IN the build-up to the recently concluded nomination exercise of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), it wasn’t a secret that the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Tajudeen Abbas, was headed for the Senate to represent Kaduna North. Many of his colleagues in the lower chamber knew about the ‘upgrade’ and were already nostalgic about the imminent ‘loss’ of their largely personable leader. The number four citizen even printed invites (though Gibbers can confirm the distribution of the same was shelved at the last minute) to his planned public declaration for the Senate in his Zaria base.
Then something changed!
There was a U-turn and Abbas ‘decided’ to cling to his Zaria Federal Constituency seat that catapulted him to the speakership over the last three years and, with the backpedalling, the centre would appear to have collapsed between his camp and that of Governor Uba Sani. The crisis of confidence between the two major groups dominating the Kaduna chapter of the ruling party blew into the open recently, forcing the usually reticent Speaker to publicly speak to it, albeit denying that his relationship with the governor had soured.
Addressing supporters, he said, ‘The governor and I enjoy a close relationship founded on trust, mutual respect and a common determination to improve the welfare of our people through purposeful leadership and effective collaboration.
‘The office of the Speaker is not only a blessing to Zaria or Kaduna North Senatorial District; it is a blessing to Kaduna State as a whole. We are committed to serving every part of the state with fairness, justice and inclusiveness, while ensuring that government programmes and development projects reach communities without discrimination or political consideration.’
For those who have always known him, especially through relationships forged in his younger, schooling years, the speech is the typical Abbas; the one to douse tension and seek peace as necessary.
But today’s politics would seem to require a different temperament. When Abbas ‘flipped’ and walked away from the Senate ticket, he reportedly threw a spanner in the carefully choreographed moves that would see the governor’s younger brother take up the Reps seat Abbas was to leave behind. The bigger stake was allegedly using the ‘upgrade’ to cast off the governor’s neck the political ‘yoke’ that comes with the state and its APC chapter producing the country’s number four citizen, for another four years.
It should be noted that the governor’s alleged discomfort with having a party man, with federal might, as a co-political lord, isn’t unexampled. It’s almost as historical as it is commonplace, maybe with different decibels of hysteria, from state to state and space to space. In his adopted home state, Trump and Florida Governor Ron DeSantis have had an on-and-off political relationship, with the current tension between them being over the Republican nominee to succeed the term-limited governor. While the president, the undisputed GOP national leader, wants black Congressman Rep. Byron Donalds, the outgoing governor has refused to endorse his leader’s candidate, who used to be his close ally before siding with Trump against the governor in the 2024 Republican nomination for president.
Back to Kaduna, with the detour by Abbas, Sani’s alleged projections simply collapsed.
A failed coup?
Both Kaduna APC lords are fierce loyalists of President Tinubu. While Sani is playing a dominant role in the president’s re-election campaign as deputy to Hope Uzodinma, the Renewed Hope Ambassador DG, it’s an open secret that Abbas, from the very beginning of his unlikely ascension to the number four citizen’s seat, has been a reliable enforcer for the Nigerian leader in the power game of the lower chamber.
With Nasir el-Rufai, Tinubu’s former main man in Kaduna, now out of favour, out of the party and neatly tucked in the dungeon, likely pending the conclusion of the general election next year, a leadership vacancy and vacuum definitely beckoned in the state’s ruling party, and the Yoruba will say there can’t be two kings in a palace. Well, the lingering Kano emir dispute would seem to have blunted the edge of the age-old truism, but the two emirs tussling in the emirate aren’t locking horns from the same palace. One is in the palace, the other, in the palace’s guest house. But both claimants still answer to the same title, possibly until the Supreme Court decides who was lawfully chosen and lawfully sacked between the duo. Someone may also want to say that would depend on the apex court coming out with enough clarity this time that won’t give room for opposing parties to be claiming victory from the same judgement that should clearly spell out a winner and a loser. So much for justice.
When Governor Sani and his benefactor, el-Rufai, parted ways, it made political sense for the governor to build new bridges and alliances and, until the recent burst, both Sani and Speaker Abbas were seen as buddy-buddy, though insiders claimed that the bromance had always been under strain. But it would seem the Speaker’s politics is as simple as his usually expressionless visage. Even after the president reportedly assured him of ‘continuity’, which implies he would keep the gavel for another four years, he reportedly acquiesced to the governor’s prodding to go to the Senate, again, allegedly with the approval of the president.
The presidency connection
With the totalitarian nature of President Bola Tinubu’s politics, it will always be easy-peasy for those with privileged access to him to use him as a meal ticket. In Lagos, even the councillorship candidates’ list is still reportedly run by and through him, even when he would not readily know those on it, making it easy for the dubious among his close political associates to shamelessly manipulate nomination contests with ‘Asiwaju so pe’ (Tinubu has decreed it). The syndrome also permeated the just-done APC National Assembly nominations in the state, leading to quality first-termers, including a beloved uncle, losing to the greed of some Bourdillon charlatans. But I digress.
Governor Sani allegedly invoked the president’s name in persuading Abbas to drop the gavel and move ‘up’ and sources in the know claimed the governor wasn’t fabricating the presidential approval claim. How can one person be approbating and reprobating?
