The visit by the presidential candidate of Labour Party (LP) in the 2023 polls, Peter Obi, to his Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) co-contestant, Atiku Abubakar, and others has been generating reactions.
Obi had, on Monday, visited Atiku, a former Senate President, Bukola Saraki, and an ex-Jigawa State governor, Sule Lamido.
The visit fuels speculations that Obi and Atiku might be planning an alliance to wrest power from the All Progressives Congress (APC), which produced President Bola Ahmed Tinubu.
A professor at the Department of Political Science, University of Ilorin, Gbade Ojo, said: “The meeting of Atiku and Obi may signal a possible alliance soon. However, politicians are known to be incurable optimists. Atiku may be recalcitrant.
Obi too may find it difficult to put into abeyance his ambition. Whatever happens, it may be a herculean task to hinder Tinubu from his second term ambition. The alliance, if perfected, is a big threat to the APC, considering PDP is a major opposition element.”
On his part, Professor of Communication, Adewale Awodiya, explained: “Desire, ambition, and desperation stir up strange alliances that may be sustained for consequential outcomes. There are no permanent foes and friends in pragmatic politics. If the electorate buys the opposition’s propaganda, voila!
“The hydra-headed political, economic, and administrative problems of Nigeria cannot be solved without much pain; no pain no gain. But the electorate is whimsical in their expectations, and that is why a genuinely reformist government may be jettisoned, and a coalition of opportunists may succeed in wresting power.”
Awodiya added: “The APC must realise that in politics, doing good, and the right thing, for an uninformed electorate is not a guarantee in securing their loyalty. A flimsy opposition may uproot them based on the necessary sufferings that accompany reformation. Call this the tyranny of an uninformed electorate!”
A political scientist, Prof. John Ayoade, said: “It is an unsustainable alliance. It failed before, and what caused the failure is even stronger than ever before. Both had contested the highest office before and neither would want to step down. Both candidates are prone to think that the Presidency is a right. It is perhaps the last chance for Atiku that age will allow. They should resolve the issue of concession now before it is too late. Their separate followership may be a threat to an amicable settlement.”
