Apparently disturbed by the leadership crisis between the National Leader of the All Progressives Congress, Bola Tinubu and Governor Akinwumi Ambode of Lagos state, President Muhammadu Buhari has reportedly invited Mr Tinubu to the Presidential Villa, Abuja.
DAILY NIGERIAN observes that there is growing concern over the chances and fate of the APC in winning the state if this rift is allowed to persist beyond the build-up to the 2019 elections
Although the due has publicly denied having any rift, the APC Governors’ Forum is reported to have urged Mr Buhari to appeal to Mr Tinubu not to disgrace one of their own.
However, the media aid to Mr Tinubu, Tunde Rahman, said he was not aware his principal was summoned to Abuja on the matter.
“You can’t trample on people’s right; you can’t stop anybody from expressing intention to contest as stipulated in the constitution.
“It is left for the party members to decide their candidate through direct primary.
“All the three governorship aspirants are going to participate in the primary. If three people have taken forms, it means the party will decide whom it wants. APC is a disciplined party,” he said.
However, sources familiar with the issue have asserted that the major reason for the rift was an alteration of the state’s major policies Mr Ambode that angered Mr Tinubu.
It was recently gathered that some APC chieftains including former APC Deputy chairman, Cardinal James Odumbaku and former Commissioner for Agriculture and Cooperatives, Kaoli Olusanya, allegedly directed Ambode to return his nomination form or face impeachment at a meeting held at Watercress Hotel, Ikeja Monday night.
At the meeting, it was also gathered, all Chairmen of 20 Local Government Areas, LGAs, and 37 Local Council Development Area, LCDAs, signed the governorship nomination form of Tinubu’s anointed candidate, Babajide Sanwo-Olu.
Also, a video clip obtained showed some of the council chiefs signing Sanwo-Olu’s nomination under the supervision of some state party leaders led by Cardinal Odumbaku and encouraging the council chiefs to support Asiwaju’s anointed candidate.
As shown in the video, Mr Odumbaku said there was no other political group in Lagos State again than the Mandate Movement, noting that the Bola Ahmed Tinubu Campaign Organisation had been fused into the Mandate Movement.
He said Mr Sanwo-Olu “is Asiwaju’s annointed candidate for 2019. We gathered here on the instruction of our leader. We must honour by supporting his choice candidate for the 2019 governorship election in the state. The era of Ambode has gone. This is a new era. In 2019, Sanwo-Olu will be the one to occupy the State House.”
However, multiple sources revealed main reasons the APC national leader refused to endorse his political godson for re-election yesterday, ascribing it to Ambode’s decision to alter, modify and scrap some state’s policies initiated under the Tinubu administration between 1999 and 2007.
One of the sources mentioned the affected policies to include Kick Against Indiscipline, KAI, and Lagos State Waste Management Authority, LAWMA, which the Ambode administration scrapped and modified to serve the residents more effectively.
While KAI was replaced with the Lagos State Environmental Sanitation Corps, LAGESC, the source said LAWMA gave way for Cleaner Lagos Initiative, CLI, which he said, designed for effective management of the state’s residential wastes.
However, according to him, the CLI later created grievous waste management challenges in the state. Asiwaju see these legacies. When scrapped, Asiwaju believed Ambode just wanted to rubbish legacies. He was indeed displeased.
Apart from KAI and LAWMA, another source cited the case of Lagos Bus Reform Initiative, which the Ambode administration invested over N30 billion Paris Club refunds the state received from the federal government between 2016 and 2017.
Specifically, the source disclosed that Tinubu’s idea of public transportation “is completely different from the Bus Reform Initiative, which Ambode introduced in 2017. Asiwaju believes public transportation should be driven by the private sector.
“Ambode’s decision to invest such huge amount on the construction of bus terminals and procurement of about 6,000 air-conditioned high occupancy vehicles is at variance with Asiwaju’s position. Asiwaju never bought into this initiative.”
The report said besides policy alteration, an entirely different source said Asiwaju was displeased with his godson because he set up a political group of his own called Akinwunmi Ambode Campaign Organisation, AAMCO, with networks across all LGAs and LCDAs.
According to the source, all political groups in the state have been collapsed into Bola Ahmed Tinubu Campaign Organisation, BATCO. Asiwaju felt the creation of AAMCO was a violation of his directive. But the truth is Ambode created the group because he won the APC governorship ticket in December 2014.
Mr Ambode had expressed interest to run for a second term as governor of the state on the platform of the APC.
