After eight unbroken years of presenting male/female governorship and deputy governorship pairings, the political configuration of Government House in Lagos is likely to change come 2015 if the All Progressives Congress (APC) retains the state.
BusinessDay gathered that the APC, which has maintained its stronghold in the state since 1999, is going for an all-male ticket for governor and deputy governor for the 2015 general elections.
Under Governor Babatunde Fashola’s first term (2007-2011), Sarah Sosan, a teacher who later worked with the State Universal Basic Education Board (SUBEB), was picked as Fashola’s running mate.
Sosan was dropped at the expiration of the first term in favour of the incumbent deputy, Adejoke Orelope-Adefurile, a familiar face in Lagos politics, who had served two terms as commissioner for women affairs and poverty alleviation under the immediate past governor of the state, Bola Ahmed Tinubu, and Governor Fashola, before being elevated to run with Fashola in the 2011 elections.
It was gathered that the decision to go for an all-male ticket in 2015 is part of the politics currently playing out within the Lagos APC, where the power brokers in the party seem to favour a Christian governorship candidate for the 2015 election.
A source close to APC in the state told our correspondent that the power brokers, who are strongly behind a Christian candidate as Governor Fashola’s successor, have agreed to the choice of a Muslim male deputy and have zeroed in on a former special adviser on political and legislative bureau, who is also an Islamic cleric.
It was learnt that this decision is also to pacify the Muslim community and the Islamic religious practice in which a female is not allowed to lead the Muslim congregation.
However, to balance the gender equation, it was gathered that a female speaker is being considered for the State House of Assembly in the next political dispensation.
BusinssDay recalls that under the Tinubu administration which spanned 1999-2007, the state had three deputy governors, two of whom were impeached before the termination of their tenure. They were Akerele Bucknor (female, impeached), Femi Pedro (male, impeached), and Biodun Ogunleye (male) who rounded off with Tinubu in 2007.
JOSHUA BASSEY
