such information are afraid. But for now, there is nothing in APC that has anything to do with the aspiration for 2023.

“Even if someone wants to base assumption on our recent visit to him during his birthday, we were there because of his status as a former President of Nigeria.

“Again, even if there is nothing when we are talking of peaceful coexistence, we must give credit to former President Jonathan on the issue of peace, how he accepted defeat in 2015 and resigned to fate. That has qualified him to be a statesman and he is now among our fathers.

“Our visit to Jonathan was pronounced because of his status as a former president that could be why some may think there was something beneath it.

“There are numerous such visits to leaders of PDP, APC, why are others not being mentioned but Jonathan?”

2027 presidency: Northern leaders want Jonathan to contest