Dr Ajuji Ahmed is the National Chairman of New Nigeria Peoples Party (NNPP). In this interview, he speaks on the rumoured defection of the 2023 presidential candidate of the party, Rabiu Kwankwaso, to the All Progressives Congress (APC) and the crisis in the party, among other issues, ANAYO EZUGWU writes
What is Kwankwaso’s position on defection; is he defecting to the APC?
I don’t think so, and I don’t think what he said indicated in any way that he is about to defect or that he is defecting. NNPP had a longstanding position that we have options. One of the options probably is what he referred to. The other option is to go into coalition with any other party that have the same philosophy and objectives that we have.
The third option is for us to go alone. These options are still on the table. However, to clarify what he said in Kano, he only expatiated on one of the three options.
He did say that if APC invites his attention, he will give them the attention on the condition that they will make themselves ready and prepared to offer concrete suggestions as well as guarantee that the interest of NNPP members and leadership will be taken care of instead of just him being talked to.
I believe that is what he said, but you have lots of interpretations to that because it’s an open political atmosphere, and we welcome that anyway because that is what makes democracy thriving.
Recently, Kwankwaso said that he and his supporters are ready to join the ruling APC, but on a clear agreement that protects and respects the interest of NNPP and his political movement. Apparently, he is saying they are joining APC?
That is far from what he said. We are talking about the same thing. He would as well have said, we are ready to join African Democratic Congress (ADC) coalition, or we are ready to join any other group, because that is what the position is. It is not that he is ready to join APC. And we are not talking about him here; we are talking about the political party.
He is just an individual. He is not the institution itself, and he, I am sure, agrees with me that he abides with the rules and regulations as well as principles of the party in making any decision.
Therefore, I believe that I will interpret what he said for you because I have spoken with him personally on what he said, and you can also link it to what he said earlier that APC has not been fair to Northern Nigeria. That is not a language of someone who has made up his mind to join the APC.
He is warning that his political movement will not allow itself to be used to win elections, and then abandoned afterwards. Can you throw more light on that?
I think that is based on experience. Lots of times in the past, I think promises were made to the party and its membership. Sister parties join to win an election, but at the close of the day, when the election is won and lost, they start singing a different tune and playing different drums. It happened in 2023.
You are a Nigerian, so you know what happened. When he was invited to Paris and thereabout, and he was talked to about accepting a slot in the cabinet of the President, but later on, a lot of things happened.
There is no excitement in politics if you don’t have an opposition to compete with you
I guess, as the English would say, much water has passed under the bridge, and at the end of the day, that never happened. That can be classified as a use and dump although he did not contribute to APC’s campaign but directly and indirectly, he was also involved, because he had such many followers in Kano. And by going with his own group, rather than going with PDP or any other group, he supported APC indirectly
Dr. Major Agbo says there is no faction in NNPP, and that he is the national chairman of the party. He also insists that Kwankwaso remains expelled from NNPP. How would you react to that?
INEC recognises parties that are duly registered and the National Working Committee (NWC) that I lead is the one that has been recognised by INEC. Even today I was invited for a meeting at INEC, but later on it was postponed. They should tell us if INEC has ever dealt with them since they were expelled a couple of years ago.
What actually happened was that they were not ready and prepared to go with the mainstream of the part and they indulged in activities that we thought was inimical to the progress of the party. Therefore, we followed due process by inviting them to defend themselves before a disciplinary committee but they did not.
As a result of that, the NWC recommended their suspension. So, they were duly suspended based on all relevant clauses of the constitution of the NNPP. After their refusal to appear, the next higher authority than the NWC is the National Executive Committee (NEC).
It was at that NEC that endorsed not only their suspension, but also found it necessary because of the continued anti-party activities that they engaged in. That expulsion was ratified by the National Convention of NNPP that followed a few months later.
Practically all the major opposition parties in Nigeria today; NNPP, Labour Party (LP) and Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), are having factions, one problem or the other. How does this impact our democracy?
It does not help democracy in any way whatsoever if parties become factionalized. That was why NNPP had taken a position to invite even those renegades who call themselves a faction, because as far as we are concerned, we have no faction. It is not healthy for the parties themselves and it is not healthy for democracy in general. But then you made a reference to rat and fish.
Supposing you are living in a hamlet of several houses and each and every one of them continue to catch fire one after the other, except one. It does not take nuclear physics to suspect that probably that this is the culprit making all these fires start in all the households around it. We are not accusing the APC and we are consistent in that position.
But as you pointed out, it is left for the APC to tell Nigerians why all these are happening in the political landscape, because there is this suspicion that they were behind it. In our own case, I doubt it very much, as I stated earlier, whether we consider ourselves having any faction whatsoever.
You remember what the President said when he was making a speech that they are not responsible, but if their opponents are quarrel, it is not their responsibility to go and settle the quarrel. That it works to their advantage. What would say about that?
He is right; it works to their advantage. Therefore, we have to put our houses in order. We are not saying that there are no crises. There are crises, as I observed earlier, across the political spectrum. Therefore, a responsible party leading the country should be sufficiently concerned over what is going on in the other political parties.
