Nigerians to watch in 2023 – Tribune Online

Nigerians watch with bated breath as the Year 2023 unfolds before us. It is the year of fresh general elections that will herald the exit of incumbent President, General MuhammaduBuhari, serving governors, federal and state lawmakers and others holding elective offices whose four year tenure would terminate by virtue of provisions of the Constitution. Certain individuals in the polity will be seeking mandate of Nigerians for positions of president, governors and as representatives in state and National Assemblies. There are also social gatekeepers whose voices will count in deciding who gets what, when and how. Nigerian Tribune unveils some of these eminent Nigerians

Chief Olusegun Obasanjo

Former military Head of State, two-term civilian president. Olusegun Obasanjo, who tore his membership card of the erstwhile ruling Peoples Democratic Party  (PDP) on the eve of the 2015 general election that ended his party 16 years grip on the nation has remained relevant in the polity. On January 1,2023, he released an open letter to the nation, “My Appeal to all Nigerians, particularly Young Nigerians,” in which he  endorsed the presidential candidate of the Labour Party, Peter Obi.

The former president installed his successor, the late Umar Yar’Adua in 2007; he played a role in the emergence of former president, DrGoodluck Jonathan in 2011. He was not missing in action in the orchestrated plot that saw to the ouster of same Jonathan in the 2015 election. Obasanjo mounted the barricades against Muhammadu Buhari in 2019 but the latter was reelected. He has urged Nigerians, particularly the youths to reject the candidates of the two predominant political parties, Bola Ahmed Tinubu of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) and his main rival, AtikuAbubakar of the Peoples Democratic Party. Will his voice counts in next month’s general election?

Bola Tinubu

Twoterm Lagos State governor is  a  kingmaker,  seeking for the exalted seat of Presidency. The two-term governor on the platform of the defunct Alliance for Democracy (AD), he has remained relevant after  his exit in 2007 from Lagos Government House, Alausa. With his new platform, the defunct Action Congress which later transformed to the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN), Tinubu  and  his other  associates regained lost grounds in the South-West, pummeling the PDP in Oyo, Osun, Ekiti,Ogun and Ondo states.

Tinubu, was the arrow head of the coalition of certain  opposition political parties that metamorphosed into the APC: his ACN;  the Buhari Congress for Progressive Change, (CPC), the All Nigerian Peoples Party, (ANPP), a faction of All Progressives Grand Alliance and certain chieftains of erstwhile ruling party, christened the newPDP.

Tinubu who played a role in Buhari›s emergence as APC presidential candidate at the historic convention held at Tafawa Balewa Square in Lagos also deployed his financial arsenal in galvanising support for his victory in 2015 and 2019 elections. The kingmaker won APC’s ticket last June and is smarting to replace Buhari at Aso Rock, the nation›s seat of power.

Atiku Abubakar

Former civilian president under Chief Obasanjo is the presidential candidate of the PDP. This year’s election is Atiku’s third attempt at seeking to govern Nigeria.

A cosmopolitan Nigerian with vast network of friends and associates in politics and the corporate Nigeria, Atiku was presidential candidate of the defunct Action Congress (AC) in 2007 as sitting vice-president in a PDP federal cabinet. He was the PDP candidate in the 2019 general election won by incumbent MuhammaduBuhari.

2023 general election is the Turaki Adamawa is third attempt to seek the mandate of Nigerians and he has expressed confidence that despite all odds, he would defeat his friend, the APC candidate, Bola Tinubu.

Peter Obi

He is a former two-term governor of Anambra State, he is the presidential candidate of the Labour Party (LP). Obi often dismissed as lacking in solid structures is on familiar terrain. He was the Vice – Presidential candidate of the PDP in the 2019 general elections. Obi home state of Anambra is under the control of another opposition party, the APGA. In his South-East geo-political zone, Obi’s LP has no serving governor as the states are divided between the APGA, ( Anambra, the APC ( Imo, Ebonyi) and the PDP ( Enugu, Abia). Obi remains convinced that he will defeat the APC and PDP’s presidential candidates. He has told newsmen that what Nigerians call the structures are really the obstacles to the nation development. He said: “The structure they have today is what we want to dismantle. It is a structure of criminality. It is the structure that produced 133 million people living in poverty, 20 million out-of-school children, and made Nigeria surpass India in infant mortality. It is the structure that destroys us and we want to destroy that structure. And you are the next structure. We want to build a better place for our children.”

Mahmood Yakubu

He is the chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC). He has continued to assure Nigerians that he would deliver on free, fair, transparent elections. Despite his assurances, certain chieftains of the ruling APC has expressed strong reservations about the logistics towards the next electoral process, particularly the Bimodal Voters Identification System( BVAS) and the INEC Result Viewing Portal, (IReV), aimed at promoting transparency and adding credibility to the process. IReV is expected to ensure transfer of results from polling units electronically and to be accessed by voters. There have been alleged moves by political actors to prevail on Professor Yakubu to drop BVAS and return to use of Incident Forms for accreditation of voters.