Congratulations to Uncle Bola! I love how he went to shake hands with the VP yesterday despite all that we have now come to know. That is simply the honourable, humble and mature thing to do especially when you’ve just defeated someone most will suggest has openly betrayed you.

Contrary to so many people’s wish for VP Osinbajo to take over from President Buhari, this was never going to happen and if it did, much as we would have loved to have a younger and much more vibrant leader, we do not by any means want one who will be handpicked by the President’s Fulani Cabal. I mentioned this in my article over the weekend. What I also mentioned is the fact that this President really never wanted the Pastor to succeed him.

Pastor Yemi Osinbajo’s best chance of taking charge of Nigeria would have been for his boss to have stepped down for him after six years in office. After all, he promised to be in office only for one term. He never kept that promise. The president overestimates his achievements and of course his political influence and value. Being given a thoroughfare to the presidency through Uncle Bola’s political-strategic manoeuvrings and his supernatural knack for being a people’s rallying point must have given a false sense of political value to the retired General.

However valuable he is politically, he could not win until his fourth presidential attempt. His request therefore to the APC stakeholders to allow him anoint his successor is outright shocking, outlandish and very much undeserved. If he actually really wanted Pastor Yemi as a successor, he ought to have sacrificed at least two years of his eight years to ease the VP into that position. But the Northern Agenda he’s allowed the cabal under him to pursue will certainly not have given room for such nationalist thinking.

Even in his own ancestral Remo federal constituency. He spent 7years as VP without a single identifiable federal project to his name in his own constituency whilst his boss was busy building a rail line to the Niger Republic. A notable federal road between Ikorodu and Sagamu linking Lagos to his Remo constituency is a case in point. I travelled on that route just after last Christmas. Just permit me to say, there was no road between Ikorodu and Sagamu, it was that bad.

One disturbing observation must indeed be made about the APC’s delayed Convention. Some of those who had the privilege of the microphone were a bunch of absolute disgrace. Unfortunately for some of us, we cannot “unhear” all that nonsense they paid N100million to spew in our faces. It ain’t just right and to think all that nonsense was beamed to the entire world in real-time?.

The contrast between all those suspected drug-induced remarks and poor Pastor Tunde Bakare’s passionate and volcanic plea for change in our nation were just light-years apart. Match that furious speech by Pastor Bakare with Uncle Bola’s political doggedness, reach and goodwill in one aspirant and Nigerians can just sit back and relax with great positive expectations. Hmmm! I should stop building this imaginary castle in the air.

Congratulations are absolutely in order for Uncle Bola. He was determined from the start and knew exactly what he wanted and how to get it. He worked assiduously hard for this outcome while his opponents turned to mere spectators. In spite of his obviously frail health, he was not taking the Fulani cabal under President Buhari for granted. When he needed to confront them, he did so decisively. He took the fight to them and demanded that the North fulfil their part of the power-sharing deal that brought this president to office. It is fair to say that this humongous landslide victory was won in spite of President Buhari, his VP and the cabal who seem to have our Commander in Chief attached to puppet strings.

We must commend the Northern governors who took it upon themselves to remind this forgetful President of the good turn he immensely benefited from. It was their fairness that I believe jolted most of the Southwest sons in the race to “remember the sons of whom they are” by stepping down for Uncle Bola. His frail health notwithstanding, I think he will manage quite well. After all, the repackaged and refurbished President Buhari you see today would not even recognize himself if shown his past pictures. That man spent almost an entire term of 4yrs in office in London looking after his health. As long as we keep Uncle Bola healthy and even though he isn’t a Saint, I am hopeful that our nation will be better looked after compared to the shambolic leadership we have today.

Uncle Bola seems to have perfected the art and act of pulling others up and surrounding himself with some good people. For the Northern governors to have stood their ground against what was clearly the president’s clandestine political joggling says a whole lot about the man on behalf of whom they took the decision to back a Southern Candidate.

Trust me, standing against the will of a sitting president in Nigeria is no mean feat, uncle Bola did exactly that starring our President’s cabal in the face when he needed to. He obliterated a sitting VP who was unfortunately pushed to becoming a colossal betrayal to his former boss and benefactor. The VP did not even come second but third with just over 200 votes compared to his former boss’s 1,271 votes.

All that final minute scheming to force Lawan, the Senate President on the party as a consensus candidate ought to be the Pastor’s cue to return to base. He should have outfoxed his new boss right there at that convention ground, the tunnel for his political escape had already been dug by Governor Fayemi, Senator Amosun and others. He should have declared his support for his former Boss. Instead, he wanted to look presidential, setting up the teleprompter and all for a twenty minutes remark. What did he think he was doing? Those voters were always going to vote the money paid to them and also as we’ve seen in this case, a reasonable bit of their conscience too. They wanted power to come to the south but the VP was just never their choice.

His failure to shock everyone by announcing his support for his Boss is why he is a Pastor and not a politician. One would have expected him to have done better politically. He has clearly shown that he does not deserve any more than he has so far been privileged to attain politically. Unfortunately for him, the fact that he could not find the narrative to extricate himself from the narrative of continuing President Buhari’s legacy was another major undoing (what legacy anyways?). I honestly don’t know why they all kept masturbating to the President’s performance in office when in actual fact his regime after seven years has been one of indescribably shocking abysmal failure.

The VP can now begin to plan his retirement, he had his opportunities. That he found it easy to completely shut the door against any possible private arrangement with Uncle Bola leading to this convention and when he had a chance to do a 360-degree turn seeing that Lawan had been picked over him, to me, truly accentuates his betrayal of his former Boss.

If he always had the capability to be this cold towards his benefactor, why then did he fail to strategize and take power through the national assembly when he had the opportunity? The entire nation would have backed him up, especially when everyone had become frustrated and unaware if the president was ever going to get better. The appetite for him to take the initiative against a clearly incapacitated President Buhari was rife but he did not have the balls. He has taught us a lesson though, it’s easier betraying your own kin who clearly isn’t enjoying the best of health than it is betraying an incapacitated Fulani President. I am glad, however, that Uncle Bola showed him, love, by going to console him after such a victory.

Now, we all know why uncle Bola wanted this primary election so much, he knew he had done his homework politically, he knew he had the confidence of the majority of the North and he knew he would win. If he could achieve that with his frail and suspicious health, I think it will be politically suicidal for anyone to underestimate him at the Presidential election. There will be challenges but they surely wouldn’t be insurmountable ones. Once again, congratulations are in order Uncle Bola. You must know sir, that this is only the beginning of the main race. You must see this through by not just winning the general elections (Baba Awolowo and Bashorun Abiola got to that stage) but by winning and getting sworn into office as President.
Oluwa a lora emi gbogbo wa o
Ase!