PDP moves to engage Obi, Kwankwaso for 2023 polls

There are strong indications that the opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) are considering talks with the presidential candidates of the Labour Party, Peter Obi, and the New Nigeria Peoples Party (NNPP), Rabiu Kwankwaso, on how to win the 2023 presidential election.

It was gathered that the PDP, barring any last minute change, would engage the two presidential candidates to form a formidable team with the standard bearer of the main opposition party, Atiku Abubakar, to defeat the candidate of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), Asiwaju Bola Tinubu.

Obi and Kwakwanso were both PDP members before they dumped the party to actualise their presidential ambitions.

Obi, a former governor of Anambra State, was Atiku’s running mate in the 2019 presidential election, while Kwankwaso was a former governor of Kano State on the platform of the PDP.

It was, however, learnt that the main opposition party are making moves to engage with the bigwigs who are believed to have control of large voters in the North and South-East regions of the country.

Speaking on the development, a former PDP National Chairman, Prince Uche Secondus, said the result of the 2019 presidential election had shown that the PDP needed to get all the votes it could from all the states, especially northern states with higher numbers of voters.

Secondus said: “In Kano State, President (Muhammadu) Buhari won in all the 44 local government areas with 1.4 million votes, while Atiku got 391,593 votes.

“Though the incumbent governor of the state, Abdullahi Ganduje, won the governorship election on the platform of the APC in 2019, it was a tight race between his party and the PDP. So, the PDP has prospects in the state, which is why it has to do what is necessary to get the maximum possible from the state.

“The 2019 governorship election results, which were a combination of the March 9 election and the March 23 rerun, showed the APC polled 1,033,695 votes, while the PDP scored 1,024,713 votes. With the above analysis, you will see that the PDP will need the cooperation of the two gentlemen to remain popular and win these states,” the former PDP chairman told PUNCH.

Secondus, however, refused to comment on what the party and Atiku planned to do to woo the two men, whom he described as “valuable persons” to the party.

The Chairman of the PDP Board of Trustees, Senator Walid Jibrin, also said there were possibilities that votes from the South-East could be split into three with Obi’s candidacy.

“We may have a situation whereby Obi will have some votes from there (South-East), then our party and the APC will get votes as well. We need to work against that. The South-East is our zone and we know the people and the voters there will not abandon us,” he stated.

This, according to findings, is the reason the PDP and Atiku are considering speaking with Obi and Kwankwaso to enlist their support.

The Star

Segun Ojo