Chief Bisi Akande, former governor of Osun State and former interim chairman of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), has written a controversial autobiography that has stirred up a great storm in Nigeria’s political landscape. Titled ‘My Participations’, the book is, on the one hand, full of self-adulation and self-glorification, and, on the other, bile and hatred towards his opponents. Yet, while Akande presents himself as a man of “inflexible integrity”, the reality is that he is just another opportunistic and self-serving politician who would abandon long-held principles for selfish political benefits.
At the launch of the autobiography about two weeks ago, Chief Akande said that he had no sympathy for President Muhammadu Buhari over widespread criticism of his performance because he applied to be president. “I do not sympathise with you,” he told Buhari, “you applied for the job.” But while that comment landed well as a political soundbite, it lacked depth, honesty and thoughtfulness as a statement of substance.
Chief Akande used the metaphor of job application. One assumes he knows that job applications are usually accompanied by outstanding and honest references about the applicant’s competence and character. So, here’s the question: When Buhari applied for the job of President in 2015, who gave him glowing references that enabled him to get the job?
Of course, it was Akande and Bola Tinubu, former governor of Lagos State. They sold Buhari to Nigerians as a would-be saviour and facilitated his election. But as Buhari has been an unmitigated failure as president, shouldn’t Akande and his cohort apologise to Nigerians for their misjudgements andselfish calculations that drove their support for him?
More on that later. First, a few words about Chief Akande’s autobiography. What really strikes me is why Akande thinks he and Tinubu are men of integrity and their opponents dishonourable men. He portrays himself as a principled man who acts only for the greater good. Yet, his “participations” in politics have largely been defined by inconsistency and hypocrisy. Take a few examples.
In order to retain Osun State for APC, Akande did a deal with the man he believed conspired to kill his leader and mentor
Nearly 20 years after failing to secure a second term as Osun State governor, Chief Akande still blames former President Olusegun Obasanjo for his fate. He said that after the assassination of Chief Bola Ige, he and other governors of then-Alliance for Democracy, AD, were “left on the open sea like a floundering ship,” adding: “Soon, the sharks were circling.” He continued: “The man who came hunting for us was President Olusegun Obasanjo.” President Buhari, too, blamed Obasanjo’s “diabolical double-cross” for Akande’s defeat.
Chief Akande, who, like other AD governors, rode the wave of popularity of Afenifere, the pan-Yoruba socio-political movement, to power in 1999, conveniently ignored the fact that he and his fellow AD governors played into Obasanjo’s hands by undermining the platform that brought them to power. And that Obasanjo simply exploited the self-inflicted crisis in Afenifere and the AD to his political advantage.
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Writing in April to mark the 70th anniversary of Afenifere, Chief Ayo Opadokun, former general secretary of the organisation, said: “It is always suicidal to demystify the platform on which you were elected into political office because the myth would have been deflated and could not be available again for your use.” He was right. Divided parties hardly win elections. And once Afenifere and AD were divided, the governors, except the politically-savvy Tinubu, were swept out of office. But Akande still holds Obasanjo responsible for his loss, calling him a “faithless suitor, unblinking political philanderer.”
But in 2014, the same Akande led APC leaders to the same Obasanjo to beg him to betray President Goodluck Jonathan, a member of his own party, and help deny him a second term. At the meeting in Ota, Tinubu told Obasanjo: “We are determined to rescue Nigeria. We want you to lead the mission. We want you as navigator.” Of course, we know how Obasanjo destabilised PDP and orchestrated Jonathan’s defeat. So, for Akande, Obasanjo was wrong to destabilise AD, a rival party, in 2003, but right to sabotage PDP, his own party, in 2015. It’s called opportunism and hypocrisy!
Chief Akande was clearly deeply hurt by the assassination, in 2001, of Chief Bola Ige, under whom he served as deputy governor in the old Oyo State. But consider this. In 2018, the APC was about to lose Osun State, trailing the PDP candidate, Ademola Adeleke, by 353 votes before INEC declared the election “inconclusive”, and ordered a supplementary election. What happened next?
Well, before the supplementary election, Akande led Osun State APC to do a secret deal with Iyiola Omisore, his estranged former deputy. In the end, thanks to Omisore’s support, the APC candidate, Gboyega Oyetola, defeated the PDP candidate by 483 votes. So, in order to retain Osun State for APC, Akande did a deal with the man he believed conspired to kill his leader and mentor. Again, that’s called opportunism and hypocrisy!
Yet, Chief Akande’s book is full of bile and hatred towards more credible leaders. He condescendingly described Chief Falae, a Yale-educated economist, as “a trained civil servant” and often taunted him about not holding an elective office. It doesn’t matter that Falae is the only Yoruba, apart from Obasanjo and MKO Abiola, to have secured more than 11 million votes in a national poll, when he ran for president in 1999. For Akande, Chief Falae has “been trying to blindly straddle Nigeria’s complicated politics.” What a cheap shot!
Well, that pales into insignificance compared with the insults Akande hauled at Chief Adebanjo. He described Adebanjo as a “blank politically-minded leader” who “never has what it takes to aspire for high political positions.” Wow! Akande can throw insults! Yet, truth is, despite having been governor and party chairman, Akande lacks the integrity and relevance of Chief Adebanjo, who has been consistent and dogged on the defining issue of restructuring, while Akande has opportunistically flip-flopped.
Chief Akande wrote a book on restructuring and was once a strong advocate of it. But since his party gained power at the centre, he has been inordinately mute on the issue. He said that APC didn’t promise “restructuring” in its manifesto but “devolution of power.” So, where is devolution of power after nearly seven years in office? He said restructuring requires “deft negotiations among different ethnic nationalities and constituencies.” But who has the convening power to create a forum for such negotiations, if not the president?
All of which brings us back to how Buhari became president. As we know, General Buhari tried unsuccessfully to be president three times. But on his fourth attempt, Tinubu, Akande and their cohort in the South-West partnered with him and gave him glowing references. Tinubu said Buhari would rescue Nigeria, likening him to General Dwight Eisenhower or General Charles de Gaulle – retired generals who transformed their countries as presidents.
Of course, they knew that Buhari wasn’t up to the job, but foisted him on Nigeria as a quid pro quo for Tinubu succeeding him as president. This wasn’t done in the best interests of Nigeria. Rather, it was a selfish political calculation.
Chief Akande was livid that a Buhari-Tinubu/Muslim-Muslim ticket was rejected, saying that “among the Yoruba, religion is not a factor in leadership.” Really? If so, why was there clamour for a Christian governor in Lagos State after a succession of Muslim governors? He misreads his people!
Buhari described Akande as a man of “inflexible integrity”, quoting approvingly from his autobiography that “he never gave or demanded bribes.” But in 1984, asa military dictator, the same Buhari jailed Akande for 42 years for corruption. Yet, in 2015, Akande swept all that under the carpet and helped Buhari become president so Tinubu might succeed him. Truth is: Akande is just another opportunistic and self-serving politician!
