About 10 governorship aspirants, including Mallam Nuhu Ribadu, today indicated interest in the Adamawa State governorship on the platform of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).
Ribadu, a fervent critic of the PDP for its corrupt excesses, joined a throng of prominent indigenes to collect the party’s Expression of Interest form for the party's governorship primaries.
The former chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) has in the past 10 years criticized the PDP heavily. After assuming control of the commission in 2004, he worked hard to indict or jail several of its members.
In addition to his EFCC stint, he headed the June 2006 federal interagency Joint Task Force (JTF) which indicted several governors, including the then Bayelsa State governor Goodluck Jonathan, for false declaration of assets, among others.
Among others, the JTF report showed that Mr. Jonathan lied about having acquired an N18 million Lexus Jeep (SUV) through savings in 2004, and a N5.5 million BMW 7351 Series in 2005. Mr. Jonathan was found, instead, to have collected them as gifts, in contravention of the Code of Conduct Bureau Act of 1990 and was recommended by the JTF for prosecution. President Olusegun Obasanjo pre-empted that process when he made Mr. Jonathan Vice-President to Umaru Yar’Adua.
Ribadu, apparently choosing to swim in those same shark-infested waters but without metamorphosing into a shark himself, last week joined the PDP from the All Progressives Congress (APC). He has justified his move by arguing that there are good and bad people in every political party.
Ribadu's forms were collected for him in Abuja by a political associate, Alhaji Hamidu Mahmoud, as he swims towards PDP favour
Others who also collected the forms include former presidential aide Ahmed Gulak, Idi Hong, Buba Marwa, Ahmed Modibbo, Awwal Tukur, and Umar Fintiri, the acting governor.