Somehow Abbas, according to his inner circle, would not even bother to check back with the Nigerian leader on why he was changing his mind about him, and at a point he was said to be seriously considering walking away from politics altogether next year, instead of becoming what the Yoruba will call akùk?´ joyè (titular head), but before he could make the ìlèsànmí (quitting with dignity) decision, a very senior official of the administration (redacting his identity for a purpose), with unfettered access to the president, would not just let go. With some principal officers, he reportedly led an inquiry delegation to the president to know why he didn’t want the Speaker again.
The team also reportedly let the president into what was playing out in Kaduna, especially the permutations. Convinced the Speaker was about losing to the shenanigans of politics, the president allegedly directed that Abbas should hold on to his Reps ticket and, if re-elected, which is almost certain, his number four seat.
President Tinubu’s politics doesn’t cut the picture of justice for the cheated. His antecedents don’t suggest it. He has tons of cut-throat political records for his critics to back the assertion up. But twice now, he has proved that he could disprove the disposition, maybe when occasionally touched by the Spirit of God.
When the NTA top leadership was flushed out in a seeming coup by one of his aides who once ran a failed satellite television company, he recalled the affected top shots within hours, despite signing off on their sacking in the first instance, the moment his Minister of Information, who was kept in the dark on the matter, was able to convince him that his earlier sacking approval was obtained by subterfuge.
The Kaduna reversal looks like a repeat and just as he managed to still keep the scheming aide close despite foiling his coup at NTA, I believe he would find a way to still keep Sani by his side even when he has burst the governor’s move against the Speaker.
Who is Kaduna APC leader?
For the APC under the Tinubu presidency, governors are deemed the leaders of the state chapters where the party rules and maybe the most senior appointed or elected officials in the few states it doesn’t control. But there have been a lot of exceptions. Who is Sanwo-Olu to attempt to decide for the ruling party in Lagos? In fact, in the last council poll in the state of the President, not even a councillorship was reportedly ceded to him even in his base, simply because the real leader in the state, President Tinubu, was angry with him over his alleged role in the crisis that engulfed the state House of Assembly following the removal of the Speaker, Mudashiru Obasa.
The same scenario has played out in Rivers. Even with Governor Sim Fubara porting to the APC, the blind can smell the authentic APC leader in the state. The bizarre dimension to the Rivers situation is that the person calling the shots in the APC isn’t even a member of the party. Politics is filled with stranger-than-fiction situations.
But by the party’s convention, Governor Sani is the assumed leader of the APC in the crucial vote-rich North-West swing state. But he has the ‘misfortune’ of his state and party producing the number four citizen of the country, who is higher up in the official protocol list. Unfortunately again for the governor, the national figure from his state seems to carry more political aura, value and weight than him and is far more beloved.
Incidentally, Governor Sani is the one I can claim to know somehow between the duo. I got to interact with his ‘team’ sometime in 2024 during the judicial consideration of complaints against his 2023 electoral victory. Abbas, I have no relationship whatsoever with, but the regular rave reviews of his project deliveries can’t but catch attention.
I learnt that the anger from the governor’s camp stemmed from Abbas appearing to do too many projects in the state under the zonal intervention initiative, better known as ‘constituency projects’. Naturally, anyone with a low confidence level will also feel threatened, humiliated and overshadowed, especially a governor who is supposed to be the man on the ground. I gathered from insiders that the project siting issue became so intense that some of the projects facilitated and financed by the Speaker had to be conceded to the state government as its projects and allowed to be commissioned under the Sani administration banner of project delivery to the people of the state.
Abbas is reportedly into such concession to ensure every part of the state benefits from his national stature, also trying not to dwarf the state government at the same time. It is a kind of stooping to conquer, and that would seem the right thing to do in the circumstance, but a man’s ego is a man’s ego. And now that both men are likely to hold on to their current jobs till 2031, the head-butting may not abate anytime soon.
A tale of three Zaria ‘boys’
Interestingly, both Uba Sani and Abbas are from the politically conscious Zaria. El-Rufai, also. Call them the three disparate Zaria musketeers. Or call what is ongoing between Abbas and Sani a tale of two Zaria ‘boys’. Both are very close to the President and openly working to re-elect him. But they could end up handing the state again to the opposition, particularly Atiku Abubakar’s ADC, if they don’t close ranks quickly and pool resources together to safeguard their turf.
With the Tinubu administration gradually making a martyr of el-Rufai, all eyes would be on the state in the January poll. His men can’t afford to be on each other’s necks. In 2023, Atiku, running on the PDP’s platform, easily won the state with el-Rufai as the sitting governor, vociferously backing Tinubu. Atiku’s PDP also swept nearly all the National Assembly seats, with Abbas coming in as the lone APC lawmaker from the state. Today, he has almost harvested all the PDP Reps from the state into the APC.
The 2023 governorship poll in the state was a hair’s breadth for the APC. But for the jurisprudential brilliance of former Attorney General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Chief Bayo Ojo, SAN, Uba’s electoral victory might not have withstood judicial scrutiny.
The 2027 dynamics are definitely different, but still not completely conducive to the governor despite his open romance with Southern Kaduna, which had always been at loggerheads with the state’s ruling establishment.
Aside from the anger of the Fulani Muslims against Sani for drawing the mainly Christian South of the state into the mainstream of governance, the fact that his ticket, fixed for him by el-Rufai, is still Muslim-Muslim like Tinubu’s is still an issue for some Christians in the state despite his open embrace of the Christian community.
Then his eternal rival and main opponent in 2027, who lost narrowly to him in 2023, has now opted for a Christian running mate.
Hopefully, Bayo Ojo will save the day again.