TheCable

Rather than share the customary cash to delegates to win his party’s presidential ticket, Dele Momodu shared copies of his publication, Ovation International, according to revelations in a book by his then-campaign director, Ohimai Godwin Amaize.

‘Fighting Lions: The Untold Story of the Dele Momodu Presidential Campaign’, written by Amaize, is due for public presentation on Wednesday, July 11, in Lagos.

The book, currently made available to only TheCable, chronicles the presidential quest of Momodu on the platform of the National Conscience Party (NCP) in 2011.

Momodu had left the Labour Party in controversial circumstances following his demarketing by the leaders of the party who allegedly wanted a presidential candidate that would put in at least N2 billion into the coffers ostensibly for electioneering.

The Ovation publisher left the party for NCP, where he sought the party’s ticket in a battle with three other candidates.

Amaize wrote: “If our political detractors thought it was over for us when we left the Labour Party, they were wrong. The new buzz was about the future of Dele Momodu and the National Conscience Party.

“Then the party primaries were held. It was going to be our first major experience contesting an election. It was scheduled to hold on Thursday, January 13, 2011; what this meant was that between the period Momodu joined the party and the date of the primaries, we had less than two weeks to actually prepare. Initially, Dele Momodu had just one person running against him in the primaries: Atei Beredugo, a former Director with the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC). Naturally, we took him as a serious contender. We met him in the party and were careful not to underrate a man who was already familiar with the terrain.

“About three days to the party primaries, a third aspirant emerged: Chief Martin Onovo, a former senatorial candidate of Fresh Democratic Party (FDP) and National Leader of the Strategic Union of Professionals for the Advancement of Nigeria (SUPA).

“If there was nothing sinister about a presidential aspirant who joined a party to contest its primaries three days to the exercise, perhaps there was something fictional about it! The last two days before the primaries were our toughest in the presidential race. It was the make-or-break period. Without a party ticket, an aspirant was going nowhere. Everything we had done from the beginning of the presidential campaign to this point,now hung in the balance.”

PRIMARY TENSION

Amaize said Momodu’s opponents appeared to have some things going for them which made the contest tensed as real party politics began.

He wrote: “There were delegates to pitch. Every state of the federation was represented at the National Convention by five delegates. Beredugo, who hails from Bayelsa State, it seemed, had some grip of the South-South delegates. While Chief Onovo’s base was unclear, the Enugu State-born aspirant appeared to have a deep pocket. And this was Nigerian politics where money answered all things. The party’s National Convention needed to be funded through the joint efforts of the presidential aspirants. There were serious bills to pay, yet there was little or no funding coming from anywhere into our campaign organisation. On our side, the responsibility of funding the party primaries, practically, depended on Momodu alone.

“As we focused on raising funds for the primaries, there was no time to waste. We needed to consolidate on our support base among the delegates. The Wednesday night before the primaries must have been the longest night for us throughout the 2011 campaign. There was no sleeping. It was a night of a series of long chin-wags with delegates and their representatives. If money was a deciding factor in this contest, we had no money to share. All we had was God’s grace, Momodu’s goodwill and some copies of OVATION International magazine. By the time all the delegates arrived in Lagos and were checked into their hotel rooms, four copies of OVATION International magazine were already packaged ready for each and every one. It was the audacity of hope at its highest.

“By the Thursday morning of the primaries, I must have been looking rough and rugged. It was not a day for designer suits.We had done all that was humanly possible throughout the night. The rest was in God’s hands. I woke up after two hours of half-sleep and half-thinking, to a new day filled with suspense. I had two speeches to draft for the aspirant – aside being the campaign manager, I doubled as speechwriter. One was a welcome address to the delegates, and the other an acceptance speech which Momodu hoped to deliver if he secured the party’s ticket. I completed my drafts and headed to Momodu’s room.”

MEMORIES AND TEARS

He continued: “I met him in tears. Memories of the June 12 struggle with Chief MKO Abiola had come flooding back to him that morning. He had recalled the 1993 Social Democratic Party’s (SDP) primaries in Jos; the night of the long knives which saw Chief MKO Abiola clinching the SDP presidential ticket after a tough battle of conspiracy and intrigue. It saddened him that 18 years after all that struggle and sacrifice, Nigeria was still on a journey to uncertainty, which had now compelled him to embark on this fresh battle for the soul of the country.

“When I returned to my room, I cried, too. Without doubt, we were optimistic about our chances and had great faith in God but looking at the exploits of the other aspirants posed a serious challenge to our hopes. Alone in my room, I was deeply worried and unsure if we had done our homework properly. Was this not what the cynics always warned us about? Riding on the wings of ‘false hope’? And then I remembered the words of the great Desmond Tutu: “Hope is being able to see that there is light despite all of the darkness.” Those words meant a lot to me.

“As the aspirants arrived the Hotel 1960, Ikeja, Lagos venue of the party primaries, the media crew thronged around Chief Martin Onovo. One thing you couldn’t take away from this man was this aura of a student union activist. He seemed to be the star of the moment. Maybe the media had a feeling he was going to beat Momodu, the big name in the race for NCP’s presidential primaries. For whatever it was worth, I was prepared for any possible outcome. I had come to terms with the fact that, win or lose, we had fought a good fight.

“It turned out we didn’t lose. We recorded a landslide victory at the primaries. Chief Onovo polled 8 votes while Beredugo had 14. With 169 delegates’ votes, Momodu clinched the NCP presidential ticket. But what really happened? How did it happen? I thought it was more than the hard work we put into the contest. And I thought was a lot more than a few copies of OVATION International magazine that we distributed to delegates while our opponents were dishing out wads of naira notes the night before.

“By this victory, after PDP’s Goodluck Jonathan, Momodu became the second presidential candidate in Nigeria’s 2011 presidential race to contest and win his party’s primaries. The third and perhaps the last would be Mallam Ibrahim Shekarau of the All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP). The others were inequitable handpicked, imposed or adopted by their parties without going through any party primaries. In a presidential race where political giants like Atiku Abubakar, Aliyu Gusau and Bukola Saraki had been eased out, Momodu the underrated underdog was still standing.”

Amaize holds the record of the youngest presidential campaign manager in Nigeria at the age of 26.

TOMORROW: How ‘ungrateful’ Genevieve Nnaji got Momodu angry