By Agency Report
Razaq Abubakre, an Emeritus Professor and former Federal Commissioner, says LP Presidential candidate, Mr Peter Obi, couldn’t have defeated the President-elect, Sen. Bola Tinubu, at the last presidential election.
Abubakre, also a former Vice Chancellor of Al-Hikmah University Ilorin, spoke with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Abuja on Friday.
The technocrat alleged that Obi’s lacklustre performance as former governor of Anambra worked against him.
Abubakre also claimed that Obi’s inability to build leaders, unlike Tinubu, who had inspired several leaders nationally and internationally, was part of his undoing.
“His use of religion in contradistinction to Asiwaju’s Muslim-Muslim ticket gave him a transient false national spread,” Abubakre said.
He recalled the simile employed by Rabiu Kwankwaso, NNPP presidential candidate, during his speech at the Chatham House, London, that Obi’s electoral fortune was like the foam of Andrews Liver Salt that comes with power and disappears almost immediately.
“This is quite apposite to describe his eventual performance, especially during the elections of state governors and House of Assemblies. Unfortunately, desperation is not a good manner,” Abubakre said.
He said he could not endorse the permutation that if all the other contestants whose origin was PDP, such as Atiku, Obi and Kwankwaso, joined forces, PDP would have probably won the presidency.
“This is underlying the divine intervention favouring Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu ab initio.
“The pattern of voting could have changed. For example, the bulk of votes that Obi received from the South-East, parts of South-South and pockets of North-Central could not have gone to Atiku.
“Some of it would have also been cast for Tinubu on his merit and record of performance,” Abubakre asserted.
He said the internal evidence of this claim is the undiminishing successes and superiority of the APC in all the elections, such as National Assembly, gubernatorial elections and state assemblies, in spite of the global economic challenges.
He said Tinubu’s superiority lies in his excellent performance record as governor of Lagos State; his cosmopolitan outlook spread nationally and with global ramifications.
“It is instructive to note that Tinubu’s emergence is divine and critical when the nation needs a true unifier, a performer par excellence and a strategic leader focused on nation-building for sustainable and inclusive growth,” Abubakre said.
Abubakre was a Federal Commissioner for the Public Complaints Commission for Osun State between 2012 and 2018, and the Dean of the Faculty of Arts at the University of Ilorin from 2001 to 2003. (NAN)
