 Ashua Jubbala Ahmed Tinibu wins the all-progressive Congress presidential ticket and former minister of science and technology of Bonaia are new questions the all-progressive Congress for not zoning its presidential ticket to the Southeast. Well this is Plus Politics, I'm Mary Anacorn. Ashua Jubbala Ahmed Tinibu has won the presidential ticket of the all-progressive Congress APC. He polled a thousand two hundred and seventy-one votes to defeat other aspirants as the party's primaries happened in the Eagle Square in Abuja. He defeated Brutumia Mechis who scored three hundred and sixteen votes and the vice-president Yemi Ushibajo who got two hundred and thirty-five votes. The presidential candidate of the all-progressive Congress said on Wednesday that he did not expect to win the party's presidential primaries. He also said he holds no grudges against members of his party who walked against his candidature. We're joining us to discuss this political analyst Bola Oba, Babashala Adebu and media strategist Alfred Bukuru. Thank you so much gentlemen for joining us. It's been a very interesting 24 hours, almost 24 hours if you ask me. I mean the presidential primaries started yesterday, early let's say mid-morning and it took almost a whole day into another for the results to be read out. But I think we all were watching with keen interest I mean every single person had their eyes on the Eagle Square. I'm going to start with you Bola. Was there any element of surprise for you especially when the results were read even at the point where seven persons were stepping down for the leader of the APC? Not at all, to be very honest with you. Not at all because I'm always predicted or projected that an indirect problem would be made to Bola Oba's electoral capital. And the guy has built beaches for decades. He's been in building beaches since 1992. And you know what? He knows what it takes to win an election especially at an electoral type of election. That is when you put it into an indirect election. So I've always projected that if the direct problem is going to be conducted it will not be the best residence to move. But in a scenario of an indirect problem which is more of an electoral college type electionary system, I knew it was going to take it. The margin and another. I think that we're having connection issues there with you. So I think we're having connection issues with you. So I'm going to toss this question to Alfred. Alfred, what stood up for you especially just like I asked him was the candidate who you know came up to say well they would have loved to but they would step down for Bola Metinibu. Again the cameras were really great picking the body language and the demeanor of Mr. President, the Vice President and so many other people who sat behind that glass. But what really stood out for you especially for someone who's looking from the outside in? Well just to even support what Mr. Bola said. I agree with him 100 percent in the sense that for indirect primaries this is politics at play. This is not human sentiments, none of those. And if you look at it from that perspective Siniputinibu or that however we want to call it has been building this over time. If you check it how many people has he helped to get into office? They are countless people. Do you expect these people to turn their backs on him? So the mode of primaries that APC chose favored him or when I don't know how they chose it but there is no way based on the capacity he's been building for him to get to lose this because pretty much everybody there one way or the other has benefited from his generosity or from his politics or from his guidance however you want to look at it and there is no way. I wasn't even surprised. For me at the end of the day you could say if you were looking at social media a few days back you might think others had a chance but if you understood politics there is no way. Now this is not the general election that we're talking about but let me say this is indirect primaries so you have to look at what was happening. Direct primaries who knows it's a toss-up but for what happened yesterday there was absolutely zero surprises. There might be speculation but no surprises. Barabashala you seem to be a bit surprised because the APC seemed to be very good at spinning stories. We saw all kinds of confusion you know information coming from the chairman of the party saying that the president had endorsed and Ahmed Lawan. We also saw the Kagi state governor who was saying he will not step down for anyone except Mr. President asked him to I mean we saw all kinds of things spinning. We even at some point got some misinformation that the vice president may be stepping down for Bola and Mehtinobu but all of those things were some sorts of social media spin but here we are and you seem to be a bit surprised why. Okay thank you very much. First of all I want to congratulate Mr. Bola and Mehtinobu for winning the APC ticket to contest for the presidential election come 2023. Just like everyone that said he has been building his career political career since 1992 just like Alajabubaka Atiku. So today he has finally gotten the ticket to contest for the position the highest stoppings in Nigeria. Now I was not surprised I was not surprised actually except I said to have been deceiving myself. The truth is if you are contesting for a position there are some things you ought to have done that would have benefited a lot of people a lot of political career in the country. Sinetobola Mehtinobu has been in this position for a very long time. If he was a governor for eight years he appointed a lot of people he had to spend the resources on a lot of people a lot of things. We can also remember how he was able to fight illegal to get the resources of legal states and local government fund that was held by the federal government. Now the guy is contesting it has the structure all over the country. It has the structure all over the country. A lot of people saw something in him and he believed so much in himself. We cannot compare him with others. Let me use Professor Yemenshi Bagu. Professor Yemenshi Bagu became the vice president on the platter of gold. He was not a