How The South South Is Gravitating Towards The APC

• Why the people of the geopolitical zone are busy embracing Tinubu

By PHC Telegraph

Politicians have hit the political trail across the country. Everywhere their voices can be heard.

Of course, this is the season when politicians test the ground and set the ball rolling in preparation for the elections to come.

Information filtering in suggest the political class is already doing a good job of it. They are forging new friendships and scrapping old alliances; creating new alignments and also extending existing frontiers.

While some are gravitating in the direction of the ruling party, APC, other Nigerians in the opposition are boarding a vehicle called ADC – the African Democratic Congress.

Sympathy for the coalition is growing in parts of the nation, particularly in the North where angry regional leaders who claim they were responsible for 74% of the total vote cast are alleging that Tinubu is treating their area with levity.

These leaders including Atiku Abubakar, Nasir El-Rufia, Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso and a host of others cite what they consider lopsided appointments, and the location of development projects that are skewed in favour of the South.

They say Tinubu has not bent sufficiently backwards to acknowledge the enormous contributions that the north made towards his victory in 2023.

In the South South, a new picture of the situation on ground is beginning to take shape.

As Nigerians watch the unfolding drama that is playing out and people in their quiet corners try to take a position on the way forward, there are strong signs that South South leaders – those in the corridors of power and their support base – are steadily gravitating in the direction of the President, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu and the APC.

In Bayelsa, most state lawmakers have voted in favour of the decision by Governor Douye Diri to turn the state from a PDP State to an APC state.

The Governors of Delta and Akwa Ibom states have long switched camps. They are now sweeping their states clean with newly acquired brooms

By virtue of votes cast, Edo and Cross River States are already APC and the situation on ground suggests that the people are rapidly aligning with the thought that a second tenure in office for Tinubu could be quite possible.

It is a matter of time, analysts say, before the Rivers State which is locked down by a state of emergency declares its support for the President.

Governor Siminalayi Fubara is expected to lead the Rivers people into the APC family when democratic structures are restored by the Presidency.

Nobody is talking any more about the issue of when the Rivers Governor would return. All speculations suggesting possible dates in the past have failed.

What is clear is that peace has returned to the crisis torn state after two years of bitter fighting.

Rivers leaders who used to be on opposite sides are being seen together in public and this is sending appropriate signals that say the political class may indeed be ready to work together.

While the coalition appears to have made serious inroads in the Northern states, the South South states appear to have reached a broad consensus which suggests that the people of the geopolitical zone are steadily heading southwards.

Given the way politics is played in Nigeria, a rotational arrangement which is described in local parlance as a “turn by turn” system is in place.

Late President Muhammadu Buhari recently served out the turn of the North which lasted eight years.

At this time, power is in the South and many within the political class think there would be no need to jettison the arrangement that acknowledges the fact that the South indeed has another four years to go before handing  power over to the North.

Some in the country’s Northern flanks, regardless of what many Nigerians see as an unwritten zoning arrangement, think that the scramble for power at the centre by the North is not misplaced.

But the declaration of an intent to contest the presidential election by some Southern elements within the opposition obviously tells a story of its own.

It posits that the turn of the South when the issue is the presidency, how power is shared and who should occupy the Presidential Villa in the next four years is not yet over.

Besides, the PDP is seemingly saying at this time that it would give its presidential ticket to a Southerner.

Why The South South Direction Is Clear: 

In the South South where a political realignment is actively taking place, the dynamics of the game is speedily changing.

Looking at movements in the political arena, some observers say the climate in the zone which for years favoured the PDP is somehow beginning to tilt in favour of the APC.

This means that many in the geopolitical region may be willing first of all to vote for a Southern candidate in the forthcoming general election.

Insiders say that most governors across the country regardless of their political leaning, are comfortable with some of the benefits that the Tinubu era has brought on stream.

The removal of the fuel subsidy condemned by members of the opposition has given state governments across the country access to more funds.

In the South South where development strides are being rapidly encouraged, the extra funds that are coming from the common distributable pool have come in handy.

The decision by the Tinubu administration to construct the coastal road which links most of the South South and the opposition to its construction, particularly by the North, has helped to strengthen the level of support that Tinubu is gradually enjoying in the geo- political region.

Besides, the level of collaboration between the governments of South South States and the Abuja-based Federal Government has improved tremendously, with President Bola Tinubu joining hands in delivering roads and other projects in states like Bayelsa.

Although not many can see the connection, Nigeria’s ability to meet its OPEC quota may help in revealing the extent of the backing that the people of the region are seemingly giving the Tinubu administration and its effort to stamp out the activities of oil thieves.

More than this, some of the economic policies, including the tax reform, put in motion by Tinubu may lead to an increase in internally generated revenue in the South South.

Many experts as well as officials of state-run governments reckon that the uew measures would help grow the economy at the sub national level.

“When you put everything together, it is not difficult to understand why the South South is supporting Tinubu. With Tinubu, there is the possibility of what some see as shared prosperity”, a well placed source said in Port Harcourt

The APC indeed promised change many years ago when it came onto the stage to challenge the PDP. Somehow, in 10 years of APC rule, change is sweeping through the South South. The PDP has gradually taken the backstage in terms of political control.

Now, there are many in the Niger Delta and the South South who are willing to stand “on the mandate”, given the feeling in the north that Tinubu’s policies are not putting them in the driving seat.

Rotimi Amaechi’s entry into the ADC is generating interest at this time in Rivers State and elsewhere in the South South, but many think the South has to be strategic in terms of its interests.

With all the governors in the South South bent on working for Tinubu in 2027, the President’s performance in the region in the next election is likely to improve vastly.