‘Tinubu has been politically circumcised ,’ PDP chieftain says

George also said that the brand of politics Tinubu practises is “very primitive and dictatorial.”

The PDP chieftain made the comments while speaking on the National Assembly leadership crisis during a recent interview with Punch.

Excerpts below:

The National Assembly election of June 9 was the most controversial in the history of Nigeria. How do you rate the outcome?

To me, it shows that our democracy is still evolving. Like the saying goes, rolling stones gather no moss and the way Asiwaju Bola Tinubu plays his politics is very primitive and dictatorial. Nigeria has moved away from the politics of the 1960s.

According to the PDP style, the President, the Vice-President, the Senate President, the Speaker of the House of Representatives, the Secretary to the Government of the Federation and the National Chairman of the party must reflect these six geopolitical zones. But Bisi Akande and other All Progressives Congress leaders came out to say that they did not believe in zoning. I thought they came from another planet when I heard this. Akande must be naive about the diversity of Nigeria. They brought their own concept to play at the national level and I am happy that they were given a political circumcision.

The APC won the presidential election through a coalition between the North and the South-West. Don’t you think that if Asiwaju Bola Tinubu’s influence wanes, it might spell danger for the Yoruba interest?

Tinubu is not a selfless leader. All he has done is to remain in his cocoon in Lagos. What is his national value? He has become powerful and that was why he was able to determine who becomes governor and who emerges the Speaker of the House of Assembly. He wanted to take that system to the national level but failed. What was he going to bring to the South-West? The PDP is still very strong in the South-West. If Tinubu thinks he has full control of the Yoruba race, then he is a joker and he doesn’t know the history of the Yoruba people. I am an irredentist Yoruba man and I have no apologies for that. In our culture, we are taught to only take that which belongs to us and not take another man’s property.

But the Yoruba were not in the scheme of things in President Goodluck Jonathan’s administration.

In the last parliament, Tinubu teamed up with the North-West and robbed the Yoruba people of the speakership position. He told his boys in the Action Congress of Nigeria to vote for Aminu Tambuwal and that was how Tambuwal became Speaker. Therefore, in the distribution of the topmost positions across the geopolitical zones, we did not have anything. Hence, Tinubu is drinking the soup that he prepared and that is what he deserves. The APC is a merger and Tinubu nominated the Vice-President and the national chairman and yet wants to pick the Speaker and the Senate President. Is Nigeria practising a dictatorship or a democracy?

The APC wants to discipline Senate President Bukola Saraki and the Speaker, Yakubu Dogara, for going against the will of the party. Will the PDP woo them or accept them if they defect?

Yes, of course. A political party is like a police station, we never shut our doors. If you go to a police station at midnight, you will find a policeman on duty. Any political party that closes its doors to politicians is a cult, not a political party. We will open our doors to anybody that wants to join as long as they live according to the law and the constitution of the party. When we were screaming about the Tambuwal issue, Tinubu was rejoicing, he thought he was smart. He forgot the saying that what you do today will have consequences tomorrow. Must they always have their way? Haven’t they been manipulating the system all this while? Tinubu should not seek to make himself too powerful; if not, the APC will die the moment he dies. Tinubu is surrounded by those who cannot tell him the truth, including Akande.

But Tinubu was able to bring the Yoruba to the centre of national politics which Awolowo failed to do.

Tinubu did that for his selfish interest but he has now been given political circumcision. The PDP brought (Chief Olusegun) Obasanjo, a Yoruba man, to the centre and then brought the Yoruba to the mainstream again in 2003 when we won all the states in the South-West except Lagos. I was Vice Chairman (South-West PDP) at the time. Any house that is built on sand cannot last. They haven’t been in power for up to a month and you can see what is happening.