politician. He was appointed or nominated to be the vice president of President Mohamed Barri. Being the vice president he did not refuse to build his own political structure. I cannot talk points to anything in Nigeria that I can say is the political impact of the vice president. But I'm sorry I'm sorry but let me just quickly come in there I don't want to talk over you. You sound like this is unprecedented. Let's take you back down history. Former president Goodlock Jonathan was also not necessarily a politician per se. He was a career let's say public servant. Now he rose from being a deputy governor to being a vice president and then a president. So when you sound like he was on the platter of gold we can also refer to a Goodlock Jonathan as someone who has been lucky his whole political career. I mean if the stars had aligned maybe that could have been the case for Yemenshi Bagu. Goodlock Jonathan was a deputy governor. Yes maybe he became the governor and before we knew it he became the vice president in Nigeria. So you cannot compare Goodlock Jonathan with Professor Ashibagi. Now we are talking of Professor Ashibagi who was a lawyer depending his clients going to court doing all those things. I think the only person who was appointed here was being a commissioner of justice in Lagos. Yes being a commissioner it was a career for him not a political career per se. Now all of a sudden from nowhere they said okay we are appointing Ashim Bagu to be the vice president to be the nominated presidential candidate of party. So it is totally different. Now if he became the vice president there is no political base no structural no political impact. Even wherever what the guy has for the past seven years is to be supporting the president and now coming out to contest for the president. Oh dear I think we also we've lost you there. Let me let me quickly toss now back to Bola Bola. Okay you've come back okay great go ahead. Okay truly I actually stand by being in this I wish yeah I wish he's the winner but unfortunately the truth has to be solved. The political the political terrain Professor Ashibagi is not it at all. Please if I may um the way I actually want to look at this is in support of what Mr. Shala is saying is that this is completely different from the ex-president good luck because number one is that on whose platform is the VP running on. It would have been different if Senator Tinibu was not running and anointed the VP to run on his behalf like he ran as a VP because that's the political structure you need a structure. But do you think that the vice president as of the blues just woke up because he had a vision from God to be the president. Do you not think that there had been a hand or the hand of Esau in this matter saying well I think that you should run. Being that he's deputizing someone don't you think he got a nod of sorts to be where he was. Well that is that is all for speculation because I personally in my own capacity I don't have any insider information. Do you not believe he woke up to run against his principle. But his challenge is it doesn't change the fact that you're running against your principle regardless of how we look at it. At the end of the day we all know how he became the vice president of the country. I mean he ran a general election. He ran a general election won't get me wrong. Let me quickly, let me quickly add this to what after you say. Hello. Yes go ahead Bola. Like the other two when you're asked oh sorry when to cost our participants in that competition they woke up on the wrong side of the grade one and decided to run. And you know this how. Let's be very, let's be brass knuckle, brass knuckle honest with ourselves. One the leader of the church where he worships and where he's the pastor and the ad wants to decide that the member of the church was going to rule Nigeria. Number one. Number two and the reason why I want to believe that hope of one day being considered that the worst of God was taken into law was the same thing that to the to the precarious. This is the fourth occasion that to the precarious would give would give the impression that he was chasing an evangelistic prophecy and would come out with what you see in particularly not only in Nigeria and witness it in England and I've read so much about it in Latin America. These people don't feel remorseful. They have no competition. So this one has missed the baguette. They will do another blind visit. Apart from it there was another pastor. There's another person. So I'm sitting there now knowing that if look I told a forum of the supporters of BP that they they added me to about six months ago if it was going to be a direct problem let's be very honest with ourselves. It would have garnered more traction than it did just today. More indirect problem especially in an environment where property has to work for life and has been turned into property has to work for life and have been turned into a kind of bait for the delegates. He had no chances. In fact I was even thinking I was even thinking when others were expecting that it was still going to step down. I did not even think Bola Metsunobu and Yeno Shibadu would be contesting against Shodja. In fact I was telling my friend yesterday that Bola Metsunobu and Yeno Shibadu would have no choice down to step down. But I was surprised that the guy went ahead to contest. Alright gentlemen let's let's let's be oddly let me go back to the politics of it all. Let's talk about you know this Bola Metsunobu win because yes now he's the flag bearer of the the APC. People will start you know hitting the numbers. People will start talking about what change can he bring to the country. What turn around can we see. Is this going to be business as usual again looking at all of the people who are stacked as flag bearers for other parties. I mean we might not know the names of so many of them but we have also on one hand Anatiku Abu Bakar. We have Apeetal B somewhere in the corner. We also have a Kwan Kwan So in the NNPP. These are some of the candidates that we know who would who Tinuble will be up against. So I'm going to come back to you now Alfred. What is the what what is the capital or rather