Editorial Suite

Fri, May 31, 2013 | By publisher


Editorial Suite

THE clouds of 2015 are already hovering in the air even though the magic year looks distant away. Politicians of all shades and colour are crisscrossing the length and breadth of the country doing what they know best, that is, mapping out winning strategies, forging alliances or cooperation and raising funds to enable them to successfully pursue their political ambitions. For instance, on Thursday, May 30, President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan played host to some leaders of his party, the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, from all the six geopolitical zones of the country at a dinner he organised for them at the presidential villa in Aso Rock. At that dinner party, the leaders endorsed his second term presidential ambition in view of the impressive performance reflected in his mid-term report presented to the nation on May 29, Democracy Day celebration in Abuja. Political analysts feel that was a skillful strategy to outsmart other aspirants who are angling for his position within the PDP.

Opposition political parties are not sitting by to watch the PDP from the sidelines. They, too, have entered the political arena with a bang and have set their eyes on Aso Rock villa. Towards that goal, the Action Congress of Nigeria, ACN, the All Nigeria Peoples Party, ANPP, and the Congress for Progressive Change, CPC, have already merged to form the All Progressives Congress, APC, to be able to effectively challenge the PDP in 2015. Besides, all the political parties are also making permutations and working out new strategies to enable them keep tighter controls on their strongholds and even spread their nets to the support bases of their opponents.

One area of interest to watch out as events unfold towards 2015 is the South-West geopolitical zone where the PDP lost control to the ACN through judicial pronouncements. For now, the zone is effectively under the control of the ACN and the Labour Party, LP. It is natural that PDP chieftains will be spending sleepless nights working out permutations on how to reclaim the states they had lost to the ACN as well as win Lagos State, which the PDP has been eyeing over the years, in 2015 while the ACN wants not only to tighten its grip on its stronghold but to also widen its territorial spread to include Ondo state, the political base of the LP. On the other hand, the LP has its own game plan to extend its influence beyond Ondo. As all these permutations are playing out, Frederick Fasehun, factional leader of O’dua Peoples Congress, has also thrown his hat into the political arena with his plan to revive the defunct Unity Party of Nigeria, UPN, to also fight for the territorial control of the South-West. A few days earlier, Olu Falae, former minister of finance and secretary to the federal government, had announced the formation of the Social Democratic Mega Party, SDMP, which is a merger of 16 unknown political parties, to also fight for control of the zone.

With these unfolding developments, the ground seems set for an epic political contest in 2015. We fancied this scenario in one of our editorial board meetings. After an exhaustive deliberation, we decided to send Olu Ojewale, general editor and the son of the zone, to nose around and feel the pulse of both the electorate and the politicians on the matter. The outcome of his investigation is our cover story for this week entitled: 2015: The Battle for South-West Soul. It’s very analytical and informative.

**********

THE African Development Bank, AfDB, has ended its 48th annual general meeting in Marrakesh, Morocco. The five-day event, which started on May 27, had more than 2,000 delegates drawn from different countries in Africa and the world, in attendance. Realnews was also there, effectively represented by Maureen Chigbo, the editor. It was a hectic session for her because of the side events that were also lined up as part of the five-day deliberation. According to her, there was an avalanche of seminars and panel discussions on a variety of issues affecting the economic development of Africa. Even though she said, the sessions for panel discussions were scheduled almost at the same time at different venues within the Palais de Congress complex, she did her best to attend as many sessions as her body could carry her. In this edition, we are also giving the readers a special package of her coverage of the five-day event. According to her, one of the important decisions taken in Marrakesh, was to move the headquarter of the bank temporarily located in Tunis, Tunisia, to its original base in Cote d’Ivoire, now that the civil war in that country has ended. The board of directors of the bank, which made the announcement, said the Bank’s 5oth anniversary next year will be celebrated in the West African country. Enjoy it.

Mike Akpan
Editor-in-Chief

— Jun. 10, 2013 @ 01:00 GMT

Tags:

2 thoughts on "Editorial Suite"