As the Gombe State chapter of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) hold primary election to choose its flagbearer for the 2023 governorship elections, the odds favour Dr Jamil Isyaku Gwamna.
Gwamna is the immediate past Managing Director of the Kano Electricity Distribution Company (KEDCO).
A total of six aspirants picked the PDP expression of interest and nomination forms to challenge Governor Muhammadu Inuwa Yahaya of the All Progressives Congress (APC).
Dr Gwamna has been nursing the ambition to tenant the Gombe Government House since 2007, when he contested and lost to former Governor Danjuma Goje during the general elections.
Gwamna is seen as one of the strongest contenders as his loyalists emerged winners of the PDP primaries in majority of the 24 state assembly constituencies; all the six candidates for the House of Representatives and two candidates for the senate.
Spectacularly, virtually all the aspirants that won the primary elections at both the state and national assembly levels are his people. They paid him a visit after they won the primary election and pledged their allegiance and support to him.
Former Governor Ibrahim Hassan Dankwambo, the state’s leader of the party, who also picked the senatorial ticket for the Gombe North, is believed to be supporting the candidature of Gwamna.
Meanwhile, Dan Barde’s loyalists, starting with his Director-General of campaign, Muhammad Dan’azumi Adamu and Shehu Abubakar Durbi, lost their bid to get the ticket for Akko and Gombe/Kwami/Funakaye federal constituency, respectively.
Another contender is the founder and former managing director and chief executive officer of Sun Trust Bank, Muhammad Jibril Barde.
Danbarde, as popularly known, was the first runner-up in the 2018 gubernatorial primary election that produced Governor Yahaya as the APC’s candidate for the 2019 gubernatorial election.
He was followed by Dr Abubakar Ali-Gombe, an accomplished medical doctor cum politician.
Dr Abubakar has been a card-carrying member of the PDP since 2009, but only recently declared his membership and picked nomination forms for the governorship seat.
Other contenders for the PDP’s ticket are; AVM Shehu Adamu Fura (rtd), a former officer of the Nigerian Air Force; Dr Babayo Ardo, immediate past Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Niger-Delta Affairs and Gimba Ya’u Kumo, a former managing director of the Federal Mortgage Bank of Nigeria (FMBN).
