2023: What if Tinubu is thinking of a Fashola again?

By Kunle Awosiyan

Let us do a bit of speculations here. One Bola Tinubu’s ally that has not been constantly mentioned in the permutations ahead of the 2023 presidential hopeful is the former Lagos State Governor and the current Minister of Works and Housing, Mr. Babatunde Fashola (SAN).

Of course some of the BAT believers do not like Fash for being too academic but if you are looking for a man who will never join others to diminish Tinubu, please look for Fash.

He understands his former boss, knows his weakness and yet won’t destroy him. That is Fashola’s strength for you. He still calls Tinubu my “egbon” till tomorrow, even though they have differences, the “Omoluabi'” in Fashola has kept him above many of those who passed through Tinubu’s school but lack the capability to tolerate BAT.

Fashola has also been silent too on 2023 but so loud in the building of road and house infrastructure. Fashola was like this servicing Lagos as Tinubu’s chief of staff years ago when his name came up as the likely successor of his boss.

Tinubu’s audacity broke the Action Congress when ambitious governorship candidates left the party but Fashola became the governor against all odds. The party was renamed Action Congress of Nigeria, ACN.

Fashola’s performance shocked and shut the mouths of defectors as many of them quietly crawled back to the party. I witnessed it, I reported it too. Tinubu has got the gut. I’m yet to see a politician of such strongwill in this era.

Perhaps BAT may not throw up Fashola or Osinbajo whom for me are the most competent by their public service experience, he may have another joker that all of them will not hesitate to support.

I have been wondering since the pilgrimage to London if the visits were actually a get-well agenda or an avenue to hint on the incoming APC presidential candidate.

The visits have continued at Bourdillon. Almost all the Southwest governors visited BAT in London, including the Ekiti State’s Dr. Kayode Fayemi and former Ogun State Governor, Senator Ibikunle Amosun.

But the recent visit by the governors had no Fayemi in attendance even though he was at Marina earlier with his counterparts. I don’t want to make any issue out of this but then it may be due to some reasons.

One, Fayemi had to attend to some other critical issues elsewhere; two he is being touted to be nursing a presidential ambition against Tinubu and will like to be diplomatic now.

Earlier, the APC Caretaker Committe had visited Tinubu. Even though this committee is believed to be the baby of some APC governors of which Fayemi played a prominent role, it deemed it fit to visit its leader who just survived a surgery.

I suspect if Tinubu is not running, he may have revealed somebody to his closest allies, which a particular governor does not like but realises that his chance is slimmer with such a figure.

There is nothing so intimidating than learning that a superior person
had been penciled down to challenge your ambition.

Or a person who knows your secret or weak points is being packaged to expose you. It looks like blackmail, no, it is politics.

No politician has got a clean ass. And when the ambitious among them suddenly surrenders his plan, it is most likely that his ass is stinking.

In the race ahead of 2023, it seems the APC chieftains are seeing more logics in what Tinubu is placing on the table. I don’t want to believe that all these visits are over his good health.

Of course he has not disclosed it formally to the party, the rumour alone is worth celebrating. The rumour can also be one of the Tinubu’s many logics, the BAT is still in the pouch.

Kunle Awosiyan, a journalist, social commentator, writes from Lagos