One of the frontline presidential aspirants of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Bola Ahmed Tinubu, on Thursday said that without the political struggle which he led, President Muhammadu Buhari would not have emerged the President of Nigeria in 2015.
Tinubu also categorically said he single-handedly nominated Professor Yemi Osinbajo as the running mate to President Buhari in 2015.
The former Governor of Lagos State, who spoke at the Presidential Lodge in Abeokuta, the Ogun State capital, while addressing the APC delegates ahead of the party’s presidential primary holding June 6-8 2022 in Abuja, said he is revealing these details in public for the first time in the home State of Vice President Osinbajo, one of his main rivals for the APC presidential ticket.
Tinubu, who was in Abeokuta in the company of Lagos State Governor, Babajide Sanwo-Olu, his Kano counterpart, Umar Ganduje, and former Borno State Governor, Kasim Shettima, also revealed that Buhari had then offered him a running mate ticket, but some blocs rose against him, fanning ember of Muslim-Muslim ticket.
The former Governor also added that when he was asked by President Buhari to submit three names for running mate, he pencilled down Yemi Kadoso, Wale Edun and Yemi Osinbajo but he later settled for Osinbajo as running mate.
“You have not heard this from me before. This is the first place I am saying this,” Tinubu who addressed the delegates in Yoruba said.
Speaking on Buhari’s emergence, he said “If not me that led the war front, Buhari wouldn’t have emerged. He contested first, second and third times, but lost. He even said on television that he won’t contest again.
“But I went to his home in Katsina. I told him you would contest and win, but you won’t joke with the matters of the Yorubas. Since he has emerged I have not been appointed minister. I didn’t get contract.
“This time, it’s Yoruba turn and in Yorubaland, it’s my tenure.”
Tinubu also said without God and him, Governor Dapo Abiodun would not have emerged in 2019 election.
“Dapo that’s sitting down here, could he have become Governor without me? We were at the stadium, they tore all his posters. Even the party flag, they didn’t want to hand over it to him, I was the one who brought it.
“If he wants to meet God at the right place, he must know that without God and me, he would not have become Governor.”
In his remarks, Abiodun who had earlier declared his support for Osinbajo’s candidature, refused to endorse Tinubu.
He told Tinubu that delegates from the state would do “the right thing” at the convention.
Abiodun described Tinubu as a political warrior, serial winner and strategist.