Bola Tinubu: His politics and his health

Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu

Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu is a very ambitious man. His ambition is of sterner stuff. He's very hard working and pursues his goal with all doggedness. As a natural man, he pursues his political goals with all the weapons of flesh. People who have had contact with him say he is very kind. A series running on social media titled "My Tinubu story" talks of his kind deeds to many people. One I watched is about a man and his wife who had conjoined twins many years ago. Tinubu finaced their journey abroad for a successful separation of the twins. The twins are now pursuing their dreams in the medical endeavor. I have a close friend, a retired military colonel whom I'm told had a brain tumor. He met Tinubu and he finaced his medical tourism abroad for the removal of that tumor. My soldier friend is doing very fine today. Even it was reported in the news that Tinubu financed the medical tourism of the late editor of Sunday Times, Gbolabo Ogunsanwo when he had a health challenge in his leg. Late Gbolabo returned to Nigeria but died later. Tinubu's publicists are making a huge political capital for Tinubu now on these cases which I think he richly deserves. But while this political mileage is going for Tinubu, a few Nigerians are thinking it would have been better to have one or two top grade hospitals in Nigeria to perform the medical miracles that Nigerians go abroad for or encourage policies that will encourage private sector initiative on setting up of such top grade hospitals instead of this practice of Tinubu helping those who are privileged to meet him. Some are pressured, inspite of Tinubu's generosity to question the source of his wealth. They are asking whether he has been spending money taken from the public purse to do those philanthropies, a case of robbing Peter to pay Paul. Nobody has been able to genuinely establish the source of his wealth.

Fortunately, some of our medical doctors in Lagos and Port Harcourt are on their own setting up high class hospitals and are doing medical wonders. Vice President, Yemi Osinbajo had a surgery on his leg recently in Lagos done by Nigeria hands. He did not have to travel abroad at huge expense to the government like his principal had done countless times. Somehow, this private effort of these doctors, especially those of them along the Lekki corridor in Lagos where Tinubu was governor for eight years and has installed three governors after he left office, all in his firm control up till now, is revealing another side of Tinubu. When the military and police officers were drafted to the Lekki toll gate to confront the youth peaceful protesters who had gathered there to protest police brutality especially to the youths, it was these great doctors who attended to many of the seriously wounded protesters by lethal shots from the military and police free of charge. The police and military denied this. Although the commission of enquiry set up by Governor Babajide Sanwoolu of Lagos State found it true that soldiers and police killed some youths, Sanwoolu upturned some of their findings to satisfy Tinubu, in what analysts believe was an attempt not to offend President Muhammadu Buhari. Tinubu took sides with the president asking what the youths were doing at Lekki. Now the youths say it is time for them to wreak vengeance on Tinubu. It is time for election, Tinubu is interested in the presidency and has won the nomination of his party, even despite that Buhari who he supported all through did not support his candidature. Youths constitute the bulk of Nigeria’s population and one of them has taken to social media to show the scar in his forehead where a bullet narrowly missed his eyes but seriously injured his skin. He told his colleagues that it is payback time for Tinubu and asked that they should ensure he does not become president. A man they alleged, who helped ruin their past cannot build their future.

If Atiku Abubakar, the presidential candidate of the opposition Peoples Democratic Party, PDP has dexterity in political manoeuvring, he has an equal match in Bola Tinubu. If Atiku has ambition, he meets Tinubu on the same ground. If Atiku is loaded with cash which he readily deploys for election and politics, he has an equal match in Tinubu. During an election morning in 2019, three bullion vans obviously loaded with cash drove out of Tinubu's Bourdillon Ikoyi house. Tinubu's publicists defended him that election is costly and that he has the right to spend his money as he likes. Atiku also exercised that right recently when, as alleged by Nyesom Wike, Governor of Rivers State that Atiku gave one billion naira to Iyorchia Ayu, chairman of PDP, to secure for Atiku the presidential nomination of the party. Nigerians are sure of a cash competition between Tinubu and Atiku in the upcoming election. Already, the naira is exchaging 735 to the US dollar, a situation blamed on the politicians who are mopping up available dollars in the parallel market.

Bola Tinubu is a great politician, he knows when to keep quite and when to talk. Even Buhari who really did not like Tinubu to succeed him judging by his body language, acknowledged Tinubu as a great political tactician. Tinubu boasted before the media in Abeokuta, Ogun State when he took his quest for APC presidential ticket to party delegates there that he solved Buhari's perennial loses at the presidential elections when he took charge of the war at the 2015 election assuring Buhari he would win. Indeed Buhari won that election and nobody can deny the great role Tinubu played in that victory. But that victory for Buhari is now working in the negative for Tinubu because the performance of President Buhari has been anything but satisfactory in the last seven years. Some electorates are insisting that nobody who foisted Buhari on the nation deserves their votes again. Such persons must be punished for fostering Buhari on the nation.

Tinubu is not deterred, he keeps fighting and he has been holding meetings with all the political influencers in the country ensuring he wins their hearts and gains entry into their territories. While Obi is gathering crowds, Tinubu is ensuring the big guns who control the electorates and who have the money and know how to use it to win election in the Nigerian way are won over to support his ambition. Tinubu's stiffest opposition is the Igbo who are also angling very seriously to produce the president of the nation, the first time since the nation returned to civil rule in 1999. Recently, Tinubu was seen in a video on WhatsApp in the home of Uzor Kalu, a frontline Igbo politician, prostrating for the mother of Uzor Kalu. Both Uzor Kalu and his mother are politicians with the mother having a strong hold on the son. Tinubu perhaps is scheming for a good cut of Igbo votes through Uzor Kalu and other Igbo political juggernauts. It might be difficult in the hands of commoners in Igboland who are very thirsty for an Igbo presidency but nothing is impossible in the hands of magic working Nigerian politicians who know the place of money in the lives of pauperized Nigerians.

Campaign was flagged off Wednesday, 28 September but contrary to his history of always being the first to make a move, Tinubu was nowhere to be found. The press reported that his flag off campaign has been postponed indefinitely. It was speculated that he had travelled to France for medical check up, perhaps in preparation for the great task ahead. Tinubu's ill health could not be concealed. Several years of hard work in politics and in office as governor in Lagos is obviously taking its toll on his health. There's a noticeable tremor in his fingers and his steps are not as sprightly as they were a few years ago. His enemies have concentrated on his perceived health challenge and have criticized him harshly. They have had experience with a president in the last seven years who is hardly at home but always in the air looking for medical treatment abroad. During a vist to Governor Muhammad Inuwa Yahaya of Gombe State, Tinubu was caught on camera taking a nap, possibly because of many sleepless nights. He has been seen almost losing his balance on few occasions.

Despite these huge bag of political disadvantages, Tinubu keeps fighting and building on his brilliance and record in office as Lagos State governor. Some are disputing these records arguing that he would have presented the performance of seven years of the president which he helped install and whose policies he has constantly maintained he would continue - policies which Nigerians have branded as retrogressive. Others think Tinubu is saying he would continue Buhari's policies only because it is safer for him to say that in order not to incur the wrath of Buhari. Indeed African presidents can do and undo when they are in power.

Tunde Akande is both a journalist and pastor. He earned a Master's degree in Mass Communication from the University of Lagos.