www.vanguardngr.com/2014/09/season-carpet-crossing-apc-back-pdp/

The PDP and the APC are not even yin and
yang. They are Siamese twins. They are
children of the same ugly mother.
If you have not noticed it already, a new
season has dawned in Nigerian politics.
That season is one of carpet-crossing back
to the PDP. About a year ago, there was a
rash of defections from the PDP to the
APC. Nearly 40 legislators left the ruling
party for the opposition. Five PDP
governors also followed suit. But now the
movement is a one-way trajectory in the
opposite direction. APC members are
having buyers’ remorse and are making
their way back as prodigal sons to the
PDP.
There are two basic reasons behind this.
One year ago, the APC was the new party
on the block. A simplistic political
calculus led some to the hasty conclusion
we finally have the party that would
dislodge the PDP after 15 years of one-
party rule in Nigeria. So some people
quickly joined the APC bandwagon. But
the more cynical reason was that the
defections were designed to discourage
Goodluck Jonathan from seeking re-
election as president. The vain hope and
expectation was that Jonathan would see
the colossus ranged against him and throw
in the towel.
New realpolitik
One year is a lifetime in politics and these
prognoses have become bankrupt. A new
harsh reality has set in. The APC is now a
shadow of its hype. Since the initial
excitement, it lost Ekiti by a landslide and
scraped through in Osun; two states
presumed to be APC strongholds. In spite
of considerable arm-twisting, including
the nuisance value of APC Trojan horse
Sule Lamido’s candidacy, Goodluck
Jonathan is going to run on the PDP’s
2015 presidential ticket.
Short of the shenanigans of Attahiru Jega
and his fictitious 30,000 new polling
units, the APC does not stand a chance of
defeating the PDP in the coming
presidential election. The combination of
these two realities is provoking a no-
holds-barred migration back to the PDP.
As a matter of fact, once Jonathan finally
declares his candidacy and is endorsed by
the PDP, there will be a mass exodus from
the APC to the PDP. Even before then,
those who lose out in the APC choice of its
presidential candidate will not waste time
before making their way to the PDP. The
movement will be massive all in one
direction because in Nigerian politics the
winner takes all. The one thing politicians
are very good at is in reading the signs of
the times.
Timber and caliber
What has happened over the last few
months is that a procession of APC who-
is-who has defected to the PDP. This
includes Attahiru Bafawara, Brigadier-
General Buba Marwa (rtd.), Ibrahim
Shekarau, Femi Fani-Kayode, Ali Modu
Sherriff, Jimi Agbaje, Nuhu Ribadu and
Tom Ikimi. These people have read the
writing on the wall and have discovered
that, by hook or crook, the PDP is not
going to lose the coming presidential
election. Don’t be surprised if by next
year, even Atiku applies to be re-admitted
to the PDP, after he would have been shut
out of the APC.
There were a lot of raised eyebrows at
Nuhu Ribadu’s defection to the PDP. But
what exactly was he supposed to do?
There is no future in the APC for him.
Ribadu served for eight years under the
“hateful” PDP. As EFCC Chairman, he
indicted Tinubu of corruption and called
him a looter of public funds “of
international dimension.” But then he
ended up in Tinubu’s ACN where he was
even comically paraded as the party’s 2011
presidential candidate; only to be traded
off shamefully in a despicable act of
political treachery.
Clearly, Ribadu cannot be APC’s
presidential or vice-presidential
candidate. Neither can the APC make him
governor of Adamawa State. Since he
recognizes that the APC is headed for
defeat in 2015, that means the offer of a
ministerial position in Abuja is out of the
question. Neither can the APC make him
the Nigerian High Commissioner to the
Court of St. James as a consolation prize.
However, the PDP can offer him all but
one of these juicy posts. So what would be
the point of staying in the APC? None
whatsoever! This kind of cold hard
calculus will become increasingly evident
to other APC politicians; the closer we get
to the 2015 election. Just you wait; they
will soon be jumping ship to the PDP in
droves.
One-party rule
There is still only one political party in
Nigeria at the federal level and that one
party is the party in power. What is the
difference between the PDP and the APC?
Only one; PDP is in power at the centre:
APC is not. Besides that, there is no
difference whatsoever! They are not even
yin and yang. They are Siamese twins.
They are children of the same ugly
mother. They are Jekyll and Hyde. They
are two peas in a pod.
When the APC first emerged, some were
excited that we would finally have a two-
party system. No such luck! For the
longest time, Nigeria will remain a one-
party state. When you truly have a two-
party system, you have two parties with
different world-views. They have two
contrasting and competing ideologies. Not
so in Nigeria. Like people, like priest! The
