A former Governor of Osun State, Olagunsoye Oyinlola, says National Leader of All Progressives Congress (APC), Asiwaju Bola Tinubu would have been running mate to President Muhammadu Buhari in 2015 but for former President Olusegun Obasanjo.
Oyinlola, a strong ally of the ex-president, stated that Buhari and Tinubu had already entered into a secret arrangement to be president and vice president respectively.
“The agreement was concealed from a good number of the party leaders until it surfaced after Buhari had got the ticket. Then the rumour came out and some us felt danger was looming with the idea of Muslim-Muslim ticket. To further add to our fears, General Buhari on one occasion said there was nothing wrong in the Muslim-Muslim presidential arrangement, saying after all he governed with Tunde Idiagbon.
“That statement made us to know it (the Muslim-Muslim idea) was a fact. On two occasions, Bola (Tinubu) mentioned it in my presence that they agreed. If you recall one trending video back then, where it was said that Buhari had jettisoned what they agreed on, that is the room he was sleeping when Buhari was looking for the post.
“We then told Baba (Obasanjo). We told him that taking power from an incumbent government was a tough task and we must not give room for excuse and miss the target. We told him they (Buhari and Tinubu) were thinking of a Muslim-Muslim ticket. That was when Baba (Obasanjo) said people should not take the sensibilities of Nigerians for granted,” Oyinlola told Saturday Punch.
Recall that Obasanjo supported Buhari in the 2015 election before the duo fell apart ahead of the 2019 polls.
Oyinlola noted that Obasanjo intervened and the arrangement was foiled.
“After that (Obasanjo’s intervention), they started saying it in my presence that Obasanjo frustrated the plan to get Tinubu on the ticket for 2015 but I always acted as if I didn’t hear them. We then had a stakeholders meeting where the issue of the running mate was discussed again,” Oyinlola, a former Military Governor of Lagos.
Apart from Obasanjo, Oyinlola stated that a former Gombe State Governor, Senator Danjuma Goje also spoke against the Muslim-Muslim ticket.
“At the (stakeholders) meeting, ex-governor Goje, rose up and said in the northern part, there is negligible number of Christians. He said the APC would need every vote to upstage the incumbent, so nobody should toy with the idea of a Muslim-Muslim ticket and everybody concurred. I think it was even Bola (Tinubu) that suggested that the matter should be taken before some leaders to resolve. But we never saw anything like that again,” Oyinlola added.