what is the walkability of the realistic aspects that a Tinuble win brings to this elections in itself. You see I'm going to actually from there a little further in this because let's not confuse being a leader to being a good manager. You see one of the things that we're going to look at. A leader builds a coalition. A leader appoints people. A leader sees things before others see it. A leader provides solution. Do I expect a Bola Ahmed Tinuble to wake up every day running up and down. No I expect him to appoint people to positions square pegs to square holes things like that. For me I honestly believe this is APC's election to lose simply because they did not break apart. If APC had broken apart in the primaries that's a different thing because now if we look at the whole picture you can confidently say that PDP is going to have a problem in the southeast. Now take away the southeast votes for PDP. That's going to Labour Party. I would say the majority of it. Now you divide it. Where are the votes coming from? Will the southwest vote PDP? I doubt it. So it's the northern votes we're splitting. Who's going to have a problem? Who's not going to have a problem? I do not know but general elections are different ball games. Just like Mr Bola said there was no contest the moment this was an indirect primary. Now on the capacity of Bola Ahmed Tinuble it depends on what angle you're looking at. I see him as a leader whether he's the greatest leader or not is a different ball game. But you can tell that this man knows how to build a coalition. This man knows how to build a team. This man knows how to empower people. Now look at his contestants. If you look at PTOB, X governor PTOB if you look at if you look at X VP article. Which of them compared if you compare all four together which of them would you say has a bigger base? Which of them would you say have a bigger disciple? Which of them would you say is a bigger maker of men in terms of when politics is involved? When we're talking about this who supports people running primaries? Who supports people in their own elections and all that? I think that's where it's going to come down to the support of the people who built a bigger tent for others to feed into and at this point I would say it's Senator Bola Ahmed Tinuble. It is election to lose. Let me come back to you Babashala. What are the consequences of a Tinuble win? This is a different way of asking the same question because many people would say like he has said he thinks that he can build a coalition but then he also said in the same breath that being a leader and a good manager are two different things. Now Nigeria does need leadership but in also needing leadership we need good managers. You see where everything is going in the direction it is going in security, the economy, unemployment. I mean the list is endless. What is the implication of a Tinuble win for this country as it is right now? Okay. Tinuble, I believe that majorly is held. There is no doubt that demand is not, there is no doubt that demand is not one that we say is held, of course that is not, but it's held we can, all of us can say it even in the public domain. So the question is will it be held to concentrate more on the job at hand? That's number one. Number two, who are the people that will be selected for position? Because being a leader requires a lot of things. It requires responsibility and accountability. If you appoint people to do a job and you don't have that strength to monitor, to require for accountability from them, definitely it's going to affect your government. That number two, he asked when it was the governor of Lagos State, he was able to do some things and the people will say oh it's the mayor of Lagos State and there are also a lot of accusations against him, on how he has bought the whole Lagos, on how he has all those people. Now he needs to prove that. Being the president of Nigeria, he needs to prove that. I'm a plain man. I am not corrupt as any people are. You people have been calling me and I'm ready to do what is necessary to bring the glory of Nigeria out. So make people believe that there is something in Nigeria that can attract people who have worked for a foreign investment and make Nigeria's sister believe in themselves. In Volatulubu fell, fell in this aspect of doing the right thing, of fighting corruption, of introducing the truth by balancing. It has been companyful. If it fails of introducing the restructuring, it has been companyful. For me, it has only been company, it has only been say something for the purpose of winning an election. We need truth for that isn't in this country. We need what is called restructuring in this country. I'm tempted to ask you this question and I want you to quickly answer so I can go to Bolaoba. Just as you said that if he's unable to, if that's the probability there, if he even gets to win the general elections, but then that probability is something that, I don't know, let me ask it as a question. Is it something that we can afford? Can we afford to toss a coin again as a country? Remember I asked where we are now in 2022, can we afford to try again and see or should we be more deliberate? I'm asking this because a President Bahari is somebody who tried to run for this office four times. The fourth time he had the opportunity. He told us everything that we wanted to hear. He promised, he made very lofty promises and I don't want to say anything but ask, has he been able to scratch the surface of all of those things? So should we be going out on a limb again this time around? Every politician you meet will tell you what you want to hear. It's a different ball game when they get to the office. Whether he is going to do it or not, we don't have a choice. We have an article, we have it and we'll have it. We didn't have a choice, really? Yeah, I'm going there. We don't have a choice because until they get there, we're not going to get to the office that we're able to say, oh, he said it and he did it. As far as I'm concerned, they are all promises. They are all promises and promises you cannot hold anybody for promising you anything. You can only hold them for holding you. So if they