A former Secretary to the Government of the Federation, and newly minted member of the Nigeria Democratic Congress, (NDC), Babachir David Lawal, has explained his decision to join the party, saying the combination of Peter Obi and Rabiu Kwankwaso could produce a government focused on development.
Recall that Lawal recently joined the NDC after previously supporting the former Labour Party presidential candidate, Peter Obi, in the 2023 election and later being involved in the African Democratic Congress (ADC).
Speaking with ARISE NEWS in an interview on Monday, he said his decision was influenced by his belief in the integrity of Obi and his long-standing relationship with Kwankwaso, as well as what he described as their shared focus on practical development programmes.
“First of all, Peter is there; I have known that he’s a man of integrity and he will try to do things differently, even from our relationship in 2023. I know Kwankwaso; I’ve known Kwankwaso for years, and I’ve seen his progress as the Minister of Defense, as the Governor, as the MD of REA. I hear stories, and I see his programs—the thousands and thousands of children of Talakawa that he has sent abroad, they come back with all manner of skills.
“So I thought that between the two of them, they will make a good government.”
Lawal said he was instrumental in bringing both Obi and Kwankwaso into the ADC, adding that he led efforts to persuade the New Nigeria Peoples Party (NNPP) leader to join the coalition after an initial merger arrangement failed.
He said Kwankwaso was, however, initially apprehensive about the prospects of the coalition, while Obi preferred a consensus arrangement rather than a presidential primary involving former Vice President Atiku Abubakar.
“I was the one that finally dragged Peter into the ADC, committed him to join the ADC. I led the meeting to bring Kwankwaso into the party. It didn’t work out at the committee level, the merger didn’t work, but eventually, since I knew Kwankwaso—Kwankwaso was a general manager of Water Resources Corporation in Kano when I was a young engineer supplying computers, so I used to go to him, so I knew him. There were some personal arguments between our relationship that I advanced that convinced him to join ADC. He joined, but there was one problem. Kwankwaso was afraid that nothing good would ever come out.
“Peter Obi was also of the opinion that unless there’s going to be a consensus and it will be him, because he cannot go to primaries with Atiku; he doesn’t have the money, he doesn’t have the inclination to spend that type of money, so he preferred consensus. Another man comes in, Hayatudeen. Hayatudeen, too, wanted only consensus.
“It doesn’t matter, everybody had made up their mind Atiku was going to manipulate the process and become the candidate. But by then, take note that by then, Peter Obi and Kwankwaso had already paired together, hoping that they were going to partner in the ADC. So they decided to leave; they didn’t even tell me they were leaving,” he told Arise News.
Explaining further on why he joined the NDC, Lawal said the party’s focus on practical development programmes, including power generation, irrigation and job creation, convinced him that it offered more than a mere quest for political power.
“They’re ticking all these things they want to do. They had reactivated the dam in Mambilla, finally now the legal encumbrance is removed. We’ve agreed that the first thing the government will do: generate electricity, resume work on that Mambilla hydroelectric which will generate three gigawatts of electricity, provide 200,000 hectares of irrigable land, and provide jobs—50,000 jobs for fishing.
“And this NDC, now they have something to do. It’s not just about ‘Let’s seize power.’ It’s not about saying, ‘We’ll remove subsidy on fuel.’ How do you remove subsidy on fuel? There are better ways of removing subsidy. So I said this party, and I talked to Dickson, and Dickson is a man of action. He agrees. All that, I said, ‘This is where I should be.'”
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