Uncovered: Yoruba/Hausa-Fulani Deal Aimed to Topple PDP in 2015

The Hausa-Fulani caucus leaders and those of the Action Congress of
Nigeria (ACN) have concluded a deal to wrest power from the Peoples
Democratic Party (PDP) in 2015, a political intelligence report
recently made available to the Presidency has revealed.
The report prepared by some loyalists of the president was reported to
have detailed the deal between the Yoruba leaders, mostly from the ACN
under Senator Bola Tinubu and Hausa-Fulani elite under General
Muhammadu Buhari.
According to the report, the oppositionAll Progressive Congress (APC)
is to select its presidential standard-bearer from the North, while
the vice-presidential candidate is to come from the South-West
geopolitical zone.
The report noted further that opposition adopted this approach because
of the conviction that the Hausa-Fulani and the Yoruba have the votes
and the majority to deliver at the polls, especially as both Kano and
Lagos are expected to fall into the hands of the opposition in 2015.
The deal also reportedly envisages giving a key portfolio to the
South-Eastand the North-Central even as it suggests that the
Hausa-Fulani population in the North-Central is growing by the day.
The deal has a mathematical undertone based on the electoral strength
of the political zones in the country.
According to the report, the oppositionhad reasoned that the
South-West, currently controlled by ACN, has 19.4 per cent of the
national voting population which in real terms translate to about 14.4
million voters.
The North-West has about 26.9 per cent of the votes, meaning about 19
million votes while the North East has about 15.8 per cent of the
votes which is about 11.6 million votes.
Opposition's calculation, according to the report, is to claim, at
least, half of votes in the North-East and another half in the
North-Central, meaning about 11.5 per cent while the North-West and
the South-West both controlled 46.3 per cent of the nationalvoting
population.
The South-East and the South-South is regarded as having low voting
threat even if bloc votes are delivered for thepresident A friend of
the president anda former top minister, who is privy to the report,
said the deal would have been ignored but for the danger it poses to
the electoral strategy of the ruling party if the president decides to
stand re-election.
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"We are legitimately worried. The Hausa-Fulani connotes Muslim
affiliation, even if you are a minority in the north. That widens the
scope to include many states of the North-Central which is our base.
We don't want to dismiss the agenda without bringing it to the
attention of the president," the former minister from the North
Central said.
According to him, "We have also done our political calculations too
but we need to address this emerging threat. We must have our own
inclusive strategy."
There are, however, reports that the Presidency, even before the
report, had commenced moves to address nagging issues affecting the
fortunes and image of the ruling party in the South-West.
A top party chief, who is directly involved in the feud rocking the
party, disclosed that political solution is being considered on such
issues as thedisputed office of the National Secretary and the zonal
executive committee election scheduled to hold after the Ramadan.
According to the politician, "People have stepped into the matter to
find a political solution. We are waiting for a resolution at least to
reunite the party in the zone," he said.
Some PDP bigwigs in the South-West were also reported to have used the
launching for the reconstruction of the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway to
push for further acceleration of implementation of federal projects in
the zone.
Meanwhile, it was not clear what the response of the ruling party is
to the report on the core north-Yoruba deal while it is also not clear
yet how practicable the opposition agenda will be in reality.