It is no longer news that all is not well between the APC national leader, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu and his once-trusted ally, Vice President, Yemi Osinbajo. The once enviable relationship they shared has turned frosty. Hard as both camps have tried to downplay the simmering crisis between them, the signals are there for everyone to see. The body language of the two personalities involved have been unmistakable. Even the recent visit of Asiwaju to the vice president’s office in Aso Rock, Abuja, has not quelled matters. If anything, it only strengthened the already raging speculation that things have indeed fallen apart between these two illustrious Yoruba sons.
Asiwaju and Vice President Osinbajo have both come a long way together. Osinbajo was Lagos State Attorney General and Commissioner for Justice when Asiwaju was governor of Lagos State almost 20 years ago. They both had tremendous respect and affection for each other. They still do. But the lure and intrigues of politics have thrown spanners into the works of their good old relationship.
News started filtering in months ago that Bola Ahmed Tinubu, whose undeclared presidential ambition has been simmering in the political space even before 2019, is reportedly facing a robust challenge from power blocs within the Presidency who are believed to be working against his long-nursed ambition to occupy Aso Rock and would rather back his erstwhile political beneficiary – Vice President Yemi Osinbajo. Many had thought this was probably nothing but unfounded speculation until the vice presidents campaign posters started flooding the major streets of Abuja and environs. Some groups have also come forward to claim they are working for the vice president. Their mandate is strictly to work towards helping the vice president realize his presidential ambition. And from this point, the fireworks between both camps have begun.
But there is a neutral group that believes that it is morally unacceptable for Vice President Yemi Osinbajo to pitch tent against his benefactor and leader, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu. They argue that his rumoured presidential ambition, which automatically puts him on a head on collision with Tinubu, is tantamount to biting the very fingers that fed him. The import of this, for those who do not know, is that it was Asiwaju who single handedly nominated Osinbajo and ensured President Buhari and other APC top shots accepted him as the running mate to the president back in 2015. Although there have been a few different accounts to this claim, City People can authoritatively say that indeed, it was Asiwaju who enthroned Professor Yemi Osinbajo as the country’s Vice President, just as he was instrumental to the emergence of President Buhari as the country’s democratically elected president.
The APC national leader himself confirmed this few years back shortly after the emergence of Professor Yemi Osinbajo as Buhari’s running mate when he was alleged by the PDP to have installed Osinbajo with the agreement that he would resign some months into office as vice president so that Buhari would, in turn, pick him (Asiwaju) as his new vice president. It was at this point that Asiwaju revealed that it was indeed the president, who was the APC presidential candidate at the time, that offered him the vice-presidential slot which he ended up handing over to Osinbajo.
Hear him: “There came a time during the course of the events when our Presidential candidate, General Muhammadu Buhari offered the Vice Presidential slot to me. Being a normal human being, I was deeply moved and honoured that he would consider me for the position. Being a patriot, I had to weigh my potential candidacy in all of its dimensions.” And after days of politicking and negotiations, the APC finally announced Yemi Osinbajo as Buhari’s running mate on Wednesday, just hours before INEC’s deadline on parties’ submission of list of candidates.
To many political observers, particularly those within the top hierarchy of the APC, this was unprecedented. Not many expected Tinubu would pass up the opportunity to be President Buhsari’s running mate.
Asiwaju, in his response, added: “Some may call what I have done a sacrifice. I call it otherwise. It is my patriotic contribution and duty. I do so with a happy and uplifted heart and clear conscience because I have committed myself to seeking the best for this nation before seeking what is good for myself. “
The former governor further said that he would never place political ambition over patriotic conviction, adding that there is no room for emotion to becloud sense of judgement.
“This is a time for cohesion and an overriding sense of mission. We must defeat the foe before us and resist all temptations intended to entice us to fight among ourselves,” Asiwaju Tinubu said.
“I sincerely commit myself to the rescue agenda of General Buhari and Professor Osinbajo.
“I declare to you, I will work and dedicate myself so that our ticket succeeds and wins the 2015 election – not for his good, not for my good, not even for the party’s good but for the good of the nation we inhabit.
Back then in 2015, the possible choice of Asiwaju as a potential running mate to Buhari was unacceptable to some members of the opposition party who were opposed to the party fielding a Muslim-Muslim ticket.
Asiwaju Tinubu accused the PDP of stoking the fear of a Muslim-Muslim ticket within the APC.
“When my name was raised, the political hatchet men tried to chop it down with rumour and lies,” he said. “Over the years, I have developed a thick skin. The personal attacks did not bother me. I am used to them. While I have thick skin, I don’t have a thick mind. There has been one form of attack that has troubled me. That is the attack based on religion.”
“I have removed myself from consideration so what I now say cannot be seen as self-serving. I plead with the people of this nation to never allow the power lust of cynical politicians to set brother against brother, neighbour against neighbour. If you look at those politicians who raise this issue the most, they are the least devout and faithful to any religion other their self-interests.”
It was Lagos State Commissioner for the Environment and Water Resources, Mr. Tunji Bello, who gave a detailed account of how Asiwaju nominated Osinbajo and ensured he emerged as the APC running mate to the party’s presidential candidate, Mohammadu Buhari. He was the Secretary to the Lagos State Government at the time. He was reacting to a false story as contained in a book, Muhammadu Buhari: The Challenges of Leadership In Nigeria, a biography on the president written by a British author, John Paden in 2016. The author, in the book, had claimed that three names were presented to President Buhari, namely. Asiwaju Tinubu, Babatunde Fashola and Prof. Yemi Osinbajo, and that to Asiwaju’s disgust, Osinbajo was picked by the president despite immense pressure from Asiwaju to drop Osinbajo and pick him instead. According to Mr. Tunji Bello, this is absolutely untrue, that the author had merely listened to hearsays rather than dig properly to uncover the real truth.
