Lack of strategic alliance with key, prominent and strategic political stakeholders in the North, has been fingered as a major factor which denied Labour Party, LP Presidential candidate, Peter Obi, votes from the North.
Obi had placed a distant third in the February 25 presidential and National Assembly election, coming behind Atiku Abubakar of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP and the eventual winner of the race, Bola Ahmed Tinubu, of the All Progressives Congress, APC.
A political analyst, Everest Anukam, who spoke to INNONEWS, said Obi would have won the presidential election, if he had engaged political leaders in the North sympathetic to his cause and choose a sell-able and acceptable Running Mate from the region.
“Obi won in Christian dominated States in the North- Plateau, Nassarawa- but did not make any headway the North West and North East zones, where Tinubu and Atiku shared the votes.
“He failed in the Muslim core states, because he did not take into consideration the power of religion in presidential politics.
“Tinubu damned the consequences and went for a Muslim Running Mate and someone with political mileage in the North, such as former Governor of Borno State, Kashim Shettima, because he knew he cannot win the presidential race without getting votes from the North.
“And this strategy worked for him because it helped him win votes in Borno State and some states in the North East.
“Obi’s choice of Datti Ahmed was a blunder. Datti has no political taproot in the North. He could not deliver his home state.
“If Obi had chosen a Running Mate from the core North, someone with political pedigree and clout in the region, he would strongly complimented the massive votes he received from the South- East, South- South and the North Central.
“He would have won more states than Tinubu and Atiku and gotten more votes. That would have given him the edge to near close to victory” he said.
Anukam stated that though the presidential election was flawed, he noted that “it was impossible for a winner of the polls to emerge without winning some states in the North”.
He said Obi may have been supported by a huge segment of Nigerians dissatisfied with bad governance in the country, but he failed to take into consideration the powerful role of religion and ethnicity in presidential politics.
“Obi had no backbone in the North. This is why he could not displace both Tinubu and Atiku in the scramble for votes from the North and this cost him a lot” he stated.
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