people are uneducated and so are the
polithiefcians. They have no ideology, no
policies and no vision. It is all about
getting into power to get a piece of the
national cake.
The APC touts Buhari as an anti-
corruption icon. It says PDP is a party of
thieves and robbers. But when did you
hear the APC require those PDP
governors and legislators it welcomed
into its ranks to account for the money
they stole while in the PDP? Never! It
relies on them to bring the money.
Murtala Nyako was impeached for
corruption. Did anybody hear APC
members say anything against his corrupt
practices?
Boko Haram politicians
Suddenly, the APC is making a lot of song
and dance about PDP’s Bunu Sheriff being
labeled by Stephen Davis as a sponsor of
the Boko Haram. But the same Bunu
Sheriff was in APC for over a year until
recently. Even as APC member, he was
fingered as a possible Boko Harram
sponsor, and the party took no action
against him. Bunu Sheriff was not kicked
out of the APC: he resigned.
At a meeting in the British parliament,
chaired by John Glen, a close adviser to
Prime Minister David Cameron,
allegations were raised that key members
of the APC in Nigeria are supporters and
financiers of Boko Haram “for ideological
and political means.” Early this year,
British MP Andrew Rosindell questioned
Foreign Secretary William Hague in
parliament specifically on the question of
the United Kingdom’s engagement with
the APC over the Boko Haram insurgency
in Nigeria.
No ideologies
Nigerian political parties are much of a
muchness. If you did not know this, the
rash of defections to and fro is eloquent
testimony. That is why Obasanjo can be
the so-called Baba of the PDP yesterday,
and today be invited by a high-powered
delegation to become the Navigator of the
APC. Kwankwaso can be elected governor
of Kano on the platform of the PDP in
2011. But midstream in his tenure in 2013,
he switches to the APC without any
change in policy or ideology.
How many prominent members of the
Labour Party in Britain have we ever
heard defecting to the Conservatives?
How many prominent members of the
Democratic Party in the United States do
we ever hear crossing the carpet suddenly
to the Republican Party? Virtually none!
The reason is that those parties stand for
something and their members believe in
what they stand for. However, Nigerian
political parties stand for nothing. They
believe in nothing. All they seek is to
feather their nests while in office.
The PDP makes few principled
pretensions. It is a party of thieves and
robbers. It is a party of “come and chop!”
That actually makes it endearing in a way.
What you see is what you get. But lately, it
has been trying to reform itself. There is
now more internal democracy in the PDP,
making for fewer spats.
The APC, on the other hand is a party of
dissemblers. It calls itself a progressive
party. But how do you have a progressive
party that makes a point of collecting the
“non-progressives” rejects of the PDP?
How do you have a progressive party led
by certificate forgers and insatiable land-
grabbers with dubious unexplained
wealth?
Political prostitutes
Nigeria political parties are Twedledee
and Twedledum. They may go by the
acronym ECN, or NEPA or PHCN; but the
one constant is lack of electricity. As for
Nigerian politicians, they are nothing but
high-class prostitutes. The principled and
upright ones, like Senator Udo Udoma of
Akwa Ibom, are few and far between.
Neither do they survive for long in
politics. After eight years, Senator Udoma
voluntarily called it quits. “The beautiful
ones are not yet born.”
But take, for example, the current
Governor of Imo State. He must hold
some kind of Nigerian record for carpet-
crossing. Okorocha was in PDP before he
was not. In 1999, he contested for
governor of Imo under the PDP. In 2003,
he ran for the ANPP presidential ticket.
When that came to grief, he returned to
the PDP as President Obasanjo’s Special
Adviser on Inter-Party Affairs. In 2005,
he was a founding-member of the Action
Alliance. By 2007, he was back in the PDP.
In 2010, he defected to APGA and ran for
governor of Imo State. Having become
governor, he decamped to the APC in
2013.
Men like Okorocha who cannot stay in one
place need to be placed under arrest.
Okorocha’s jumps from pillar to post have
one unchanging purpose: his unending
search for politically greener pastures. If
he does not secure the vice-presidential
ticket of the APC at their coming
convention, your guess is as good as mine
if he will remain one day longer in the
party. In short, at this stage of Nigerian
politics, virtually all our politicians are
self-serving. Far more than the people
they misrule, they are the ones always
looking for stomach infrastructure.
BY FEMI ARIBISALA

Most Nigerian politicians are lazy, self-serving and greedy. They cannot survive being in the opposition for long, with the kind of structure of government in the country where too much power and resources is controlled at the centre.

Facts are Facts. Different people, same party = Same people different party.