Anytime the discourse of Buhari’s failure is brought to the court of public opinion, there’s no way Bola Ahmed Tinubu would not take a shot from the barrel of criticism that is reserved to exterminate Buhari for his apparent failure and incompetence.
Dragging Tinubu in the mud for Buhari’s failure is not a misplaced one, it is tenable and justifiable. Because, like the second coming of Jesus Christ, Tinubu and his foot soldiers preached the Gospel of Buhari’s Messianic ability to rescue the country from the abyss of underdevelopment to the South West, with synergy to his already popularity and acceptance in the northern region, the presidential race was a smooth ride to victory for Buhari who had lost the election three times consecutively before 2015.
Meanwhile, according to grapevine reports, there’s a covert agreement between Tinubu and Buhari to relinquish power to the National leader of APC at the end of his tenure in 2023 as a reward for his political sacrifice over the years.
True to that postulation, the machinery for Tinubu to take over the highly-coveted seat in Aso-Rock in 2023 is already in motion. Effortlessly, major politicians and socio-political groups from the North has thrown their weight behind Tinubu’s presidential ambition as their “thank you” gift for his support to their kinsman since 2014.
However, in an article I wrote in November 2015, titled “SUSTAINING THE CHANGE MANTRA”, I hypothesized that the failure of Buhari is going to be a dent on the presidential ambition of any politician coming to power under the umbrella of APC.
“It would have been another story if Buhari became the president as a sole candidate of his own self-created party. But contrary to his own coined quote “I belong to everybody and I belong to nobody”, the unfortunate and devastating story is that the style of his administration posing to be a regional government won’t argur well for the party(APC) that brought him to power.
It is no gainsaying that if Buhari fails to retrace his steps, the sacrificial efforts of other political heroes like Bola Ahmed Tinubu, Rotimi Ameachi, Aminu Tambuwal, Adam Oshiomole and even Baba Obasanjo(their supposed navigator) among others in the era of change would be nugatory because Nigerians of nowadays are more enlightened, determined, informed and cautious politically.” The article reads in part.
Unlike Obasanjo who had openly disassociated himself from the failure of Buhari and lampooned him couple of times for his abysmal performance, the silence of Bola Ahmed Tinubu over Buhari’s performance is deafening. And to discerning Nigerians, his silence is understandably strategic. Unlike Baba Obasanjo who has nothing to lose for openly criticizing Buhari, Bola Ahmed Tinubu has a lot to lose if he toils the path of Obasanjo.
Except for felicitating with Buhari on his birthday like every other people, the only time Bola Ahmed Tinubu had hailed Buhari was 2018, praising him for acknowledging June 12 as Democracy Day and the posthumous honour bestowed on late MKO Abiola. That move obviously was a masterstroke from the Buhari administration to placate the Yoruba people as the 2019 election was fast approaching.
Even at that, Bola Ahmed Tinubu cannot deny the fact that Buhari whom he sold to Nigerians as a “General” who would eradicate the myriad of “challenges” the country was facing before 2015 has added more problems than solutions for Nigerians.
In his felicitation message to Buhari on his 79th birthday, Bola Ahmed Tinubu alluded to the “challenges” when he said: “Your tenure in office has coincided with some of the most difficult and challenging times this country and, indeed, the entire global community has faced.”
“Economic crises, global pandemics, insecurity and criminality have all played a role in making the past few years difficult for the people of our great country.”
Let us excuse and forgive Tinubu for saying that with his tongue in check, at least, that he acknowledged that the country has been battling economic crisis, insecurity, criminality and other forms of difficulties deserves a round of applause.
What he failed to acknowledge is the fact that most of these difficulties that characterized Buhari’s administration are man-made and avoidable—save the COVID-19 pandemic that held the world by the balls. The myriads of challenges Nigeria is battling with are results of leadership oversight and crass ineptitude of an administration that relies on trial and error policies, missed opportunities and inactions. Rather than appointing technocrats devoid of party affiliation to salvage the country from the abyss of destruction, Buhari dashed out critical ministerial positions to party men as reward for their financial support to his presidential ambition, and all we have are square pegs in round holes.
Anyways, that is not the bone of contention here. Buhari is bowing out of the corridor of power in 2023 to retire to his farm in Daura, the legacy he is leaving behind is that of a president who bequeathed untold hardships to Nigerians rather than ameliorate our misery. Apart from construction of roads and railways, bailout funds to governors to squander, Buhari is leaving a legacy of a president who couldn’t rescue the country from the abyss of economic woes and rampant insecurity.
Reacting to apologists of Buhari who count infrastructure as the achievement of the current dispensation, Niran Adedokun in his column on 12 of August, 2021,”What Shall Buhari Legacy Be?”, said: “The Yoruba say that the child you did not train is the one that would sell off the houses that you have built. Therefore, it is counterproductive to build gigantic structures while your citizens are unhappy, hungry, and unsure about the future.”
Tinubu’s presidential ambition and the dilemma of continuity
Amidst the assumptions of if he’s running or not, Tinubu has said he wouldn’t reject the call of those asking him to run for the presidency in 2023. Even though he asked people to continue guessing, there are machineries in motion already to make his presidential dream a reality. The South-West Agenda For Asiwaju(SWAGA) and Tinubu Support Group (TSG) are definitely not here to joke around. Hence, Tinubu’s presidential ambition has left the grapevine to become hard sell news. Making the front page of newspapers almost every week.
However, unlike the kind of energy exuded by Tinubu in 2014 to rubbish PDP’s 16 years in power as wasted years—selling a mantra of CHANGE to the electorates—the questions begging for answers are: what will Tinubu use to sell himself to Nigeria if he’s not going to rubbish the abysmal performance of Buhari? Will he have the temerity to be sincere with the voters that he can relate with their misery under the Buhari administration and competent enough to proffer solutions to the myriad of challenges or will he choose to massage the ego of his ‘brother from the north side’?
Tinubu will be facing a dilemma of continuity as it is obvious the voters are yearning for respites and closure from the hardship they endured for eight years of Buhari’s maladministration. Campaigning to continue on Buhari’s legacy because of party affiliation will be an own-goal for Tinubu. At the same time, rubbishing Buhari’s legacy to sell his own manifesto is like shooting himself in the leg.
Nigerians are waiting for Tinubu to officially declare his intention so they can bombard him with questions on not just how he is going to take the country out of the wood, but also why they should believe him if Buhari that he enthusiastically sold to them performed below expectation. He is not only going to be answering questions about his agenda for Nigeria, but also answering questions about the poor legacy of President Muhammadu Buhari. The legacy of Buhari is definitely going to take a toll on Tinubu’s presidential ambition.
I hope he’s ready to talk the talk and walk the walk and tell people what he truly stands for.
“True leaders don’t invest in buildings. Jesus never built a building. They invest in people. Why? Because success without a successor is failure. So your legacy should not be in buildings, programs, or projects; your legacy must be in people.” — Myles Munroe
