Chuks Okocha and Amby Uneze
16 November 2009
Activities heralding the re-election campaign of President Umaru Musa Yar'Adua will effectively take off in Abuja today, THISDAY can report.
A meeting will be convened to inaugurate national and state coordinators as well as appoint national facilitators of the campaign group, the newspaper was told.
The meeting is under the direct supervision of the Presidency which has picked the Senior Special Assistant to the President on Political Matters, Senator Polycarp Nwite, as the anchor.
Presidency sources informed THISDAY that the campaign team would be named "Yar'Adua for New Nigeria" and would hold the meeting at the Yar'Adua Centre, Abuja, with Nwite superintending. The time of the meeting is 11am.
The invitation to the meeting was signed by one Dr. Idris Aminu who is already serving as secretary of the committee and is on the staff of the Presidency.
Other part anchors of the meeting are one Senator Mahdi, who is serving as Chairman Board of Trustees, and Farouk Abdulazeez, former Chairman of the defunct Peoples Democratic Movement (PDM) - the political group of the president's late brother, General Shehu Musa Yar'Adua.
When THISDAY contacted Nwite yesterday, he confirmed that a meeting would take place today to inaugurate the committee for the "Yar'Adua for New Nigeria" campaign.
But he said he was only facilitating the fruition of a group of Nigerians to formulate the President's vision for a new Nigeria.
According to him, "what we are holding is a meeting of Nigerians who believe in the continuity of the programmes and policies of President Yar'Adua to take Nigeria to a new level."
He further said the movement would be officially launched at a latter date, but explained that what today's meeting is all about is to announce the names of state coordinators and national leaders.
It was gathered that the office of the senior special adviser to the president on political matters has been gradually engaged in organising meetings for the President's second term bid.
Ironically, Yar'Adua had, during the Special Convention of his party, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), directed that all campaigns for 2011 be suspended as they were a distraction to his administration.
Already, the Deputy National Chairman of PDP, Dr. Harilu Mohammed Bello, has said that the party would support the second term aspiration of Yar'Adua as the seven-point agenda of his administration is programmed to be completed within eight years.
According to the deputy national chairman earlier in the year, "President Yar'Adua is entitled to four years in office. That [will] end by 2011 and by the grace of God, he will seek a second term in office to make it eight years, because his seven-point agenda is designed to be implemented within a time frame of eight years.
"He is entitled to second term in office and by the grace of God, there is nothing on ground to stop him. The PDP structure is on ground for his second term in office. There is nothing to indicate that he will not contest for the second term in office when the time comes."
Bello expressed the support of the party for the second term of President Yar'Adua, declaring: "We shall offer him a 100 per cent support when the time comes. I can assure you that the PDP structures will afford him the second term when the time comes."
Ahead of the 2011 general election, the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) said prepareations for the smooth conduct throughout the country are ongoing.
Disclosing this when the members of the House of Representatives Committee on Electoral Matters visited her office, the Resident Electoral Commissioner (REC) in Imo State, Mrs. Maria Owi, said INEC, in preparation for smooth conduct of 2011 elections had started making non-sensitive materials available to states.
She stated that the construction of INEC zonal stores was one of the many efforts of the leadership of the commission to ensure that 2010, 2011 and subsequent elections in the country were conducted without hitches.
According to her, "by hitches I mean the problems that might stem from late arrival of materials which had been identified as a major problem in Nigerian elections."
Owi added that the construction of the zonal stores was done in the six geo-political zones of the country, emphasising that the one in Owerri was meant to service the South Eastern zone of the country comprising Abia, Anambra, Ebonyi, Enugu and Imo.
"The Commission's intention is to ease the problems that arise in the distribution of both sensitive and non-sensitive materials during elections. With the zonal stores, materials for each zone would have been warehoused before elections as this would make for easy distribution to the states, quite unlike when each state depended on getting their materials directly from Abuja," she said.
She said the delivering of non-sensitive materials had commenced and would continue until all the zones were saturated with the non-sensitive materials needed.
The REC expressed her belief that the visit of the Committee would go a long way in providing the synergy the commission required from the National Assembly towards the actualisation of credible polls come 2010 and 2011.
Responding, leader of the delegation and committee chairman, Hon Musa Sarkin-Adar (Gada/ Goronyo Federal Constituency, Sokoto State) observed that the aim of the oversight function was to take note of the preparation by INEC for the conduct of the forthcoming elections as well as ensure that funds were provided as and when due for the election.
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It is a very good thing in Nation for one to have a continuty in govt. but what can Yaradua administration show Nigeria for the past 3years of his govt. in place. I was going through what the young Central bank governor said when he was call upon as governor to central bank, if I am not mistaking what Sanusi said was that instead of seven agenders if the goverment or Yaradua administration can only take two agenders first resolve the NEPA problem seconded by Road he said Nigeria will be set for highway recovery. Please my readers let us ask ourself most of us overseas, what are we waiting for if Nigeria is good. If there is light and good road mostly a lot of Nigerians oversea including myself know what we can do in Nigeria to contribute to the economy of our Nation. Common Yaradua as one of the first educated president in Nigeria you and your administration should do better. I don't know if you and your Vice we perform a miracle on stability of Light which all Nigeria will agree with me before the end of this year, I think then you and your guys will be able to point at something done. Without this Yaradua I don't think a lot of us overseas will like to see you in the second term race.
IsaacA New York