How Masari galvanised the north for the Jagaban Borgu

By Abdu Labaran,: Governor Aminu Bello Masari is not new in politics. Even when it was not fashionable to canvas for power shift to the South, he never left anyone in doubt, especially in the ruling party, the All Progressives Congress (APC) that it was not right to deny shifting power to the South in 2023.

 He always spoke his mind as to where power should be in the 2023. Of course, he never hide his feelings about were power should be and who is to take over from President Buhari in May 2023.

It was not new for him to tell the political truth even at the risk of losing his political ambition.

It was his lot to tell then President Obasanjo, when the the later took the Federal Budget to the then National Assembly for its assent, that their time in government was Consituitionally up. When it was his turn to speak as the Speaker of the  Federal House of Representatives, or the number 4 Man in the political hierarchy of the nation, then Masari told the World that it was the last Budget that President Obasanjo would ever make, as their time in office would be constitutionally up so that a new set of rulers would take over from them from May 2007.

 Obasanjo, who the rumour had it that he haboured a Third Term ambition, which the Nigerian Constitution did not allow, was flabbergasted at the con-dour and fearlessness of Masari. The President never expected that. But Governor Masari paid dearly with his ambition to be Governor of Katsina State at that time.

 President Obasanjo was vindictive, and made it clear that Aminu Bello Masari would pay for his opposition to the Third Term Agenda.

Buhari, who had promised never to contest any election in the country, was also elected President of the Nation. And it was the Jagaban Borgu who made it possible at that time, with all the then ACN Governors in tow for a meeting with then Muhammadu Buhari in Kaduna where he convinced the latter to reconsider the vow he had made never to contest any more election in the country.

The Jagaban Borgu had promised Buhari to give him all the support he needed to win the 2015 election. And he never went back on that promise, as he himself, his supporters across the country, and all the ACN Governors gave him their votes which made him President in 2015.

And it looked like it was not going to be easy for anyone in the South West to succeed President Buhari in 2023.

Some APC Governors in the north had ganged up to fight him and they started by removing the party’s National Chairman, Adams Oshiomhole:, who they believed was an ally of the Jagaban Borgu, and one of them had an arrangement to hand over power to the son of a chieftain of the main opposition party in the country, all because one of them had ambition to be Vice President to a Minister,  who hailed from the South-South and was a former governor of his  state. As soon as their plan was out others began their move to truncate their plan.

And they failed woefully as, despite removing Oshiomhole from being the Head of the party, the Jagaban Borgu emerged victorious in the primary election of the party, thanks to the open and subterranian activities of some people like the Katsina State Governor, who had, and still do, believe that it was totally immoral to deny the Jagaban Borgu the chance to have a shot at the Presidency, even if the agreement made with him was not constitutional.

The Katsina State Governor had a meeting in Kaduna with all his colleagues in the north who were in the APC and sold the idea of supporting the Jagaban Borgu to achieve his dream to become the next Nigerian President after Mohammadu Buhari.