Oshiomhole dissociates Tinubu from Buhari, rambles on continuity

Former National Chairman of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Adams Oshiomhole, had a hectic time responding to interviewers’ questions Wednesday morning, when he appeared on ARISE News live breakfast programme, The Morning Show.

The usually eloquent and loquacious former governor of Edo State literally lost his voice and was physically unease in his chair as he struggled to respond to questions posed to him by the anchor trio of Reuben Abati, Tundun Abiola and Rufai Oseni.

In the about 30 minutes interview monitored by RELIABLESOURCENG.COM, Oshiomhole was taken up on his party’s Muslim-Muslim presidential ticket for the 2023 election, the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) opposition to the APC ticket and whether the party’s candidate, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu will continue with President Muhammadu Buhari’s legacy if he becomes president.

Oshiomhole’s nightmare started earlier in the interview when Abiola asked him what Tinubu will do differently from the present Buhari government, having been part of it and if Tinubu’s government, if he wins, will be a continuity of Buhari’s.

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The former labour leader coyly dissociated Tinubu from the current government, arguing that it was unfair to assess the APC presidential candidate Tinubu on the achievements and failures of the Buhari’s government since he is not part of the administration.

“I think in apportioning blame or crediting people you look at their role. It is a fact that Asiwaju himself said he co-founded APC. I was a co-founding governor of APC along with Fashola and others. But he never participated in governance, he never held any position in government, he didn’t carry out any contract on behalf of government. So, how can you credit him either way? You can’t credit him. I mean, this is just being fair,” Oshiomhole said.

Oshiomhole’s misery hit feverish point when Oseni pointedly asked him if he was dissociating Tinubu from Buhari.

Now cornered and nowhere to hide, he went on merry-go-round, rambling: “Let me be very, very clear. President Buhari inherited a terrible economic situation, don’t forget that the 1915 (2015) elections were postponed on the account of level of insecurity in parts of the country. Some progress have been made in many areas but some new problems have developed. Some are external to us, maybe some could have been pursued differently, there’s no question.

“But going back to the issue of political parties, even as a candidate of the same party steps forward to contest for an election, he comes up with his own manifesto. It’s not one manifesto of 2015 that he will want to use in 2023, because we are in a very dynamic environment, a very dynamic situation and so he may have to formulate policies in the light of the current situation. So, you don’t have to be detained by the past.

“So, the fact that you are not going to say, yes, security for example, I’m going to fight it exactly the same way, it’s valid because new forms of criminality have emerged. In looking at security situation for example, we discovered that the size of the Nigerian Army after the war was about 250,000 soldiers, so this is about the same (today). Then the population of Nigeria was about 50 million, today we are about 200 million.

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“I believe somebody can come, I have watched your programme regularly, I have seen one of the presidential candidates when you asked him about security, he said he’s not going to disclose it, so it’s secret; so we have to vote for him on the basis of things that are in his mind which he has not shared with us. But I can tell you that based on our informal conversation, we have to double the size of our armed forces, not only in relation to the fact that our population has quadrupled, but also giving you current challenges around the world and around our neighbours and within our country.

“I also believe we need to review the… what you people talk about the security architecture, they are really, really specific. For example, I really don’t understand why we should have a separate outfit for civil defence, separate outfit for road safety, all of that overhead. I have travelled fairly to many, many countries, I haven’t seen the multiplicity of agencies. One policeman stops you if you exceed the speed limit, checks your driver’s license, also take your driver’s license to his vehicle check whether you’re on wanted list. I believe a policeman should be sufficiently trained to deal with these issues.

“So, I believe that given the level of able young men and women, there a lot of Nigerians who can be of help if properly employed and we streamline our expenditure. We might spend a little more but achieve more huge numbers and better outcome. But these are my views, these are not the views of the candidate. The candidate will speak for himself, its after he has published his manifestos or sets of programme that we can begin to expatiate on our understanding of how all those things will be achieved. It’s not for me to pre-empt him.”