Presidential candidates in the April elections and their backers have extended their campaigns to a few western capitals, hoping to drum up informal but significant international support as election draws closer.
Specifically, some of the candidates are consulting with international political PR firms, engaging the Nigerian Diaspora and attempt to knock down international profile of their opponents. Key in their strategy, according to informed sources is the scramble for favorable mention among top official circles in key western capitals and the international media.
In fact, some of the presidential candidates have confirmed personal participation in next weekend's (March 12) Diaspora Presidential forum holding in New York, being organized by the Nigeria Peoples Parliament in the Diaspora.
Seen widely as the candidate to beat, both at home and abroad, being an incumbent, President Goodluck Jonathan's campaign, according to insiders in his government is relying on the government's established contacts with several official, business and individual contacts.
Many of such contacts include current and retired US, British officials, who are engaged formally with the federal government in one assignment or the other and have expressed informal support for the president's election in their personal capacities.
For instance, Ambassador Howard F. Jeter, a former Ambassador of the United States to Nigeria, and who is still influential in US government circles is one of the key figures engaged by the campaign organisations of leading presidential candidates.
Jeter is working closely with the federal government currently on a few issues, including helping to mobilise international investors from the US to invest in Nigeria's power sector, an area of crucial importance to the Jonathan presidency.
Although he is now a private consultant and an influential African-American, Jeter's reach however also stretches to other political parties, as he was is said to also be helpful to other presidential candidates on how to secure international support through the use of US and Europe-based political consultants.
Two other former US ambassadors Mr. John Campbell and Dr. Rene Robin Saunders, are also said to be actively engaged in the run-up to the presidential election. But while Saunders is not directly linked with any of the presidential candidates as yet, she is said to be sympathetic to the Jonathan campaign. Saunders last month hosted a non-partisan forum on the Nigerian election in Washington DC, trying to focus international attention on the election and the run-up activities to it, including the party primaries and the voters' registration.
Campbell however is believed to be opposed to the Jonathan presidency and he is identified as one of those clamouring in top US circles for a change of leadership in Nigeria. Unconfirmed sources said Campbell might be open to working with the presidential candidate of the Congress for Progressive Change, General Muhamadu Buhari, based on his perceived support for the retention of power in the North.
There is also the Corporate Council for Africa (CCA), an otherwise non-partisan business association comprising US-based business concerns with investments and interests in Africa. CCA is also said to be quietly supporting the Jonathan campaign in continuation of its tradition of backing the incumbent and the perceived leading presidential candidates in Nigeria and Africa.
CCA has a few linkages to the presidency, including a Memorandum of Understanding signed with a quasi-governmental organization, the Nigerian Economic Summit Group. Through linkages such as this, CCA has managed over the years to build trust with top Nigerian government officials and sources said top leaders of the group, which includes US oil companies in Nigeria, are also privately backing the Jonathan-Sambo campaign.
A top federal government official conceded that many in the US official and business circles are happy with the Jonathan presidency and have expressed their support privately for his campaign.
Opposition parties are not left out. For example, the Action Congress of Nigeria, ACN, presidential candidate, Nuhu Ribadu, who had built for himself a considerable international following while he was chairman of the Economic Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) is also said to have engaged international PR and campaign consultants with the active support of the ACN leader, Chief Bola Tinubu.
But while Tinubu and the ACN is packaging a multi-million naira project to launch Ribadu's presidential campaign image internationally, the former EFCC boss, according to sources is practically sustaining huge image losses internationally, since he fell out with some of his colleagues in former president Olusegun Obasanjo's economic reform team.
For instance, former Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, Nasir el Rufai, who has openly opposed Ribadu's presidential aspiration on the platform of the ACN is said to have expressed his disappointment in Ribadu's choice of party, because Ribadu as EFCC chairman had informed the Obasanjo economic team that Tinubu was corrupt while he was governor of Lagos State.
According to informed sources, Rufai, who is well-connected in Western capitals and who actually led some aspects of Yar'Adua's international campaign in 2007, has now unleashed his international contacts and connections against Ribadu, and is now actively trumpeting the credentials of the candidates of the Congress for Progressive Change – Buhari-Bakare ticket.
Although it is not yet known whether the CPC candidate has secured the services of an international consultant, Ribadu's campaign operatives concede that Nasir's contacts, especially in the US have rubbished the ACN presidential candidate's image, so much that it requires an urgent repair.
A knowledgeable source said the grudge between Ribadu and his former reform allies was that he did not inform them ahead that he was going to use the ACN platform. At least two leading members of the Reform team are said to be irretrievably opposed to any form of political alliance with Tinubu.
Another leading presidential candidate keen on the international scene is the ANPP Presidential candidate, Alhaji Ibrahim Shekarau who has actually managed to secure a top interview with BBC's Hard Talk and has confirmed participation in next week Nigeria's Diaspora Presidential Forum in New York.
Meanwhile, the presidential forum set for next Saturday in New York, according to its organizers has already secured the participation of some leading presidential candidates. Mr. Salisu Abdullahi, a Senior Special Assistant to Governor Shekarau confirmed that the ANPP presidential candidate would personally attend the forum.
The forum is also expected to be streamed live on the Internet and also recorded for TV and radio broadcast later in Nigeria.
Source: April Poll: Presidential Candidates Scramble For International Support (http://ngrguardiannews.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=40651:april-poll-presidential-candidates-scramble-for-international-support&catid=1:national&Itemid=559)