GEMADE PLANS TO CONTEST FOR NIGERIA'S

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 ABUJA 002975

SIPDIS


E.O. 12958: DECL: 10/27/12
TAGS: PGOV PINR NI
SUBJECT: GEMADE PLANS TO CONTEST FOR NIGERIA'S
PRESIDENCY


REFS: A) 01 Abuja 2938, B) 01 Abuja 2881,
C) 01 Abuja 2878, d) 01 Abuja 2832


Classified by Ambassador Howard F. Jeter. Reason:
1.5(d).



1. (C) Summary: Barnabas Gemade October 28 informed
the Ambassador of his plans to run against President
Obasanjo. The former PDP Chairman accused his
President of fostering corruption, non-performance and
heavy-handedness. Gemade offered useful information
on the timing of the PDP primaries and its convention.
While Gemade's allegations cannot be dismissed, he
failed to mention that, as an insider, he had enriched
himself from corruption and lack of transparency that
he now complains about as a relative outsider and a
disappointed and wounded suitor for the PDP
Chairmanship. End Summary.



2. (U) Former People's Democratic Party Chairman
Chief Barnabas Gemade October 28 called on Ambassador
Jeter to inform the USG of his Presidential
aspirations and to invite the Ambassador to attend his
formal announcement the next day. The Ambassador
declined the invitation, commenting that he had not
attended any other Presidential campaign announcement.
Providing some documentation on his platform, Gemade
said he understood the Ambassador had a tight schedule
but hoped an Embassy officer might attend. (NOTE:
None did. End Note) The former ruling party Chairman
was accompanied by two aides; DCM (notetaker) also sat
in.



3. (C) Gemade recounted President Obasanjo's alleged
sins, including fostering corruption, non-performance
on issues of concern to Nigerians and heavy-handedness
in his dealings with the PDP and its leading members.
Obasanjo condoned and had full knowledge of Works and
Housing Minister Chief Tony Anenih's practice of using
money skimmed from road-building contracts to grease
political wheels. Over 200 billion Naira had been
spent on road-building contracts since May of 1999,
Gemade charged, but the actual construction completed
could have been done with only "one-tenth of that."
Anenih was so intent on getting money for Obasanjo's
re-election that no performance under a contract now
took place once the "mobilization fee" was paid to the
contractor and the contractor had kicked back the
agreed political pay-off. Gemade estimated that
Anenih had skimmed at least 30 billion Naira (USD 236
million) for Obasanjo's campaign and other political
purposes from contracts awarded by his Ministry.
Gemade offered that, as a former Minister of Works and
Housing, he understood how the system could be
exploited. (Comment: By reputation, Gemade not only
understood the loopholes, he also exploited them. End
Comment.)



4. (C) Gemade charged that Obasanjo was insensitive
to other members and elected officials in the PDP,
including Governors and National Assembly members.
Because he (Gemade) would not support the continuing
manipulation of the legislative branch and the
sequencing of party primaries in Obasanjo's favor,
Obasanjo had decided to replace him, Gemade averred.
Eighteen of the 21 PDP Governors had told Vice
President Atiku Abubakar, dispatched by Obasanjo to
plead for their support in ousting Gemade, that they
wanted Gemade to stay. However, Gemade said, Atiku
had offered Presidential support in allowing the
Governors to appoint state-level PDP chairmen in
exchange for helping ditch Gemade. The Governors
were won over by the offer. However, Gemade
asserted, everyone knew he had been running the party
well and that there was no basis for his dismissal.



5. (C) Gemade also claimed that "everyone" in Nigeria
could see that the Obasanjo government had not
delivered on its early promise. If a free and fair
election were held today, the President would lose
badly. Even in the Southwest, Obasanjo had at best
50% support, and he was doing much worse in the other
five geo-political regions.



6. (C) Gemade suggested that Obasanjo's control of
the PDP Central Working Committee might be blinding
the President to his thin support in the National
Executive Committee. He predicted the NEC would
reject Obasanjo's preferred sequencing (Presidential
nomination December 6, followed by State-level and
National Assembly positions December 13, and local
government slots December 18) in favor of a bottom-up
sequence (starting with local government and finishing
with the Presidential nomination) that would take
place during January. Obasanjo could not get the
nomination if this sequencing were employed because he
was deeply unpopular in the states and LGAs, Gemade
claimed. By putting his office first in the series
for which nominations would be decided, Obasanjo hoped
to pre-empt his intra-party opposition and preclude
development of a grassroots consensus around any other
possible candidates.



