Bola Tinubu: The Rise and Fall of a 'god' of Men | by Chike Nnamani
...how the lion king demystified the lion of bourdillon
|by Chike Nnamani
He betrothed the Southwest regional politics like a colossus, creating and dethroning political figures. Issuing orders and receiving none. He held the proverbial yam and knife and whomever he likes, he gives. He can make and destroy. He was a god!
He orchestrated the evil that befell the nation today by foisting in the current herdman in Aso Rock. His words were like laws - more powerful than a state government or legislature. Question his authority at your own peril. Political hopefuls besieged his Ikoyi home like bees running after freshly harvested honey.
At the build up to the 2015 elections, he was so feared by the powers that be at the centre that a major campaign of calumny was launched against his person - much more than that of the Herdsman contender himself. They knew his capability.
In those days, partys' squabbles are settled at his home not by any reconciliation committee. In early 2015 during an intra-party squabbles in APC before the election, the current Minister of Transport, Rotimi Amechi, who was then a sitting governor in oil rich Rivers State, ran to him in his Ikoyi home, knelt down to him for an issue to be settled. A stubborn Amechi? Who could not even respect a sitting president like Jonathan, had to humble himself and knelt before the Jagaban of Lagos State.
In 2011 he held a court at a section of the London house of a former NigerDelta governor, where he insisted that his protege, Fashola, would not go for a second term; that their earlier agreement was only for a term in office. It took the intervention of his close associates for him to reconsider his earlier stance to allow Fashola go for a second term.
Atiku Abubakar is a known political heavy weight in Nigerian political circles, more powerful than some former Presidents. However, Atiku has to leave the Action Congress party in 2008, a party he formed with the Jagaban and in which he (Atiku) contested the 2007 Presidency with. All because he could not contend the party machinery with the Lagos Landlord.
In December 2014 again, after the Action Congress metamorphosized from AC to ACN to APC, the party's presidential primary was to be conducted at the Eagle's Square, the country's centre of party activities for an equal and level playing field. Atiku Abubakar was a major contender and he was feared amongst others, even Buhari.
But in his characteristical manner, the Lion of bourdillon single handedly relocated the convention from Abuja to Lagos where he'll have unfettered powers to influence the outcome. At that time the current herdsman in Aso rock was just like a house boy. No input whatsoever. The relocation was to pave way for his emergence anyway. And it worked out, and kept us where we are today.
In February 2015, few days to the election, when the party sponsored a lecture at the Chatham house, London. The speech was to be delivered by then Presidential aspirant, Muhammadu Buhari; so the people very close to the herdsman drafted a speech for him. But this did not go down well with the emperor, who questioned why a speech would be drafted without his input. He ordered that the speech be withdrawn, or else he himself will withdraw from the campaign. The speech was withdrawn and the Lagos Landlord wrote his own speech and handed it over to Buhari to read.
Acquisition of wealth is an understatement. Lagos is the richest state in Nigeria and richer than most African countries, but the Lion of bourdillon is richer than Lagos State. A former EFCC Chairman, Nuhu Ribadu, once told a foreign media that this man (Tinubu) made away with over 75% of Lagos resources.
The Beginning of the end
Today, the once revered Bola Tinubu has been reduced to a party errand boy with his former boys occasionally lashing out at him, all because they knew the Fulani masters have broken the wings of the emperor.
The first salvo fired at him by the Aso Rock herdsman was the statement: "I belong everybody; and I belong to nobody" during the presidential inauguration in 2015 which pundits believed was directed at Tinubu. Tinubu was before then calling the shots at the top echelon of the party. Few days later, a big banner of Tinubu which was erected alongside that of Buhari at the party's national secretariat in Abuja, was pulled down. Indicating that there are only one captain in a ship.
All the fights for his estranged sons like Fashola, Fayemi etc. to be dropped and his own nominees be appointed ministers were abortive - as these were the men that the Fulani lords needed to build a wall against Tinubu. They don't need any ministerial loyalty to Tinubu. In fact, Fashola indirectly called him a pig when the fight for the ministerial tussle was at its peak.
It would be recalled that when the various corruption scandals of Fashola were released to the public from unknown quarters, the current Minister of Power stated that, "When you fight with a pig, the pig gets happy and you get dirty." He equally stated that he would soon release the details of those that killed Funsho Williams, a former governorship aspirant in Lagos State during the administration of Tinubu.
As if to spite him in the face, when Buhari finally released his 6-month-waiting lists of "noise makers" (ministers as he called them) he sent it to Tinubu in "respect," to peruse before announcing it to the public. Chai! This was the same Tinubu who he denied nominating a single minister. The Fulani masters decided to make him "the more you look, the less you see." His nominee for Ondo governorship was bypassed. His nominee for Kogi governorship was ignored too. The list is just endless.
Anyway, today Buhari wants to contest again in 2019 and he wants this "boy" Tinubu around for the electioneering period so he kept him busy with a job of reconciling warring APC factions. Now Tinubu wants to employ his last political sagacity once more to make changes in the party hierarchy, so he announced that the party chairman, Oyegun, has to go for peace to prevail. But to his consternation, the Fulani masters re-instated Oyegun back and extended his tenure in his presence, in the mist of his assignment. This was a slap for a man that single handedly made Oyegun the party chairman. The problem is not in giving a monkey water to wash hands but in retrieving the container it used in washing hands.
The once political chess master, Tinubu, who desperately desired to be calling the shots at the presidency, has been beaten down in his game; and he seemed to have lost his voice in challenging his detractors than he did in previous administrations.
Chike Nnamani, a writer and political analyst writes from Abuja Nigeria.