failed in promises, it is promised. So you can't hold them. You can only use it against them. Maybe in the subsequent election. All right, let me come to you. You say to them at today. Yeah, let me just come back to you Alfred. Let me quickly go to Bola. Bola, we see that the PDP is having closed door meetings right now. As soon as they heard the win, we got reports that the PDP and of course the PDP governors, I beg your pardon, and the presidential candidate of the PDP were in closed door meetings today. What do you think this strategy would be? I'm asking because judging from what Baba Shalai is saying is that well, maybe we don't have our hands tied. We just wait until a person gets into office that we can decide if they're capable of doing what they've asked us to do. But what about the voter also preempting these politicians so that they do not feel that we really have our hands tied behind our backs? This election in the 2020 presidential election, you are going to have play a new mine of the Sheu Musa Yaduard School of Politics. Utocracy, much good. Utocracy, playing, playing the advantage of what the playing advantage of popularizing or using poverty as a weapon against the electorate. Don't fool yourself. Atiku, what I meant to do, one point so, they were disciples of Sheu Musa Yaduard and they were members of this PDM movement. If any one of my colleagues remember that. Now, if you look at the politics of Utiku and the politics of Gola Netibubu and even the ostensibly populist politics of Kuang Kuang So, we can see that the two who are successful out of there are the two who have replicated what Sheu Musa Yaduard, the, especially in the south west, when it came to, I must add a personal encounter, a personal location with Baba Degibu before he passed on. And I said, Baba Degibu, how could a Sheu Musa Yaduard come out of the way from Katsuna and come down to Ibato and make us a woman to feed the likes of Jack Onde and some of the other greats of Aula, in Aula was full of politics. And you know what Baba Degibu told me? Baba Degibu told me in classical Oyon Yoruba, the which I would translate, I would endeavor to translate that but the guy knew how to play politics with money. My brother, Utiku and Gola Netibubu today became the flag bearer of the two major Biku parties in Nigeria because they have always used money to build bridges. So, so, so quickly, how, where does that leave us? Because we complain about, we complain about the level of corruption, even under a government that had sworn that they were going to fight corruption. Where does that leave us? If we're buying votes at the party level, what happens to the general elections in closing? Corruption is not a problem in Nigeria. Anywhere in the world, in any Libra democracy, there is corruption. You need a leader who can spin ideas there and create a team that can chase good ideas. You are not as corrupt as Southern Italy. You are not the last Greek government, the last three or four government of the state of Illinois in America are in prison. Buahari invests on our politics by making you people believe that corruption is not your property. That is why all that Buahari and the lack of creativity and value innovation, we are deeper in the mess. And it has essentially has to capitulation. Okay. Corruption is not a problem in Nigeria. The problem is lack of leadership creativity and value and value innovation in leadership. Because Nigerians are entrepreneurial, we are so entrepreneurial and powerful that when we when we see a good we can change that. Because we're running out of time, quickly, Alfred, you wanted to chip in something. We need to wrap up. Yeah, absolutely. Go ahead. Go ahead. No, I actually agree a little bit of what Mr. Bola said, along with what Mr. Shala said, because number one is that yeah, I want to agree that corruption is not Nigeria's problem. Corruption is an extract of a major problem. Okay, so it's not our immediate problem. It's an extract. Something is leading towards that. I feel our biggest problem is vacuum of leadership. Now, if we talk about if we talk about where really are we going? Number one is that we don't run an ideology-based politics. Somebody can move from APC to PDP from PDP to labor with zero consequence. So what really options do we have? We want to believe we have options. We have individuals that are running for power. None of them is running based on an ideology. Who's a conservative? Who's a laborer? Who's a moderate? We do not know. I believe our democracy is still too young. And number one is let's not get caught up with this issue of instant gratification. Just like you mentioned, can we afford to? Why can't we afford to? Nothing happens automatically. It takes time. You have to build it. It's a question of now, let's even get people to participate. We first have to start playing inclusive politics whereby if somebody does not make a promise, like Mr. Shola said, if somebody makes a promise and does not perform, punish him at the polls in the next election. We cannot always be in a hurry saying we don't have time, we don't have time. Since when have we been saying this? Since 1999, who has ever paid politically for corruption? So if you ask me at the end of the day, I would hope Nigeria wins. And by Nigeria winning, it's not just about who won. It's a question of how did you win? Why did we vote for you? I also believe in protest votes. Rather than voting for these two people, let me vote for someone else to make you realize that you know what? My vote counts. I don't think Nigeria will get fixed in this cycle. Okay, all right. Okay, we have to go. We have to go. And this is no, no, no, there's no, there's no room for campaigning on this show, not today. I'll send you an invoice if you have to. Well, I want to say thank you gentlemen. Time is not on our side. I want to appreciate you guys for being part of the conversation. Thank you. It's been a pleasure. Thank you guys. Thank you all for talking with us. We will take a quick break. And when we come back, we will be looking at what one of the presidential aspirants, Obunaya Anu, had to say about the issue of zoning in the APC. Stay with us. We'll be right back.