A possible reason Senate President Ahmad Lawan was drafted into the crowded 2023 presidential race on the platform of All Progressives Congress (APC) has filtered into the open.


According to a political risk consultancy firm that gave insight into the game plan in its weekly intelligence report on Nigeria, Nigeria Politics & Security, there are likely to be some defections before APC’s presidential primaries on June 1 by those who now believe that they have little or no chance of being selected for the party’s ticket.

According to the intelligence report, Lawan is one of those who submitted the forms on time, adding, ‘’despite his late entry into the race to succeed President Muhammadu Buhari, he has emerged as one of the frontrunners as the APC seeks ways to respond to the possibility of facing a northern candidate representing the opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).

‘’Lawan’s chances of winning the APC ticket have improved following the failure of a plan to draft Nigeria’s 2010-2015 President Goodluck Jonathan into the presidential election race.

‘’Yobe State’s Governor Mai Mala Buni — who until recently was the APC’s caretaker chairman, and who hatched the plan to draft Jonathan appears to have been behind the move to bring Lawan into the race after the previous plan failed.’’

APC closed the sale of its nomination forms on May 13 and is currently screening the 28 presidential candidates who submitted their forms before the deadline.

Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) Governor, Godwin Emefiele, did not submit the completed APC forms and will therefore not be screened.

This, according to the intelligence report, is despite receiving a last-minute legal injunction preventing the CBN’s board from stopping him from competing.

President Buhari’s instruction for all political appointees who have declared their intention to run in 2023 to resign on or before May 16 appears to have deterred Emefiele from proceeding with his plans. Nonetheless, he is likely to be fired anyway because he has demonstrated his political partisanship as an APC member.

An increasing number of cabinet members including Minister of Labour and Productivity Chris Ngige, and the Minister of Justice and Attorney General of the Federation (AGF), Abubakar Malami, have abandoned their political ambitions after Buhari instructed all candidates to resign their portfolios by May 16.

Ngige had purchased the presidential nomination forms, while Malami had obtained the ones for the Kebbi State gubernatorial election. The fear of losing their powerful jobs appears to have compelled them to reconsider their quest.

However, a number of cabinet colleagues, including Minister of Transportation Chibuike Amaechi, have resigned so that they can run for one of the posts in next year’s general election.

‘’There is a growing likelihood that neither APC nor the main opposition PDP will win the 2023 national elections on the first ballot and that regional parties will subsequently emerge.

‘’The APC’s overwhelming dominance is likely to dwindle; the PDP is likely to remain in its South-South strongholds; while the smaller parties will be strong in specific states and the National Assembly’’, the intelligence report says.

Continuing, it said Kano State Governor Abdullahi Ganduje’s Chief of Staff announced his defection to the New Nigeria Peoples Party (NNPP) on May 14. He is the state’s latest high-profile defector to the NNPP which gained popularity after its 1999-2003 and 2011-2015 governor, Rabiu Kwankwaso, defected from the PDP.

NNPP recently welcomed Abdulmumin Jibrin — Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s campaign director general in the North — who defected from the APC to the NNPP despite pleas from Tinubu not to do so.

Fourteen PDP members in Kano State’s House of Assembly have subsequently defected to the NNPP which has transformed into the major opposition in Kano which, after Lagos, has the second largest number of voters and but boasts the highest turnout.