All views expressed in this article are those of the writer. It therefore does not in any way, represent the views of CNR Nigeria.
|by Chike Nnamani
He betrothed the Southwest regional politics like a colossus, creating and dethroning political figures. Issuing orders and receiving none. He held the proverbial yam and knife and whomever he likes, he gives. He can make and destroy. He was a god!
He orchestrated the evil that befell the nation today by foisting in the current herdman in Aso Rock. His words were like laws - more powerful than a state government or legislature. Question his authority at your own peril. Political hopefuls besieged his Ikoyi home like bees running after freshly harvested honey.
At the build up to the 2015 elections, he was so feared by the powers that be at the centre that a major campaign of calumny was launched against his person - much more than that of the Herdsman contender himself. They knew his capability.
In those days, partys' squabbles are settled at his home not by any reconciliation committee. In early 2015 during an intra-party squabbles in APC before the election, the current Minister of Transport, Rotimi Amechi, who was then a sitting governor in oil rich Rivers State, ran to him in his Ikoyi home, knelt down to him for an issue to be settled. A stubborn Amechi? Who could not even respect a sitting president like Jonathan, had to humble himself and knelt before the Jagaban of Lagos State.
In 2011 he held a court at a section of the London house of a former NigerDelta governor, where he insisted that his protege, Fashola, would not go for a second term; that their earlier agreement was only for a term in office. It took the intervention of his close associates for him to reconsider his earlier stance to allow Fashola go for a second term.
Atiku Abubakar is a known political heavy weight in Nigerian political circles, more powerful than some former Presidents. However, Atiku has to leave the Action Congress party in 2008, a party he formed with the Jagaban and in which he (Atiku) contested the 2007 Presidency with. All because he could not contend the party machinery with the Lagos Landlord.
In December 2014 again, after the Action Congress metamorphosized from AC to ACN to APC, the party's presidential primary was to be conducted at the Eagle's Square, the country's centre of party activities for an equal and level playing field. Atiku Abubakar was a major contender and he was feared amongst others, even Buhari.
But in his characteristical manner, the Lion of bourdillon single handedly relocated the convention from Abuja to Lagos where he'll have unfettered powers to influence the outcome. At that time the current herdsman in Aso rock was just like a house boy. No input whatsoever. The relocation was to pave way for his emergence anyway. And it worked out, and kept us where we are today.
In February 2015, few days to the election, when the party sponsored a lecture at the Chatham house, London. The speech was to be delivered by then Presidential aspirant, Muhammadu Buhari; so the people very close to the herdsman drafted a speech for him. But this did not go down well with the emperor, who questioned why a speech would be drafted without his input. He ordered that the speech be withdrawn, or else he himself will withdraw from the campaign. The speech was withdrawn and the Lagos Landlord wrote his own speech and handed it over to Buhari to read.
Acquisition of wealth is an understatement. Lagos is the richest state in Nigeria and richer than most African countries, but the Lion of bourdillon is richer than Lagos State. A former EFCC Chairman, Nuhu Ribadu, once told a foreign media that this man (Tinubu) made away with over 75% of Lagos resources.
The Beginning of the end
Today, the once revered Bola Tinubu has been reduced to a party errand boy with his former boys occasionally lashing out at him, all because they knew the Fulani masters have broken the wings of the emperor.
The first salvo fired at him by the Aso Rock herdsman was the statement: "I belong everybody; and I belong to nobody" during the presidential inauguration in 2015 which pundits believed was directed at Tinubu. Tinubu was before then calling the shots at the top echelon of the party. Few days later, a big banner of Tinubu which was erected alongside that of Buhari at the party's national secretariat in Abuja, was pulled down. Indicating that there are only one captain in a ship.
All the fights for his estranged sons like Fashola, Fayemi etc. to be dropped and his own nominees be appointed ministers were abortive - as these were the men that the Fulani lords needed to build a wall against Tinubu. They don't need any ministerial loyalty to Tinubu. In fact, Fashola indirectly called him a pig when the fight for the ministerial tussle was at its peak.
It would be recalled that when the various corruption scandals of Fashola were released to the public from unknown quarters, the current Minister of Power stated that, "When you fight with a pig, the pig gets happy and you get dirty." He equally stated that he would soon release the details of those that killed Funsho Williams, a former governorship aspirant in Lagos State during the administration of Tinubu.
As if to spite him in the face, when Buhari finally released his 6-month-waiting lists of "noise makers" (ministers as he called them) he sent it to Tinubu in "respect," to peruse before announcing it to the public. Chai! This was the same Tinubu who he denied nominating a single minister. The Fulani masters decided to make him "the more you look, the less you see." His nominee for Ondo governorship was bypassed. His nominee for Kogi governorship was ignored too. The list is just endless.
Anyway, today Buhari wants to contest again in 2019 and he wants this "boy" Tinubu around for the electioneering period so he kept him busy with a job of reconciling warring APC factions. Now Tinubu wants to employ his last political sagacity once more to make changes in the party hierarchy, so he announced that the party chairman, Oyegun, has to go for peace to prevail. But to his consternation, the Fulani masters re-instated Oyegun back and extended his tenure in his presence, in the mist of his assignment. This was a slap for a man that single handedly made Oyegun the party chairman. The problem is not in giving a monkey water to wash hands but in retrieving the container it used in washing hands.
The once political chess master, Tinubu, who desperately desired to be calling the shots at the presidency, has been beaten down in his game; and he seemed to have lost his voice in challenging his detractors than he did in previous administrations.
Chike Nnamani, a writer and political analyst writes from Abuja Nigeria.
All views expressed in this article are those of the writer. It therefore does not in any way, represent the views of CNR Nigeria.
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