•Shocking Details Emerge
Over the last few weeks, there has been so much talk about whether Pres. Muhammadu Buhari will support the lifelong aspiration of Asiwaju Bola Tinubu to be President.
Since Tinubu came out to tell Nigerians that he has formally informed the President about his ambition, many had wondered whether Pres. Buhari will genuinely and sincerely support the aspirations of the man who helped him to power.
It’s now obvious that Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu is clearly running for the No 1 seat in the country and he’s clearly in the lead. He is also the most serious contender for the job. He has toured the length and breadth of the country, consulting and seeking opinion on his presidential ambition.
As it is, some Governors and top leaders of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), are split over presidential aspiration of Tinubu. They aren’t sure where to pledge their allegiance because it’s not clear to them if President Buhari would back them.
It’s clear, even his (Buhari) body language doesn’t suggest he approves of the ambition.
The founder and pioneer national chairman of the defunct Congress for Progressive Change (CPC), Senator Rufai Hanga, said a few months back that there was an unwritten agreement between Buhari and Tinubu to hand over power to him after his tenure. He said, “this is an open secret. There was an implied agreement. Even in Law, there is implied and expressed act. If something is expressed, there are no two ways about it. There was an implied agreement that he would take over. That is why he didn’t back out after the first tenure. If Tinubu knew that he would not benefit, he would have backed out during Buhari’s first tenure. But he knows there was an agreement,” he said.
But in the last few weeks and months, things aren’t the way it was predicted, despite Tinubu going to Aso Rock to inform Buhari of his intention to run. And he did this ahead of other aspirants, so he (Buhari) won’t have any other choice but to support his long time ambition.
Let’s take you back to when President Buhari granted Channels TV an interview and he said his preferred candidate would likely be killed if he mentioned his name. Political analysts and other sensible Nigerians assumed it couldn’t be Tinubu.
Let’s take you to our major discussion of why President Buhari doesn’t want to give Tinubu the Apc ticket.
In the last few years, there have been a lot of issues in Nigeria. One of those is the issue of Fulani herdsmen killing farmers. Another one was the EndSars saga that almost tore Lagos apart.
The Buhari government, at that time, believed it was sponsored against his government. In fact, he (Buhari) said plainly in a TV interview that it was organised to remove him.
He made this allusion when he spoke about the #EndSARS protest that happened 2 years ago. You remember the young people that wanted to march here and remove me?”
The president added: “Tell the young people to behave themselves and make the country safe, then we can attract real investors to the country”. What the president felt, according to online rumours then, was that somebody powerful was behind the protest. Asiwaju’s name was mentioned then.
Another reason why Buhari won’t want Asiwaju to succeed him is that the Cabal from the North feels Asiwaju is too smart and powerful for them (the northerners) to control if he becomes the president.
Let’s tell you what some political analysts feel. They feel many of Buhari’s policies don’t favour the West and as such, he (Buhari) wants somebody who he can trust to remain in power to continue his legacy. One of the policies is the Visa on arrival which favours the other Fulani from all over West Africa.
A few months back, President Muhammadu Buhari was advised to urgently stop his policy of ‘Visa on arrival’ for foreign herdsmen to enable Nigerian security agencies check the influx of militiamen and other criminals in the move to tackle insecurity.
Benue State chapter of the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) which gave the advice, at a press conference in Makurdi, said it was convinced that President Buhari is aware of what the Open visa policy has cost Nigeria in terms of the worsening security situation.
With this in mind, he would want somebody he trusts; somebody he has worked with, that can continue with such a policy.
Another reason is that someone who is being rumoured to have been nursing the Fulani agenda, wouldn’t want that plan to go unachieved. He would still want to be relevant outside the government by ensuring Fulani still remains powerful in governance. And the only way is to put somebody that can continue in the same direction.
Another point is the fear of the unknown. Asiwaju, to some extent, has his own plan and idea of how a country should function for the benefit of every Nigerian. He is seen as a smart individual who could not be trusted when he attains power. Don’t forget there has been a continuous issue on the restructuring of the country. This is the biggest fear of the North. They feel it would be difficult to operate under this system, so they want to ensure somebody who shares the same objective on the issue of restructuring, gets the APC ticket and subsequently emerges president.
Sometimes ago, Pat Utomi, a professor of Political Economy, said some politicians in the north are afraid of restructuring because they are uncertain about where it will lead them
Speaking at a virtual media parley ahead of the ‘Never Again’ conference to mark 51 years after the civil war, Utomi said the north largely relies on the Federal Government for their share of revenue, which “has made them really unproductive”.
“There is a real crisis in the North that the south does not understand. They are painters of people who hate each other very much; that is the truth of the matter. That is why they are scared of restructuring because they don’t know where it will lead them, and outside of Nigeria, they are formless; there is no North,” he said.
Utomi, however, urged northerners to dismiss such fears, saying restructuring will help them “become productive and move away from the poverty status”.
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