Tuesday, October 02, 2018 /06:42PM /OpEd by Reuben Abati
After two postponements, the All Progressives
Congress (APC) Party’s Governorship Primary will hopefully hold at last, in
Lagos today, October 2. The Godfather of Lagos APC politics, if you are truly
partisan, you can delete APC and say Asiwaju Bola Tinubu – effectively
dominates all of Lagos politically, and has publicly declared that whereas the
incumbent Governor Akinwunmi Ambode wants a second term in office, he, the
Godfather and the party leaders no longer want him. Ambode’s crime as stated,
for more than two weeks is that he has refused to carry relevant stakeholders
“along”, whatever that means. The godfather changed the narrative on Sunday
when he disclosed that Ambode’s crime is that he failed to implement a
“blueprint” for the development of the state. Ambode is fighting back. He called
a World Press Conference and called Babajide Sanwo-Olu, the consensus
candidate who has been handpicked to replace him, names.
When this crisis occurred, Ambode who was
brought to power by Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu begged his godfather and benefactor.
He was ignored. Ambode’s wife also went before the grandmaster of APC politics
in Lagos State. She was treated politely and dismissed. Sanwo-olu has the
support of 36 members of the State House of Assembly, all local Government
chairmen and chairmen of Local Development Council Areas, party leaders, and
Lagos APC members in the National Assembly. Ambode has only the support of
local councilors and a segment of public opinion. From the look of things,
Ambode as they say, is a “goner”.
But that is not the story. The story is that
after all the begging and genuflection, Ambode is now standing up for a
fight. On Sunday at a World Press Conference, he pulled off his gloves and
resolved to engage in a bare-knuckle fight. He accused his opponent, the Asiwaju
camp’s candidate of fraud, incompetence and incapability. Sanwo-Olu has refused
to respond in like directly, except may be through proxies, knowing clearly
that he still serves in the government of the same man whose office he wants to
take. If Sanwo-Olu is so bad, why is Ambode still retaining him as Managing
Director of the Lagos State Development and Property Corporation (LSDPC)? But
of course, the fight is not between the two of them, it is between Ambode and
Tinubu. Tinubu accuses him of abandoning a blueprint. Who are the authors of
that blueprint? Is it a constitutional matter that a Governor must be held
hostage by a document prepared long before he assumed office? What is the
content of that blueprint, if the rest of us may ask?
I like the fight between Godfather and Godson.
There will be no winners at the end of the day. There will only be losers on
both sides. One, the Ambode saga has already exposed Asiwaju Bola Tinubu’s
vulnerability. His political legacy is at stake. Ambode, having been pushed to
the wall has become the underdog who is ready to shake the table. He has pushed
the table. Two, Ambode is fighting the battle of his political life. If he
defeats Tinubu, he would have re-made himself into a political force. If
he loses, he would still have succeeded in exposing the evil of the Godfather
syndrome in Nigerian politics. His travails may end up turning him into a
hero. Three: nobody is talking about us: we the people, in this entire
equation. We know that. Four, whatever happens in Lagos has implications for
President Muhammadu Buhari’s fortune in the general elections of 2019.
Lagos, not Osun, is the ultimate test for
President Buhari’s chances in 2019. But let’s thank Ambode for shaking the
table. Whether or not he wins today is not the issue. It is what comes the day
after. We wait.
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