Presidency: Osinbajo not a traitor – Sagay…..Says Tinubu’s supporters talking nonsense

It is complete nonsense to suggest that the ambition of Vice President, Yemi Osinbajo, to become President by next year, is a betrayal of the National Leader of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Asiwaju Ahmed Bola Tinubu, who wants the same job.

This was the position of Itse Sagay, Chairman of the Presidential Advisory Committee Against Corruption (PACAC), while weighing in on the issue, believed to have created bad blood between Osinbajo and Tinubu, said to have brought him to the political limelight when, as governor of Lagos State, he brought the Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN), then a university teacher into his cabinet.

Aside from appointing Osinbajo as Attorney General and Commissioner for Justice, Tinubu, was also said to have played a key role in making him VP by recommending him to then APC presidential candidate, Muhammadu Buhari.

Tinubu had joined the fray, by firing the first shot, in what had been an open confrontation between his supporters and the VP when he told the media that he had no political son grown enough to be President, a veiled reference on the matter, only for Osinbajo to reply on Wednesday that he owed no one any allegiance, but Nigeria to whom he swore an oath.

But Sagay entered the fray also, where the Tinubu camp likened Osinbajo to Judas who betrayed Jesus Christ, and “modern day Akintola who betrayed Awolowo,” in reference to the 1962 Action Group crisis which was a result of the struggle for power between two political leaders of the Western Region and Action Group (AG), Chief Obafemi Awolowo and Chief Samuel Ladoke Akintola, saying such labelling of the VP was misplaced.

“I think labelling the Vice-President a betrayer for coming out to contest for the presidency is most uncalled for. In the larger interests of Nigeria, anybody who thinks he has something to offer should be allowed to indicate interest and contest the election. This is because the greater the variety, the most likely possibility that we will get the best candidate.

“So, I don’t think it is good to try to curtail the variety of those who are interested by shutting down to anyone. Those publications against the Vice President were very unfortunate and distasteful. We are all aware of the antecedent of the Vice President, particularly as a former Attorney-General of Lagos state. What some of us are saying is that everybody should be given a chance so that the delegates will have a wide choice to make and will  be able to pick the very best.

“When you begin to threaten or eliminate people, you are narrowing the choice and you may end up eliminating the best person. In my view, the Vice President is entitled to contest. Let the delegates determine who the candidate will be.”