USAfricaonline.com is listed among the world’s hot sites by the international newspaper, USAToday.
Special to USAfrica The Newspaper, Houston USAfricaonline.com and NigeriaCentral.com
Little was known about Vincent Ogbulafor until he became a minister in the Presidency. Even throughout his period as a minister, the public knew very little about him as he seldom appeared to be involved in governance. He became the National Secretary since the November 2001 Convention in Abuja. The very first initiative which Ogbulafor (in picture) took as PDP Secretary was not just embarrassing, but also suicidal. Immediately Ogbeh travelled to Uganda in mid-January, Ogbulafor wrote letters to small factions of the party in the states, unilaterally recognizing them. He even claimed he wrote the letters on behalf of the chairman who, in fact, was not aware of the letters. The letters were addressed to factions of the party in Plateau, Ebonyi, Anambra and Oyo States, among others. The letters were ill-thought-out, provocative, and in breach of the party’s NEC directive at the November Convention and reaffirmed only a couple of weeks ago.
The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) of Nigeria is not just the ruling or government party; it is far bigger than the other two recognized political parties combined, judging from the numbers of their members in control of local governments, state governments and different legislatures. Its membership is far bigger than any other party in Nigerian history. Its members flatter mit as Africa’s largest political party. In its very early days, the PDP gave the impression that it could become a mass movement.
Any time anything untoward happens to the party, it excites a lot of interest. This is very understandable. Democracy is still on trial in Nigeria. And should it fail again, Nigeria may well be worse than Somalia, a country which has for a decade been without a government; lawlessness, anarchy and fratricide have been reigning supreme there.
Different warlords have since the early 1990s carved out different empires in the country for themselves. If Somalia, a country with only one ethnic group and Islam as almost the only religion could degenerate to this state of nature where life is nasty, brutish and short on account of the inordinate ambitions of its so-called rulers, what will become of our fate should Nigeria, a country of 110million people belonging to 350 ethnic groups and diverse religious traditions, plunge into a colossal crisis? Against this background, the emergence of Chief Audu Ogbeh in November 2001 as the PDP National Chairman was greeted with great applause throughout Nigeria.
Ogbeh, intellectual, hardworking, just, and honest, is one of the very few people in Nigeria who have held public office without a blemish whatsoever. In fact, the public speaks with nostalgia about his tenure as the Minister of Communications in the Second Republic. In his well-known book, which is a scathing criticism of the Nigerian condition, entitled: The Trouble With Nigeria, Professor Chinua Achebe has nothing for Ogbeh other than respect.
The Samuel Ogbemudia Committee, which conducted both the states’ congresses and the National Convention, recommended to the NEC to take steps to resolve conflicts in the states where there are parallel executive committees. It was accepted. Just before he travelled to Uganda in January, Chief Ogbeh and the NEC had set up a fact-finding committee to look into the disputes with a view to resolving them immediately. While the committee was about to start work, Ogbulafor unilaterally recognized certain factions.
Reactions were swift, spontaneous, and violent. In Oyo State, for instance, members of one faction attacked their rivals when they were holding a meeting in Ibadan. At least one person was kidnapped. In Ebonyi State, members of the bigger faction invaded the newly acquired secretariat of the faction loyal to Senate President Pius Anyim, assaulting the staff and wreaking havoc on the building. In Anambra State, I am told that it was the valiant efforts of the deeply religious Governor that prevented the people of the state from assaulting the minority faction.
This gale of violence in PDP states was checked only by an announcement on January 22nd by Chief Ogbeh asking members of the party to disregard the state executive committees published by Chief Ogbulafor in the media. The next day, a meeting of the National Working Committee was held in Abuja, which, in keeping with the NEC decision, went ahead to search for solutions to the crises. President Obasanjo attended the meeting.
Why did Ogbulafor write those controversial letters? It is an open secret to all PDP members, even in the rural communities, that Ogbulafor acted for personal reasons. One of the reasons was to pre-empt Vice President Atiku Abubakar’s new effort to incorporate loyalists of Governor Orji Uzor Kalu into the new Abia State Executive Committee of the PDP.
Another reason was to reward the controversial young government contractor from Anambra state, Emeka Offor, who has for over one year been assisting Ogbulafor and other members of the “Abuja Group” from Abia State with finance in their war against Kalu. They said Mr. Offor is also waging a violent war in his home state against the government of Dr. Chinwoke Mbadinuju. Offor knows he can not defeat the governor in the legitimate way, and so resorted to unorthodox means, which included the Ogbulafor abortive coup d’etat.
The third reason for the coup attempt was to help the Senate President flush out the performing governor of Ebonyi state. Unconfirmed reports have it that, despite his deep involvement in the 2001 Electoral Act fraud, Anyim was one of the brains behind Ogbulafor’s abortive attempt to manipulate the status of PDP Executive Committees in states where there are controversies following the last October / November State congresses. Anyim and electoral manipulation controversy again! But is it justifiable to use the National Secretariat of the PDP to prosecute a parochial agenda, especially when the targeted victims are very loyal PDP members with excellent records?
Would Ogbulafor have gone home satisfied and slept soundly if deaths had resulted from the violence that greeted his purported recognition of dissident factions? Did he not anticipate a robust challenge to his act of recklessness? Did he expect the PDP National leadership to support his unilateral action which was ultra vires?
Why should Ogbulafor not abide by NEC decisions of his party? Truly, the PDP has a lot of soul-searching to do because if its National Secretary could flagrantly go to this extent, only God knows what will happen during its primaries for the 2003 election, and especially when the party’s own candidates contest against candidates from other parties in the general election.
Will elements like Ogbulafor in the PDP allow INEC to announce authentic results? To save both our party and democracy, it has become imperative to start doing comprehensive character screening of every candidate or nominee for every major post. If this had been carried out, it is debatable that Ogbulafor would have got the job of the PDP National Secretary. Ogbulafor was a governorship aspirant in the PDP in 1999, but when he lost the primaries to Orji Kalu , he ran to the All People’s Party and unsuccessfully ran against him. He was nominated by Chief Emmanuel Iwuanyanwu to fill an APP slot in President Obasanjo’s All-Party cabinet.
But he secretly joined the PDP somewhere along the line without quitting the cabinet, into which he was appointed in the first place as an APP member.
The next thing the nation heard was that Ogbulafor was contesting to become the PDP National Secretary, a sacred position. What does all this tell us about honour and integrity in relation to Ogbulafor and the party? I am deeply surprised that Ogbulafor, a knight of the church, should indulge in such manifestly unjust and provocative partisan pranks. He should be aware that on the last day God will judge him by higher standards than most people because as a knight much higher conduct is expected of him.
Meanwhile, we must thank God for leaders like Ogbeh who always insist on what is right. “When the righteous are in power”, says the Holy Writ, “the people are happy.”
Adinuba is a Lagos-based communications consultant and commentator on policy issues.
