The news that Governor Segun Mimiko is defecting from Labour Party to the PDP was to many a storm in a tea cup. To some, especially in Abuja, he is more PDP than many PDP governors and showed so when he delivered for the party in the last presidential elections more than half of the party’s governors.
But no matter his efforts in pushing the interests of President Goodluck Jonathan, the jabs from fellow governors remained a discomfort to the Ondo governor.
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| *Supreme Court Judgment: Ondo State Governor Olusegun Mimiko jubilating with his Supporters shortly after Supreme Court judgment in his favor in Abuja. Photo by Gbemiga Olamikan. |
When last month Governor Mimiko stood on a five man panel with five other governors at a Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN event on poverty alleviation schemes, the Labour governor was the first to praise the efforts of the Jonathan administration in uplifting the Medium and Small-Scale Enterprises Schemes, saying that that was a sufficient reason to releect the president.
Political chasm
Whether stimulated by jealousy or he saw Mimiko as an interloper, Governor Babagida Aliyu of Niger State was to jab Governor Mimiko to defect to the PDP if he saw the good things that were being done by the PDP federal administration.
But defecting to the PDP had never been an easy task for Mimiko, given the political chasm that has existed between him and the mainstream of the party in his native Ondo State since he walked away from the party in 2006.
Mimiko came to the PDP from the Alliance for Democracy, AD where he served as a commissioner, and was reportedly largely instrumental to the defeat of the AD government by the PDP in the 2003 gubernatorial elections which brought Segun Agagu, to power.
No one has proved it till today, but it has been largely whispered in political circles that there was an agreement for Agagu to serve one term and thereafter, Mimiko would run for governor in 2007. However, by 2006 the signs were that such an agreement if it was ever made would not be honoured and Mimiko who had become a minister in the Olusegun Obasanjo administration was forced to leave the PDP to contest against Agagu in the 2007 election on the platform of Labour Party which he set up in the state. Though Agagu was declared the winner by the electoral authorities, the result was upturned by the courts after a trenchant judicial battle more than one year later.
Though now dead, Agagu and his associates never forgave Mimiko for the humiliation which was reinforced in 2011 when Mimiko humbled Agagu, his former boss in the Ondo South Senate election by pushing his adopted Labour man to win the seat.
Though Southwest political leader, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu was supportive of Mimiko’s judicial battle against the PDP in the period between 2007 and 2008 when he was declared winner by the Court of Appeal, Mimiko and Tinubu also parted ways in the period before the 2012 gubernatorial election , forcing Mimiko into a sort of political orphan that had to battle entrenched political establishments for re-election in 2012. It was a hard fought battle in which he triumphed.
Given his roots in the PDP and the apparent failure of the then PDP state leader, Agagu to firmly hold the structures of the party in the state, it was not surprising that cleavages appeared within the PDP with some of the PDP members creating a faction that supported Mimiko’s re-election against the desire of Agagu.
The faction led by a former diplomat, Ambassador Olu Agbi, included party chieftains among whom were Chief Segun Adegoke, Dr Akin Olowokere, Mr. Demola Adegoroye and Mr. Kunle Agunbiade. The faction had rubbed delicate nerves ahead of the 2012 election when it endorsed Mimiko as against the candidate produced by the Agagu faction of the party, Chief Olusola Oke.
Inevitably, the Agbi faction of the party which has consistently been supportive of the Mimiko government is now generally known among political stakeholders as PDP –Gbesibe.
Meanwhile, the other faction led by Agagu according to sources also shifted its sights towards the Asiwaju Tinubu forces in the Southwest. Just before the death of Agagu last year, the faction it was learnt was set to embrace the Tinubu led All Progressives Congress, APC in the Southwest for a working agreement or possible merger.
That faction of the PDP is also known among political stakeholders in Ondo State as PDP Jagaban.
Though Mimiko has been the issue in Ondo politics for close to seven years, sources close to the governor say that his decision to retrace his steps to the PDP were forced by political exigencies.
One major reason it was learnt is the weight or cost of being the only governor in the Labour Party. Besides the cost of funding the party, the governor it was learnt was uncomfortable with the loneliness around him. The jab from Governor Aliyu at the CBN event last August was only a reflection of such jabs.
Besides, Governor Mimiko is also projecting the implications for him and President Jonathan in 2015 were he to support the president as a Labour governor. Associates of the governor reveal that many votes were lost to Labour in 2011 when the Labour Party took the decision to support the president in the presidential election and also at the same time support Labour candidates in other tiers.
“Presidential election and National Assembly elections are going to be done the same day so, he can’t canvass for Jonathan for the presidency and campaign for Labour Party for the National Assembly elections. It will be hard to sell to our people, the difference in election,” an associate of the governor said. “Many members of the electorate won’t understand the voting process of voting for the PDP and also voting for Labour Party in the same election,” the associate added.
His imminent entry into the PDP is, however, bound to reshape political calculations as PDP Jagban which is the officially recognised faction is bound to be unsettled by his entry as their one time enemy becomes their political leader. Sources say that a 60:40 sharing ratio in favour of Mimiko has been agreed between the governor and PDP national leaders.
But outside Ondo State, the entry of Governor Mimiko into the PDP is bound to reshape political permutations in the Southwest where Tinubu had until lately held full sway. With a two term governor in the person of Mimiko now in the fold, the shape and scene of the PDP in the Southwest are bound to be expanded putting an apparent question to the claim by the APC that the southwest is their foothold.
Source: Vanguardng
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