By KEMI KASUMU
If the information reaching us about former President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan picking the presidential expression of interest and nomination forms to contest for the forthcoming primaries on the platform of All Progressives Congress (APC) is correct, it means President Muhammadu Buhari may be having among those seeking to succeed him, the probability of handing over to his predecessor as his successor in 2023.
Although there has been no specific occasion showing that Jonathan formally decamped from Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) to the ruling APC as all that have been heard were rumours, the long dragged rumour came to fruition on Monday May 9, 2022 with two separate letters addressed to National Organising Secretary of the APC from a bank of receipt confirming receipt of N30 million and N70 million for Expression of Interest and Nomination Forms, respectively, from Jonathan to join the race to contest the 2023 presidential election.
Significant in the Jonathan’s case is the clear show of detribalised nature of those fronting to return him to power, who are Fulani people from Northern Nigeria. The DEFENDER, in recent time, had consistently reported North’s disinterest in retaining power in 2023 as, according to an interview by one of them, the South, particularly South West, will produce the next President of Nigeria except they do not want.
That it was a Northern group that picked the forms on behalf of Jonathan, a South South person from the tiniest minority in the country, has been described as good sign that North is far from what the likes of Afenifere and Igbo groups portray of them.
The forms for Jonathan, who is yet to defect from PDP, was picked up at the International Conference Centre (ICC), Abuja Monday evening.
The DEFENDER reports that Goodluck Jonathan was Vice President from 2007 but that he took over power when the late President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua died in 2010 and contested the 2011 election, which he won.
He lost his reelection to President Muhammadu Buhari in 2015 during which he acknowledged defeat before the final collation of the election results.
It was reliably gathered that two influential governors from northern part of the country are behind the effort to return Jonathan to power.
According to a media report, multiple sources, who are in the know, said the two governors, close to Buhari, have secured the buy-in of a section of the presidency to actualise their agenda of drafting the former president into the presidential race.
“While one of the governors is from the North West, the other is from the North East geopolitical zone. The two governors have been playing key roles in the affairs of the APC in the last few years,” the report said.
Although a purported statement emerged same Monday evening to say Jonathan was not aware of the forms picked in his name as reported, but our source recalled that earlier in the month he had told some of his supporters who were insisting he should declare to “be on the watch”, a disposition political pundits described as acceptance.
In the last seven years, the former president has not been attending activities of his PDP.. This is just as his romance with President Buhari and top shots of the ruling party takes the centre stage, a development that has pitched him against opposition leaders in the country.
Evidence of the payments for Jonathan’s forms below:
