Suddenly
the veil covering one of the grandest plots in modern political history got
burst, and its contents spilled into the public domain. Despite the façade of a
long-promoted ‘official’ APC proposition of a South-East 2023 Presidency as
prize for Igbo support of the President Buhari bid for re-election, Fashola
fired the first salvo proposing a South-West APC Presidency likewise come 2023.
Fashola
was unequivocal when he spoke pointedly to the highest level of the South-West
political and cultural leadership, averring that in supporting the Buhari-Osinbajo
ticket to success, they were making an already decided 2023 Yoruba Presidency a
fait accompli. It was not long after, Vice-President, Pastor Osinbajo hit the
trail with the same song. When the grand master himself, Asiwaju Tinubu capped
the orchestra,also in whispers, to same high level audience, in the most
provincial of the Oduduwa dialects, it was not difficult for discerning minds
to decode the real McCoy.
That
more than a Candidate of South-West extraction being presented by the APC for
the 2023 Presidential election, such a Candidate shall also be the INCUMBENT
PRESIDENT at that appointed date via a pre-consented, pre-2023 resignation of
the serving President. Thus, an OSINBAJO INCUMBENT PRESIDENCY BEFORE 2023 is
the real project of the current Tinubu – PMB pact.
The
trio of Tinubu, Osinbajo and Fashola are strong-willed and clear-headed
characters, hardened and cold-headed strategists of the first order; not given
to frivolities, or the vain glory and garrulousness of the El-Rufai kind; who
have a masterly grasp of the dynamics of politics, nationally and
intercontinentally. These have a clear understanding of the fallacy and
non-workability of zoning/rotation of a Presidential office that is still being
contested for in a multi-party competitive system.
Who
can teach those first rate scholars/strategists that there is no body of
stakeholders nationwide who can compel the major contending political parties
to reach consensus on zone of choice or selection of flag-bearer? The mission
of any major contending Party is victory in the next immediate election, a
victory that cannot be put at risk on the altar of zoning. Was the Presidency
ever zoned to Jonathan or to the South-South? No major political party would
have attempted such a risk in a thousand years. Jonathan inherited the
Presidential Office upon the passing of President Yar’Adua, and thereafter
proceeded to contest for the Office as incumbent President from 2011 through to
2015.
Evidently,
the zoning of Presidential office was put in effect just once in 1998-1999,
when the General Abdulsalami regime compelled and rail roaded the existing
political Parties to present their flag-bearers from the same South-West Zone.
Are these features not well understood by the Jagaban and his cult, yet they
have made the 2023 zoning of Presidency to the South West, the single issue,
and with all assuredness, in their APC campaign in the Zone. What else would
have brought back the Asiwaju full steam in investing support once again on the
PMB Presidential pursuit after failing to reap the anticipated dividends in the
2015 venture? Certainly, not the zoning of a non-existent presidential ticket
to himself or any from the South-West. There must be an offer more tangible,
and of superior utility on the table.
It
is a fact of modern history that the APC, whole and entire, root and branch,
came into being as a Tinubu investment. In coalescing erstwhile political
parties, political factions, tendencies, the Asiwaju pulled off one of the
greatest works of political engineering in world history. This he followed up
with a PR and marketing firepower unknown in these parts nationally and
internationally for the Buhari presidential bid. In reaping the dividends of
his investment, instead of realizing his projected target of constituting by
himself the sole one-man cabal of the Buhari 2015 Presidency, he was edged out
by a new hitherto unknown ‘cabal’ composed by the triumvirate of BabaganaKingibe,
Abba Kyari, and Nasir El-Rufai.
This
time around, the new Tinubu-PMB pact has as its anchor, a 100% Asiwaju
controlled Presidency pre-2023, something that has once again invited his
consummate commitment. To the extent that PMB had declared the Jagaban the
prime ‘owner’ of his re-election project. Much more, the Asiwaju has been so
unguarded in his relentless boasts, alluding to his forthcoming ‘Godfather’
role in a Buhari regime, post 2019
Though appearing robust physically, the mental impairment of
Mr. President has become so evident, perhaps the product of heavy medication-powered
physical fitness. His incapacity for enduring another tedious 4 years of Presidential
leadership is just obvious for the world to see. Hence, the likelihood of the
scenario envisaged by the PMB-Tinubu pact. With the plot busting into the
public domain, what is at stake is no more a Buhari-Atiku contest, but a choice
between an Atiku Presidency and Asiwaju Tinubu Presidency.
Ichie Sunday
Chibuko
lasscobo99@yahoo.com
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