7. (C) Gemade admitted that, within the PDP, Vice
President Atiku Abubakar was the strongest contender,
but the VP was not yet a candidate (Note: The four
PDP aspirants facing Obasanjo are Senator Ike
Nwachukwu and former Senate President Chuba Okadigbo;
the Second Republic Governor of Kano State, Abubakar
Rimi; and Gemade. End Note.). Gemade offered that
the requirement for an aspirant to purchase a form for
5000 Naira in order to "express interest" was created
by the Obasanjo-controlled Central Working Committee
as a device to smoke out Atiku; it was not a legal or
Constitutional necessity, and Atiku's supporters in
the NEC would probably hand Obasanjo a defeat by
throwing out the requirement. Moreover, he said the
spectacle of the President going to a bank to purchase
an electoral form had demeaned the Office of the
President.



8. (C) Most in the party wanted the primaries (really
more like caucuses) to take place during January,
starting with decisions on local government and
proceeding upward from there, Gemade stated. There
was concern among Obasanjo's opponents that a section
of the PDP constitution allowing all Special
Assistants and Special Advisors to the President a
voting seat at the party's Presidential convention
would invite abuse by Obasanjo's backers. Gemade
claimed that section had been mysteriously inserted
"by the printer." Already, Gemade stated, there were
180 persons in such positions, and Anenih was
continuing to hand out appointment letters to
political hacks certain to support the President.



9. (C) (Comment: Gemade should not get away with
ascribing this clause to scrivener's error. Most
accounts date the clause to a meeting which Gemade
chaired when he was still in the President's camp.
Perhaps Gemade thought it was bad enough to feel the
sting of his own machinations without having to admit
them to us now. End Comment.)



10. (C) Comment: The National Executive Committee is
slated to meet on Thursday, October 31. If Gemade and
Atiku are reading the tea leaves right, Obasanjo is in
for a fright. However, the importance of money in
Nigerian politics should not be underestimated, and,
by all accounts, Anenih has been spreading it
liberally. The decision on how to sequence the
primaries, assuming it is definitively taken, will
give an early sense of the balance of forces in the
ruling party.



11. (C) Comment continued: When speaking with us,
Gemade knew his audience. He asserted a strong
commitment to democratic principles, claiming to be
working with other politicians to fight the scourge of
political violence. He spoke, more in sadness than in
anger, about blandishments offered to dethrone him
from his position as PDP Chairman and asserted that it
was common knowledge that he was doing a fine job at
the helm. He claimed he lost favor with the President
because he objected to automatic self-succession. In
other words, Gemade said many of the right things, and
painted himself as an angel, which he is not.



12. (C) Comment continued: The Barnabas Gemade who
met the Ambassador, however, bore scant resemblance to
the Barnabas Gemade the Mission has known in the past.
That Gemade was an Abacha-era Minister who later led
one of the parties that the late Bola Ige
devastatingly lampooned as "five fingers of a leprous
hand." This week's Barnabas Gemade said he had tried
to convince Abacha not to have each of those parties
nominate him as its standard-bearer, but the 1994-98
version never voiced such qualms. One Barnabas Gemade
told the Ambassador that Obasanjo was failing on the
economy and tut-tutted about deepening regional and
ethnic divisions, even as another Barnabas Gemade
works behind the scenes to reverse the privatization
of Benue Cement Company, one of the more promising
transfers of state assets to private hands. Gemade
and other indigenes of Benue object to the company
being turned over to Aliko Dangote, a Northern
businessman who has proved his competence in the
cement industry. Instead, Gemade and his friends want
Benue Cement given to people like...Barnabas Gemade,
someone reputed to be deeply corrupt (Refs C and D).
Gemade's claims that he rejects violence run at odds
to those of Benue Governor George Akume (Ref A),but
pots often call kettles black in Nigerian politics.

13. (C) Comment continued: Also, if Gemade lost his
post at the PDP helm for standing up to Obasanjo, that
certainly was not how things were seen at the time.
Ref B reports that Gemade was faulted for being overly
deferential to Obasanjo and for failing to carve an
identity for the party separate from the Presidency
and that Gemade actively worked to isolate and even
expel from the party those who did not toe Obasanjo's
line. The Ambassador has seen the overly differential
Gemade in private and in civil meetings with Obasanjo.
Finally, Anenih may be greasing the political skids
with large sums of cash, but Gemade seems to forget
that it was Anenih and others who purchased the PDP
Chairmanship for him in order to prevent independent-
minded Sunday Awoniyi from taking the top party job.



14. (C) Comment concluded: Anenih and other
Presidency political operatives made Gemade PDP
Chairman, and he seems to forget that those who make
you can also break you. He was dropped not for
opposing Obasanjo but for his failure to manage the
ruling party effectively -- certainly a Herculean
task. Gemade was offered a senior Ministerial
position in exchange for departing quietly.
Overestimating his support in the party, he tried to
fight. So he was forced into retirement. Now
embittered, he wants to exact his pound of flesh, and
Tiv anger at the President over the October 2001 Zaki
Biam massacre guarantees Favorite Son votes for
Gemade. This venal former boss of a government
parastatal cannot win, but he can help reduce
Obasanjo's chances of succeeding himself. The Gemade
we met was simply not believable.


JETER