*Ex-President's confidants say too early to talk about potential run in next election
Emmanuel Addeh in Abuja
Political leaders from the North, a region in Nigeria which holds a huge chunk of Nigeria's voting population, are working behind the scenes to convince former President Goodluck Jonathan to join the 2027 presidential race, reliable sources told Newsmen last night.
Sources with the knowledge of the plan said that recent comments by the Governor of Bauchi state, Bala Mohammed, to the effect that he would not contest the election if Jonathan eventually caves in, said that the governor's statement went beyond just flying a kite.
The game plan, it was learnt, became even clearer following the recent #EndBadGovernance nationwide demonstrations, which apparently showed serious disgruntlement by the voting population in the region with the Bola Tinubu-led administration.
Torizone was told that the scheming to persuade the former Nigerian leader to join the race was already in top gear, even though Jonathan is non-committal at the moment.
However, when Newsmen contacted the former President's confidants on the move by northern leaders, they were hesitant to talk on the matter, but were unanimous that talk about 2027 was premature at this point; "this talk about running or not running is way too early in the scheme of things. The former President is focusing on his international assignments and humanitarian works rather than concern himself with potential run for President in 2027."
At the weekend, the Bauchi governor, Mohammed, said that he will not contest under the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) presidential ticket if the former president decides to run again.
But the source stated that the decision to sway Jonathan to agree to throw his hat into the ring went beyond party lines and affiliations, explaining that if Jonathan decides to participate, then Nigerians will see how party affiliation an issue will not be.
Mohammed, a Minister of the Federal Capital Territory under Jonathan, who spoke after an event organised by a Non-governmental Organisation (NGO), Save Africa Initiative (SAI), had urged Jonathan to consider running for the presidency.
The governor said the former president has more experience and would do a good job if he had a second mandate to manage the country.
He said: "With regards to your call for me to present myself, I am still contemplating my chances as the leader of the opposition. I know there are good leaders within the People Democratic Party (PDP), especially my boss Goodluck Jonathan.
"I have always said that as long as Jonathan is around, I will not present myself for leadership of this country, unless he decides not to run. If we can persuade him to come forward, I will support him with my blood. Out of modesty, he is still not ready. I hope you will meet him and encourage him to run.
"He will do a better job because he has the experience. We know the prices of things; we know the level of inflation. His leadership recruitment was exemplary. We need leaders like him - young people with energy, foresight, and drive," Mohammed argued.
Aside the fact that Jonathan is expected to govern the country for only one term, having done his first term earlier, before his loss to ex-President Muhammadu Buhari, the North is also considering that picking Jonathan will be a fair deal.
With Tinubu scheduled to end his first stint in Aso Rock by May 2027, the political permutation is that if Jonathan decides to contest, the South will have served out its eight years by 2031, given the unwritten understanding among Nigerian politicians to allow for rotation of the presidency between both regions.
Jonathan served as president from 2010 to 2015 after his then boss, Umar Yar'Adua died, before conceding defeat to Buhari after the 2015 polls.
While the last national protest was peaceful in the South, it was largely violent in the North, with some angry demonstrators going beyond the main reasons for the action to hoist the flag of a foreign country.
The violence that followed, many believe, was a blowout from the pent-up dissatisfaction with the current government, which they believe is the cause of the current hardship in the land.
Tinubu had after taken over the reins of power in May 2023, begun a slew of reforms, key among which were the 'removal' of fuel subsidy as well as the devaluation of the Naira, as a result of the merging of the official and parallel FX windows. These policies have had very harsh economic impact on Nigerians.
According to the reliable source, during Jonathan's regime, his government was largely inclusive and addressed issues like the Almajiri system and creating initiatives for unemployed youths.
The northern elite is also said to be disgruntled with the current administration because of what the source described as the loss of control of the levers of power in the country and the feeling of palpable helplessness.
The region is said to be comfortable with Jonathan because, according to the source, "they like and trust him because they benefitted from his government." He maintained that if the Almajiri schools policy had continued, the number of out-of-school children would have reduced by now. "They see Jonathan as a safe bet," he added.
He stressed: "And because of the aftermath of the last national protest, they believe that the All Progressives Congress (APC) has lost ground across the North. So, that's the problem."
Buttressing this recently, the Dean of Borno Elders Forum, Prof Khalifa Dikwa, said members of the elite in the northern region of the country were unhappy with Tinubu because of his "misfit and weak appointees" as well as his "anti-people policies".
The political analyst, who spoke on national television, said the northern elite were "not happy because each of these policies affect the north entirely".
He said: "Most of the appointees are either misfits or weak or to the wrong places," adding that the appointments by the Tinubu administration were "lopsided".
Dikwa added that even "the southern elite should be annoyed because Nigeria is more than Lagos", describing it as "provocative".
Some prominent northerners had also raised eyebrows following the decision of the federal government to relocate some departments of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) and the headquarters of the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria (FAAN) from Abuja to Lagos.
In trying to refute the narrative, Vice President Kashim Shettima, said recently that there was no truth in the claim from some quarters that Tinubu was working against the interest of the North to cripple the region.
The Vice President spoke in Kano when he received a federal government's delegation which visited to condole with him on the death of his mother-in-law. Shettima maintained that Tinubu was not against the North.
He argued that the fact that Tinubu appointed northerners as the Minister of Defence; the Chief of Defence Staff and the Chairman of the Police Service Commission (PSC) put a lie to the claim that the president was biased against the North.
"At an appropriate time, we will lay out facts that the president is not against the North as being championed by some disgruntled elements who always want to cause disaffection between government and the citizens," the vice president said.
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