In utter disgust, the Honourable Commissioner responded further: “I don’t know how the author came about his story, but he totally got it wrong because what he wrote basically is based on the falsehood that reeks of deliberate misinformation and mischief.”
“I know how Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu picked Vice President Yemi Osinbajo because I was part of the process that midwifed his nomination. In mid-December 2014, it was a Saturday morning after President Mohammadu Buhari had been picked by All Progressives Congress (APC), at the party’s presidential primaries at Teslim Balogun Stadium in Surulere, Lagos. I received a phone call from Asiwaju to see him that morning. On my way to his house, I discovered that a car at a reasonable distance was that of former Lagos State Commissioner for Information and Strategy, Dele Alake, who was, ostensibly, heading towards Asiwaju’s house in Ikoyi. Asiwaju must have called him too for that task that could be explained underneath.”
“As soon as we arrived, Asiwaju quickly asked us to join him in his car as we headed to a Guest House. At the Guest House, the former APC Chairman, Chief Bisi Akande, Professor Yemi Osinbajo and one renowned Pastor joined us.”
“At the meeting, Asiwaju related to us the urgent need to pick a Vice Presidential candidate for the APC. He advised that we immediately discard the idea of his being nominated for the vice-presidential slot as it was no longer possible to pick a Muslim-Muslim ticket. This he reasoned made sense if indeed we were to be realistic in our bid to defeat President Goodluck Jonathan in the 2015 election. He reasoned that what was important and imperative at that time was to look for a good Christian nominee to complement President Mohammadu Buhari.”
“I remember Baba Akande responded to his aversions that he would still have preferred that Asiwaju should be the running mate since it had been done before. Baba Akande was obviously referring to the MKO Abiola/ Babagana Kingibe nomination. Asiwaju responded by distinguishing the political equation then from what was before us at that point in time. He foreclosed that scenario as no longer possible. We all voiced our opinions, and at the end of the day, it was resolved that we had to get a Christian candidate.”
“It was at this point that Asiwaju reminded us to be fast in coming up with an option because he felt other geographical zones are also jostling for same position reiterating the need for the South West to get it as a must. Asiwaju audaciously told us for that left for him, and if he were to pick anyone, he would suggest Professor Yemi Osinbajo. That Osinbajo, apart from being a brilliant legal luminary is also a committed progressive, and democrat. And having been married to the late Obafemi Awolowo’s granddaughter, it would not be a problem selling him to the old political establishment of the southwest for acceptance. He asserted that Alake and myself having served in his cabinet could attest to the great works he did as Attorney General during his, Asiwaju’s administration as Governor of Lagos State. He also reasoned that the second major factor in favour of Osinbajo was the fact that he is a strong Christian and one that he is already a Pastor at the Redeemed Christian Church of God (RCCG).”
“In the long run, Osibajo’s nomination was well-received by all of us at that meeting and Professor Osinbajo was asked to start detailing with us, further strategy sessions to which he brought out his laptop and we all commenced a brainstorming session. The rest of the discussion was to strategise on how to contain other likely opponents from the southwest zone before proceeding to Abuja to battle other regional zones in the coming nomination.”
“The meeting did not finish until about 9.00 pm when we returned to Asiwaju’s residence in Bourdillon. By the time we returned to his house, there were about six serving Governors already waiting to see him from different parts of Nigeria.”
“What is particularly sad now is that the book launch of the president was deployed to create a make-believe story that puts the society at a disadvantage of history. One would have thought that now that the progressives, through an uncommon alliance in 2015, created an upset by defeating, for the first time in the country’s history, the then ruling People’s Democratic Party, it might be taken as given that the role of all active participants in the exercise would be correctly recorded. But surprisingly and painfully too, such an avenue was used to create a historical distortion of facts.”
“If a political adversary had done that, one would not have been disturbed. This is because at the end of the day under such circumstances, the goal is usually to create a make-believe story that puts the society on a wrong side of history. But now that the progressives, through an uncommon alliance in 2015, created an upset by defeating, for the first time in the country’s history, the then ruling People’s Democratic Party, it might be taken as given that the role of all active participants in the exercise would be correctly recorded. But surprisingly painful is the fact that a historical distortion of facts is coming from unexpected quarters at this early stage of progressive politics.”
“It becomes more of a matter of concern when a renowned intellectual writes a book and begins to redefine events in his own way by abashedly evading facts that are bellowing in the public space in order to re-create a world of make-believe for his audience. Sincerely, such an act understandably becomes a matter to ponder seriously.”
“Let us stop here. It is not all clothes that can be dried in the sun.”
Hopefully, this will lay to rest the controversy surrounding how Osinbajo was nominated as the running mate to President Buhari. And it should hopefully send a message to the Osinbajo camp, reminding them that Osinbajo would be biting the fingers of the very man that picked him out of obscurity and placed him on a pedestal where he now dines and sits with the most powerful in the universe. How all of this political warfare will eventually pan out remains to be seen. With bated breaths, we await the coming of 2023, it is only a matter of time now that it will be upon us…
– WALE LAWAL
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