Bashir Machina is not Ahmad Lawan’s Deus Ex Machina, By Sufuyan Ojeifo

What else would I be writing about if not the contestation for the Yobe North Senatorial Seat, which has been made popular by the fact of Dr Ahmad Lawan’s presidency of the Senate? Were it not for his validation as Senate President, the senatorial zone/seat would have been like any other in the country. On the other hand, the senate presidency has emphatically glamourized Lawan and Yobe North with both enjoying significant attention in the country’s power sharing and balancing architecture.

Explicably, the emergence of Bashir Sherrif Machina as candidate of All Progressives Congress, APC, in Yobe North, which has caused a fundamental disruption in Lawan and the party’s agendum to give post-presidential primary poll accommodation to Lawan, has adverted substantial national attention to the issue of Yobe North ticket. Remember that Lawan had been the Majority Leader in the eighth senate after he was outfoxed by Dr Bukola Saraki in the race for the Senate Presidency in 2015. And, just in case, you do not know, Lawan had spent eight years in the House of Representatives from 1999 to 2007 before climbing upstairs to the Senate. So, he is as old as the National Assembly in Nigeria’s Fourth Republic. To that extent, he could be referred to what the Yoruba call “Ebora” or “Iwin” or “Eru jeje” something, loosely translated, is close to genie.

Lawan had been adopted by the ruling APC to step in the saddle as Senate President in 2015 but lost the opportunity to consummate the process by reason of some orchestrated legislative/political coup and/or force majeure masterminded by Dr Bukola Saraki, acting in concert with the opposition Peoples Democratic Party’s (PDP’s) Senate Caucus. A constellation of forces had actually interplayed and somewhat conspired to upend what would have been a Lawan Senate Presidency; and, he had to wait for another four years to realise the ambition. His Senate Presidency owed so much to the tenacity and surefootedness of Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu with whom Lawan would, in 2022, slug the party’s presidential ticket with at the presidential primary election at the Eagle Square.

In 2015, I remember the last-minute push by Bola Tinubu to undo or practically crumble the Saraki/PDP nimble plot so he could enthrone Lawan as Senate President. I witnessed one of his numerous overtures: I was with the late Chief Tony Anenih in his Asokoro residence, having some discussions, when a call came through to his mobile phone. I heard him say: “Bola, you remember me today.” After exchange of pleasantries, Anenih was apparently listening to what “Bola” was telling him. Then, it was Anenih’s turn to respond: “It is too late. They had taken a decision; and I was privy to the decision for the PDP caucus to work with Saraki to emerge as Senate President and for Ike Ekweremadu to emerge as Deputy Senate President. The inauguration is tomorrow. Bola, it is too late to change the decision.” After the conversation, Chief Aneneih told me that was Senator Bola Tinubu reaching out to him to see how he could assist to pull the PDP senate caucus back from supporting Saraki. This recall is to show how Tinubu invested in Lawan’s Senate Presidency at both personal and party levels.

But when the move failed in 2015 and another opportunity presented itself in 2019, the deal was pragmatically sealed under the command room guru, the restless Adams Oshiomhole as National Chairman of the APC and he (Lawan) majestically sauntered into the office, on a platter, so to speak. Mission accomplished! It was significant that the imprimatur of the party and the Presidency was writ large in Lawan’s coronation as the third citizen. Lawan has somewhat done well in consolidating his hold on power. He was able to ensure that the peace of the Senate and its relationship with the Executive arm of government were not ruptured. Although, his era is considered largely uninspiring when compared with the eras of his predecessors from 1999, it becomes difficult even now as I write to locate the basis of his sudden interest in the 2023 presidency, which he sought on the platform of the APC to the fatality of what would have been a robust voyage through the Legislature from 1999 to May 2023 if the Supreme Court verdict does not favour him.

With his eyes on the ball of the presidential ticket of the party, I still wonder who and what nudged him on to jostle for the presidency when the incumbent President Muhammadu Buhari, from the north of the country, has been in office since 2015. It did not matter to him how divisive his candidature would be if he, being a northerner, had won the presidential ticket to succeed another northerner. Amid the political frenzy, he had become largely distracted, taking for granted so many things about Yobe North Senatorial ticket. If he did not believe he would win the presidential ticket of the party, he would have put in place a very solid and much trusted placeholder who would be ready to resign/withdraw, without as much as a whimper, from the race and open the space for a rerun that he (Lawan) would have participated in to pick the nomination ticket of the party to return to the Senate. If there was such an arrangement with Bashir Sheriff Machina, it is either the arrangement was not rock solid to benefit from requisite fidelity or that there were superior or superintending forces that subsequently compelled or pressured Bashir Sheriff Machina to scorn, scoff and turn his back on the original arrangement (read gentleman’s agreement). I am just attempting a conjecture here. But then again, ideally, if there had been a deus ex machina kind of arrangement, Lawan would have been easily rescued from walking into the political cul-de-sac he now finds himself such that he is seeking judicial rescission for a possible reprieve that could save a robust twenty-four-year legislative voyage that took him from the nadir to the pinnacle of the National Assembly from plummeting somewhat suddenly to an opprobrious terminus.

The court of first instance had validated the nomination of Bashir Sheriff Machina who was the only aspirant that participated in the primary poll for Yobe North Senatorial seat when Lawan was busy jostling for the presidential ticket of the APC in Abuja. The appellate court had also upheld the verdict of the court downstairs, further worsening Lawan’s predicament. Whereas, at an intersection in the long-drawn dramatic process, Lawan had said he was not going to challenge the process in court, it would appear that the APC, on the watch of Senator Abdullahi Adamu, is determined to pursue the case to its logical conclusion. The party had, on two occasions or thereabouts, listed Lawan as its senatorial candidate in its submissions to INEC, but each time it did, court orders had always kicked in to protect and preserve the valid nomination of Bashir Sherrif machina. To the credit of the party, it is frontally sponsoring the appeal at the Supreme Court, which is the last bus stop in constitutional matters and/or adjudications. The apex court has fixed hearing of the appeal for Monday, February 6.

Even if a judicial miracle happens at the apex court, one thing is very clear, Bashir Sherrif Machina has not been Ahmad Lawan’s deus ex machina. He has demonstrated the courage and tenacity to hold his own and to convey a strong message that he can represent the people of Yobe North Senatorial zone as Lawan had done if not better. Although, whatever happens in the Supreme Court in respect of this matter is in the womb of time, yet I keep remembering Bola Tinubu’s jab at Lawan about the senate president licking his wound after defeating him (Lawan) and others at the party’s presidential primary election in Abuja. Will that be Lawan’s eternal lot? The answer is blowing in the wind.

● Ojeifo sent this piece from Abuja via ojewonderngr@yahoo.com