Magnus Abe’s NNPC Board appointment: Matters arising

The full import of the recent appointment of Senator Magnus Abe into the Board of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, NNPC, to represent the South South geo- political zone of the country may be lost on most people, but the fact is that it has far-reaching implications, especially for the politics of his home state, Rivers, and the entire South South zone.

The appointment, indeed, has major implications for the politics of Rivers State where Senator Abe and Transportation Minister, Chief Rotimi Amaechi come from; for Bayelsa state where the Minister of State for Petroleum, Chief Timipre Sylva comes from and for the South South zone where all three as well as the national chairman of the All Progressives Congress, APC, Adams Oshiomhole and Deputy President of the Senate, Senator Ovie Omo-Agege come from.

NNPC is unarguably the cash cow of the country and membership of the Board of the Corporation is by all standards, a big deal.

Senator Abe and Chief Amaechi started off from the same political family of former governor of Rivers state, Dr. Peter Odili and continued together during Amaechi’s tenure as governor after Odili. They, however, fell out when Amaechi did not support Abe’s ambition to succeed him and his second attempt in 2019 to fly the flag of the APC to oust the incumbent, Gov. Nyesom Wike, another offspring of the Odili family.

Abe has since then been having a running battle with Amaechi and is believed to have been, to a large extent, responsible for the failure of Amaechi’s preferred candidates for the governorship position – Dr. Dakuku Peterside in 2019 and Toye Patrick Cole in 2019.

Abe, literally, single-handedly, aborted the move of Amaechi to stop incumbent Governor, Nyesom Wike’s second term bid when he, overtly, worked against the installation of Cole. The bitter rivalry led to the split of the party down the middle and to litigations that ended in the Supreme Court with APC having no candidates for the elections in the state.

When it became clear that APC was not going to field candidates, Amaechi, at the last minute, ordered his supporters to vote for the literally unknown candidate of African Action Congress, AAC, Omoyele Sowore’s party which was, before then, virtually little heard of in Rivers state. He apparently wanted to win the polls at all costs to reassert his hold on the politics of the state and improve his rating at the national level. This was apparent from the level of support the AAC candidate, Awara Biokpomabo, enjoyed, especially from the federal security agencies.

Again, Abe stiffly opposed the move for APC to back Awara and, with his supporters, ensured that the ticket failed. Indeed, some analysts suggest that he got his supporters to tilt towards Wike.

When the dust of the polls settled, it looked as though Abe had lost out, as he could not become Governor and did not return to the Senate. Meanwhile, Amaechi retained his strategic Transportation ministry, though with Aviation now excised from his portfolio.

With his recent appointment into the NNPC Board, however, it is believed that Abe has bounced back to reckoning and would now be much more able to reorganise his political machinery for stiffer opposition to Amaechi and for another shot at the, so far, elusive governorship position.

It is almost certain that if Amaechi had known that such appointment was being contemplated, he would not have supported it for Abe, as it would have amounted to empowering his political opponent, especially as his own camp appears to have been weakened with the easing out of Dr. Peterside, from his choice position as Director General of the Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency (NIMASA).

Some of those who interpret the non-reappointment of Peterside to the NIMASA top post to a covert attempt, by Amaechi’s political opponents at the national level, to emasculate him, insist that Abe’s Board appointment is a re-enforcement of that strategy, the goal being to clip his wings and weaken his, as yet openly undeclared, interest in the presidential race of 2023.

Credit for Abe’s appointment, however, would largely go to Sylva, the sitting Minister of State for Petroleum, who many see as being in a scantily veiled supremacy war with Amaechi, concerning who should be the political leader of the old Rivers state, comprising the present Rivers and Bayelsa states.

Some say, for instance, that Amaechi did not fully support Sylva’s candidate for governorship of Bayelsa state, David Lyon, to weaken Sylva’s claim to the leadership position while Sylva supported Abe to secure the NNPC Board membership to ensure that Amaechi’s hold on Rivers is weakened and national political ambition deflated.

Meanwhile, the leadership of the South South zone is still being hotly debated by supporters of Oshiomhole and Senator Omo-Agege. Oshiomhole’s supporters insist that as national party chairman and the only political leader from the zone who won a governorship seat for the party, his claim to leadership of the zone is unassailable, but Omo-Agege’s supporters stress that as the highest ranking elected office holder from the zone, he should be the incontestable political leader, notwithstanding that he is relatively younger than Oshiomhole, Amaechi and Sylva.

Before 2023, the alliances, especially at the national level would have fully crystallized, but pundits insist that the hard fighting, newly reflated and now high flying Abe would play a major role in determining what happens in Rivers State and the South South zone.