NASS POLL: AMOSUN, FAYEMI, FASHOLA'S CONSPIRACY AND TINUBU'S POLITICAL ESTABLISHMENT

The sordid game that has been playing out in the National Assembly is quite interesting and heartwarming. It was a mixture of dangerous political chessgame and treachery. A fight between established

Several pundits have propounded theories about Nigeria's democracy, which has its own peculiarity from other conventional democracies in advanced climes. It was fondly being described as a dirty game and the players are complying with this by fighting dirty to get noticed.

No trust, no decency, no caution and no respect for party's supremacy. It is a rule of the might, rather than the rule of the thought.

This is the exact description of what had happened in the hallowed chambers of the National Assembly over the election of former Governor of Kwara State, Bukola Saraki as Senate President and Yakubu Dogara as Speaker, rather than the party's preference: Senator Ahmed Lawan for Presidency and Femi Gbajabiamila for Speakership.

In-depth dissection of the scenario gave a pointer to the fact that treachery and backstabbing is part of the game. It gave a signal of impending implosion in All Progressives Congress. It shows a vivid and monstrous picture of how incoherent and divisive APC is. Not only the APC as a political party should learn a lesson from this, it also gave the acclaimed national leader of the party, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu an inkling that he should watch his back.

An ardent political watcher in Nigeria today does not need the services of a soothsayer to foresee that Tinubu is facing a serious challenge in the party. There is an unwarranted jealousy, culminating in a gang up against him by his own blood brothers from the South West in cahoots with some Hausa-Fulani politicians.

Quite unfortunate was the fact that bulk of the conspirators were people that had benefited from the political wizardry and generosity of Tinubu.

Multiple grapevine sources revealed that  the present Governor of Ogun state, Gov Ibikunle Amosun, the immediate past governor of Lagos State, Mr Babatunde Raji Fashola and the disgraced and arrogant ex-governor of Ekiti State, Dr Kayode Fayemi had celebrated the crashing of Femi Gbajabiamila from the speakership race.

These neophytes erroneously saw this as Tinubu's failure, rather than the entire APC in the Southwest.

This conspiracy even included some notable business magnates in Nigeria, who felt a grossly corrupt  Saraki -led Senate leadership would serve their interest against any backdrop of government policy from President Buhari that might want to hurt there business interests.

It also included some aides of the president themselves who were bribed with huge amount of money to be part of the conspiracy, a source privy to the outcome of the meeting which was held at the top floor of the Nicon Hilton Hotel in Abuja had business mogul Otedola bringing the cash that was disbursed to hatch their sinister plans which also included Ogun state governor, Gov Ibikunle Amosun.

The duo of Fayemi and Fashola had not hidden their sinister intention to erect alternative political block to Tinubu's dominance in the Southwest, even when they have no wherewithal, ingenuity and cult-like followership to achieve such a towering and incredible exploit.

Unfortunately, Amosun seems to be veiling his own venom against Tinubu, their benefactor.

Putting it succinctly, Fashola  and Amosun could be best described as being modest in his political aspiration.They have been pursuing their agenda in the most matured way without ruffling feathers with anybody, which makes their cases more pardonable because of the question of sustained political survival.

But alas that of Fayemi has been brazenly infantile and in-gratuitous. He threw caution to the wind in a manner that was akin to the Yoruba adage which says “Ore Pe, Asiwere Gbagbe”, which implies that the mad people do forget the good you do to them with a spate of time.

Fayemi's political trajectory in the Southwest progressives has been a colossal waste. Catastrophic, to say the least. This is a man who became governor after a hard fought fight that spanned over three years of continued and sustained legal battle. The leaders of ACN stood by him. They committed multi billion naira investment to ensure that he felt a dose of that governorship seat. Contacts were made across Nigeria to ensure that this ingrate's mandate was not subverted on the platter of political patronage and connection being used by the PDP then. How did he repay these leaders, via back-stabbing, unnecessary tale bearing and conspiracy, just because of political position.

Fayemi, who considers himself as alternative to Tinubu today cannot walk freely on the streets of Ado Ekiti, even Ekiti at large, except his town, Isan Ekiti. If his popularity has been that overwhelming, how could he have crashed to Mr Ayodele Fayose, a man that had been rejected by Ekiti people eight years ago? No thanks to his phantom and baseless photochromic theory, he facesavingly contrived  to pooh-pooh Fayose’s landslide victory.

The outcomes of elections that had been conducted since his disastrous outing in June 21, 2014 governorship poll indicated that he cannot even form alternative to an ordinary Boolekaja' politician like Fayose, let alone a super star like Tinubu.

It is an indisputable fact that Nigeria's political arrangement conferred on the President and the State Governors enormous powers. Powers to hire  and fire and that of life and death. If a man like Fayemi, who could not  manage his success with the enormous resources as a governor, in terms of powers and cash is given four Ministries to manage as minister, he would still not deliver.

Fayemi's political failure seems congenital. It was like an irremovable curse and President Muhammadu Buhari must be cautious in his dealings with these political rat.

Going back to the new scenario at the National Assembly, the National Chairman of the party, Chief John Odigie-Oyegun must exert his supremacy. He should not be docile like PDP, who decided to keep mute during the Aminu Waziri Tambuwal political debacle of 2011. Those that partook in projecting PDP agenda, even while in APC should be made to face the music.

APC as a political party that is built on decency and discipline, is naturally endowed with the strength to operate with lean resources. Its leaders are not rapacious and should not be afraid of returning to the opposition, if these traitors are rooted out of the party. They should be allowed a free will to return to the PDP, where they can easily get keyed to the custom of business as usual and cash and carry politicking.

An advice to Tinubu would be that he should look inward for his traducers.

He should not see his travail, which though I believe he has the capacity to confront headlong, to have emanated from Former Vice President Abubakar Atiku, Aminu Tambuwal, Bukola Saraki or any other leaders of the party. His case was a conspiracy of his own brothers, Fayemi, Fashola as arrowheads.

In conclusion, the projectors of gang up must be wary of the fact that you cannot fight an established figure in politics, except you want to collapse the entire structure. Let me remind them  of the conspiracy in the Southwest Geo-political zone in 1965.

Having been installed as the Premier of the Western Region through the instrumentality of Chief Obafemi Awolowo's political establishment, Chief S.L. Akintola wrongly thought he had arrived. He bit the fingers that fed him and the diadem fell from his head and  he went into political oblivion with those he co-opted to feud with his benefactor.

The recent of this case was that of former President Olusegun Obasanjo and immediate past President Goodluck Jonathan. You could see how the latter ended ruinously for deciding to fight the former, who gave him supports to survive the Hausa-Fulani onslaught in 2011. Fayemi, Fashola and their ilk must learn from these lessons before getting consumed by their own dangerous antics.

Written by Solomon Afolayan.