If I were APC and I want to promote democracy, I will give encourage them to settle their cases within themselves and rebuild their structures in order to compete fairly and squarely with the APC if they want to strengthen democracy. What I mean by that is that not literally they should give the other parties money, but they should allow them space to operate fairly and equally with the APC.
It is only in that regard that the party in government can contribute to the stabilisation of the polity through other parties. There is no excitement in politics if you don’t have an opposition to compete with you. NNPP, probably, will be in government in 2027 and we will open our doors to other political parties as well as encourage them.
You lost some cases in court against the Agbo faction and you have neither challenged nor appealed the rulings…
We are not aware of any court case that they won, which we did not obey the rulings of the court. The one that they are referring to; we took them to court.
What the judge said was that he has no jurisdiction because it is a quarrel within a political party. The judge cited clauses after clauses in the constitution of the country, as well as the constitution of the parties themselves, which now seem to indicate which she confirmed did not give her jurisdiction over the case.
But what you have after that was jubilation on their part that they have won the case. Talking about winning cases; I cannot count, and I think at a point we have 18 cases across the country with them. I cannot remember one single instance where the court ruled in their favour.
What you need to look at, even if you are not a judge, is the facts. Who is recognised by INEC? If you today Google INEC’s website, which party is on the portal as recognised party? That is why we always insist that we do not have a faction, because if we were to have a faction, we would not have been representing the party at INEC and all its meetings, and also fielding candidates successfully in all elections since 2023.
Some leaders in the North are saying that the region will decide who sits in Aso Rock when the time comes. They are angry that the North is marginalized but the President disagrees with those saying that. What is NNPPs stand?
NNPP stands at exactly the situation because if you look at the situation squarely in its eyes, you will find that the gamut of opinion within the northern part of our country is that the region has been shortchanged. Therefore, they are not criticising the government as such, but providing objective criticism for them to rise up to their responsibilities.
We are not saying that because it is North, favour it or because it is South-East, also go ahead and favour it. What we are saying is that if you put all the facts together, you will find out that allocation of resources for projects and infrastructure across the country, go mostly to one part of the country.
I think it is not just the North that is complaining or has the right to complain, other regions of the country such as the South-East and South-South are also complaining. But I know that South-South at a time began to jubilate when they got the coastal highway, which they said has covered 30 kilometres or thereabout.
In any case, if the Tinubu administration were to take up the challenge of completing the Abuja-Kaduna-Kano highway, which the previous administration did not, but made so much noise about completing it, you only need to drive on that highway and see what is happening. If they had completed that highway in the last two years they have been in power, I don’t think it will be a small symbolism of their commitment to that part of the country.
So, can the North be compensated doubly within the next two years? I doubt it very much. But if they do, I will be happy because they will be providing greater competition to us in NNPP and the game will be more exciting.
You described the NNPP as the beautiful bride of Nigerian politics, the most currently sought after in the country, with a manifesto anchored on progressive ideology and citizens’ welfare. What informed that conviction?
The NNPP is the bride of the country and the bride of the other political parties. Tell me which other political party controls a single state that represents the collective aggregate of votes of five states?
Brides do not go out to work for themselves. Brides can only be wooed and married. I do not mean that the bride is the strongest party in the world, and therefore, we are beating our chest that we will win every election. No, we know our limitations and our strengths.
We believe that the other parties should look at us if they want to strengthen themselves. We are not going to look for any one of them, but any one of them can look for us. If they want to strengthen themselves, it is only the NNPP that they can come to and get aggregate of votes that they require to win a national election.
What do you make of the new baby in town, the ADC, with all the powerhouses going to the party?
The ADC to me is a combination of the ‘uncombinables.’ There are lots of characters there who represent something of strength to the polity. But in my estimation, they are too divided but we will have to see how it pans out. APC had two distinct strength of Congress for Progressive Change (CPC) and Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) to come together to form APC. Tell me a single block that belongs to ADC.
They do have individuals, but they do not have any strong group as such who are coming into the picture to give you the strength of believing that this is a serious coalition.
Unfortunately also, added to that, those that you refer to as the juggernauts of Nigerian politics who opted to be there, each one of them has his own ambitions. And where you have such an ambition of people who probably cannot reconcile themselves, you will have some chaos within the coalition.
So you think they cannot reconcile themselves? I believe they will not be capable of reconciling themselves unless if they give a lot of trade-offs within themselves, which does not seem to be the case. Also, right now, it is already a coalition in crisis because you refer to NNPP being recognized by INEC and so on and so forth.
We gathered that Kwankwaso is still going to be your presidential candidate in 2027. The question is how many times has he contested and isn’t it time for him to take the back seat and give the younger generation a chance?
That is true. But he is not the only person that should be called upon to step aside for younger people. But you have made a wrong premise over it all, that he is going to be the presidential candidate of the party in 2027.
No, we are not guaranteeing anyone the ticket of the NNPP in 2027. Kwankwaso is a powerful politician within the party but that does not foreclose the chances of anybody coming into NNPP and wanting to contest against him and maybe a host of other aspirants who will view the party as a credible platform for them to realize their political objectives.
When are you electing a new NWC?
In March of 2026, and we are going to begin our congresses, I believe in November, which will culminate in a national convention that will elect the new NWC.
