Defection Plans: Suswam Recruits Benue Elders To Pacify Akume
Former Governor of Benue state and Senator representing Benue North-East Senatorial District, Gabriel Suswam has commenced reconciliatory moves with the Minister of Special Duties and Inter-Governmental Affairs, Senator George Akume.
As a prelude to the reconciliation, Suswam is believed to have recruited some elders of his home state to assist him lobby and smoothen the path of genuine reconciliation with his predecessor in the Benue Government House.
Forefront News gathered that the move is to pave way for his eventual defection to the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), where Akume asserts himself comfortably as the leader in Benue state.
Checks by our correspondent indicate that even though Senator Suswan had openly declared that he remains a faithful member of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), his eyes and focus is set on how to defect to the APC.
Pointedly put, Suswam has been holding meetings with close associates and members of the President Muhammadu Buhari’s kitchen cabinet seeking their support to prevail on Akume to facilitate his smooth defection to the ruling party.
Suswam’s relationship with Akume went sour since 2011 when, as a sitting governor, he openly worked to stop the current minister of Special Duties from returning to the Senate for a second term.
Suswam, it was further gathered through sources close to him, has paid and secured the services of an elder, who is a former national officer of the ruling party during the second republic, and also Akume’s kinsman as well as another leader of the Jime/Ode Campaign Organization in the last general elections to lead the reconciliation process.
The role of the recruited two elders, it was gathered is to put together more persons that have the ears of Akume including his wife, Mrs. Regina Akume to help in the assignment of pacifying the minister.
Sources hinted that Suswam was recently uncovered as disclosing at a meeting with some of his confidants and associates at his Makurdi residence, that he negotiated and still negotiating election tribunal cases with support from the presidency to favour some of his trusted persons, who won elections on the platform of the PDP like himself.
It was further gathered that the strategy is to pave way for a smooth movement with the same people to the APC to enable him have a better bargain.
He was quoted to have told some of his associates that both the Chief of Staff to the president, Abba Kyari and the President of the Senate, Ahmed Lawan have endorsed the strategy and are according him the needed cooperation towards achieving the plan.
As a form of compensation, Suswam told some of his inner caucus members that the duo of Kyari and Lawan have agreed that they will work to see that all criminal charges against him in courts, especially those bothering on corruption are quashed once he crosses over to the APC.
It was also gathered that Suswam in a desperate attempt to win his recruits, assured them that the gubernatorial candidate of the APC in Benue state, Emmanuel Jime, who is challenging the election victory of Governor Samuel Ortom, is likely going to win his case at the Court of Appeal that would most likely order a rerun election in areas favourable to the APC.
He assured that once the court verdict is achieved, his defection to APC will therefore be a big plus as he will help the party to win both his Logo Local Government and that of Ukum.
The Suswam recruited team to work on Akume, is believed to have commenced making contacts with prominent stakeholders in the Benue APC, even as they seem to be hitting brick walls with some of the persons they met, who expressed misgivings with the move on the premise that Suswam is too “slippery” and “tricky” to trust.
