By Ismail Omipidan
As Nigeria’s Vice President, Kashim Shettima clocks 58, Chief Press Secretary to the immediate past Osun State Governor, Ismail Omipidan, writes on the Nigeria’s number two political trajectory since joining politics in 2007.
“He is the One Who has originated the heavens and the earth, and when He wills to (originate) a thing, He only says to it: ‘Be’, and it becomes.”
The above quote from Quran Chapter 2, Verse 117, appears apt in analysing the political trajectory of Nigeria’s current Vice President and ex-Borno Governor, Senator Kashim Shettima .
I have known him for 23 years now. I met him in 2001 when he was still a banker in the course of my duty tour in Borno State. He joined politics formally in 2007. As a commissioner in Borno State, he served in about four different ministries, including Finance, Agriculture and Education. By 2011, he was elected the governor of the State on the platform of the defunct All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP). He spent two terms. By 2019, he was elected a Senator to represent Borno Central Senatorial District and by 2023, he was elected alongside President Bola Ahmed Tinubu GCFR as the Vice President of Nigeria, a position some thought was reserved for them, forgetting that what Allah has destined for Mr. A cannot miss him.
Historically, until 2015, Borno State had never been in the same party with the government at the centre. Therefore, any time election was approaching, the need for Borno to be brought into the mainstream politics was usually the campaign thrust of the opposition party in the state.
Like the opposition NPN did in 1983, in the build up to the 2015 electioneering, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) which is the major opposition party in the state since 1999, rallied most Borno elites together and impressed it on them to see reason to kick out the All Progressives Congress (APC) government in the state, and support the PDP so that the party could form government at the state level.
The PDP promoters at the time said it was only when the party was allowed to form the government in Borno State that the state could enjoy the type of federal presence it deserved, and it was the only time it could get the full backing of the federal government in its fight against insurgency in the state.
Interestingly, Shettima’s predecessor, Senator Ali Modu Sheriff’s defection to the PDP was seen as a major morale booster, for the PDP’s quest to win the state, ahead of 2015, with Sheriff himself boasting to ex-President, Goodluck Jonathan, who was the PDP’s presidential candidate at the time that he would ensure he delivered the state to him and to the PDP, bragging that “Mr. President, hold me responsible if Borno is not delivered to the PDP,” adding that the APC was not going to get up to 30 percent of the total votes.
Rather than engaging in self-praise, Shettima quietly went to work and by the time the election was won and lost in 2015, the PDP could not even secure the required 25 percent votes for the party’s presidential candidate, Gooodluck Jonathan, as Shettima delivered 473, 543 votes to the APC presidential candidate, Muhammadu Buhari, representing about 97 percent of the total valid votes cast, leaving Jonathan with just 25, 640 votes.
So, once the presidential election was won and lost in March 2015, signalling APC’s win at the centre, the PDP’s quest to govern the state made little or no meaning to an average Borno person, as the few coverts it had gotten saw no further need to continue to support the PDP, since the APC which they intended on send-packing, had won the presidential election.
Again, in 2019, in the entire States in the north, Borno was the only state that improved from its 2015 performance at the presidential election. For instance, while President Buhari‘s votes dropped significantly in most of the northern states where he previously won, in Borno, the votes increased by about 400,000, as Buhari polled 836, 496 votes to defeat former Vice President Atiku Abubakar, the PDP’s candidate, who garnered 71, 788 votes.
Shettima is usually underated because of his quiet nature, which is seen by many who do not know this enigma, as a weakness. However, for those of us who know him very well, beneath that quiet nature, lies his greatest strength as he deploys it effectively to achieve results where others have failed.
He was 45 when he became Borno State Governor in 2011. And he did very well. But those who believe they have the power of life and death politically referred to him as a “small boy” in private and in public. They attempted to dislodge him in 2015. God showed His hands: Shettima beat them to their game.
Again, in the build-up to 2019 elections, they attempted frustrating the emergence of Prof. Zulum as the candidate of the APC, insisting Borno must be rescued from the hands of “yara” (small boys), forgetting that “these small boys ” stood up to be counted when it mattered most. Like it happened in 2015, God again showed His Hands: Shettima again beat them to their game in 2019 and, in the end, Prof. Zulum went on to win the governorship contest.
Even though Asiwaju Bola Tinubu had long before emerging the 2023 presidential candidate of the APC decided on the choice of his running mate, some persons attempted to play God the moment they realised the pendulum was dangling on Shettima. They mobilised to the Holy Land to pray against Shettima’s emergence, but because God has decreed it would be, it came to pass.
As his friend and one of his confidants, I know that his being an unabashed pro-Tinubu did not start overnight. It dates back to pre-2015. He shared a lot of insights with me about some of the leg works they embarked upon with Tinubu locally and internationally in the build-up to sacking a ruling government in 2015. It was Shettima who first told me about the Tinubu presidential project in January 2019. The rest is now history.
Our Vice President, as you celebrate your birthday again today, I pray Almighty Allah continue to guide your steps and provide you with the knowledge and wisdom to navigate through our country’s murky political waters.
I pray those demons that instigate mistrust between the President and the Vice President flee from the Villa. I pray Allah also grant you the knowledge, wisdom and courage to identify them and flee from them whenever they come calling.
Happy birthday to you my dear friend, brother, and benefactor, Vice President Kashim Shettima. Allah ya kara zumunci, sir.
Omipidan, a journalist and public Affairs Analyst, writes from Abuja.
