A week before the second anniversary of President Bola Tinubu in office, leaders of his political party, the All Progressives Congress (APC) were in a frenzy, dishing out gales of endorsements for his undeclared re-election bid for the 2027 presidency. The President was endorsed by the Progressives Governors’ Forum (PGF), an umbrella of 22 governors of the party, the leadership of the party in the North-West geopolitical zone, the National Assembly and state caucuses of the party across the zones. Ordinarily one would wonder what was at stake and what prompted the rush to show solidarity with the president whose party is the only one “making the difference,” in our polity. At least, in the last few months, the APC has made the difference by not only capturing states, but it has also being capturing big fishes from the opposition and their legislators. None of the major opposition parties that🚹 battled it for the presidency in 2023 is 🧍♀️ with two legs. One is on its knees, while the other is busy rolling on the floor. The APC is coasting home even before the referee blew the whistle to commence the 2027 race.
So, what’s the push behind the rush by the national chairman of the APC, Abdullahi Ganduje and his members to endorse President Tinubu two clear years ahead of the election? Segun Sowunmi, a member of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) spoke on Arise television last week and declared that with his knowledge of President Tinubu, the former Lagos governor was not swayed by the accolades being showered on him by his party men. He said that Tinubu, being streetwise, knows that politicians would always sing songs that would swell the head of the leader and that if Tinubu were a fickle-minded politician, he won’t be able to build the massive structure that took on the Nigerian system and delivered him the presidency in 2023. Having seen the rise and rise of the Tinubu political stratagem, I am somewhat convinced by Sowunmi’s postulation.
But if we may ask Ganduje and co, why the rush? The answer cannot be far-fetched. It is found in the claim that politicians and sycophancy are like a twin in the mold of a Siamese. In fact, a commentator once said that sycophancy is the politician’s raison d’être. A friend also once confessed that politicians enjoy praise singing and that due or undue adulations serve as tonic that oil their fancy. “We enjoy those things,” a friend said his boss once told him. And the hailers also usually know the mumu buttons of the subject matter and press them at will.
At the Banquet Hall of the Presidential Villa, Abuja, where APC stalwarts named President Tinubu as the party’s sole presidential candidate for the 2027 general elections, Ganduje had declared that: “As the Chairman of the party and as the only recognized platform to field a candidate in any election, I hereby affirm the endorsement of the President.” That was after Hope Uzodinma, governor of Imo State and Chairman of PGF had on behalf of his colleague governors moved a motion for Tinubu’s endorsement. Senate President Godswill Akpabio and Speaker Tajudeen Abbas had also roped in the 109 Senators and 360 members of the House of Representatives, plus all Speakers of the 36 state assemblies in a massive motion that endorsed Tinubu for 2027 presidency.
Though there was not a ministers’ forum to raise similar motion, it is all taken for granted that the ministers are all primed for the endorsement going by the high volume of the Renewed Hope singsong oozing out of their camp in recent weeks. In the last one month or thereabout, the song on the lips of the ministers is on the sweetness of the Renewed Hope Agenda, which they all claimed has been delivering the goods. Even as the APC leaders revel in the orgy of endorsements for the president, which is hardly anything the president needed at that point, I want to say that Ganduje and Co missed the point. As the leader of the party in power, his business should be to galvanise government operatives to deliver democracy dividends. He should be at the forefront of leading the charge to showcase how the government is truly making the difference in the lives of Nigerians. Maybe he needs a lesson from Afenifere’s book of governance under Pa Abraham Adesanya. The Pan-Yoruba Socio-political Organisation was the vehicle through which the Alliance for Democracy (AD) took charge of the South-West in 1999, and with Afenifere in control, the organisation usually called its governors to scorecard sessions in Ijebu-Igbo, apart from sending teams to ascertain development objectives in the different states. That the APC under Ganduje was merely seeking to massage the president’s ego and regale him with a second term ticket that is already in his inner pocket is missing the point badly. The APC chairman should know that in the tradition of presidential democracy, sitting presidents have the right of first refusal for second term tickets and whoever attempts to struggle the ticket with the incumbent will be easily dealt with by the party structure. So, how can anyone think that a second term ticket within the APC would be Tinubu’s headache? Even if Ganduje would not check the history of the United States presidency, as a former governor, he is well equipped to recall the nature of things within Nigeria since 1999. President Olusegun Obasanjo got the re-election tickets of his party, notwithstanding the hubris raised by some stakeholders, Dr. Goodluck Jonathan also got the re-election ticket for the 2015 election, even though he lost to the opposition led by President Muhamadu Buhari, who effortlessly secured a re-election ticket of his party in 2019.
Perhaps Ganduje as party chairman does not know his role as the leader of the party. Rather than galvanise his party men to a dance on the altar of sycophancy, he should be seen helping the president to sell the offerings of the Renewed Hope Agenda. Why is he not taking the ministers to task, calling them to scorecard sessions in the party headquarters? He should be calling the governors to do the same. Governance should not just be about the niceties, the ceremonies and the glamour you see on television. Some actors like the party chairman, ministers and others should be doing the seen and unseen jobs like the midfielders in a football field to ensure that the people enjoy the dividends of the hard-earned democracy. By merely dancing around the president and offering him a ticket that is not lost is of not value to democratic growth.
As I was about concluding this, I saw the effort of the Minister of Education, Dr. Tunji Alausa in launching the revitalized Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET). I must confess to being impressed by the offerings of the programme as enunciated by the minister. According to him the idea is to retool technical and vocational education in the country to the extent that Nigerians would no longer rely on foreigners to handle most of the technical works. According to the minister, the Federal Government would train at least five million youths in industry-relevant, entrepreneurial, and income-generating skills in the coming years.
“This is not a projection; it is a mission backed by strategic investments, implementation frameworks, and multiple partnerships,” Alausa said on Friday, adding that 25 trade categories had been developed across sectors such as ICT, renewable energy, construction, agriculture, the creative industry, and the automotive industry. He also said that the ministry had engaged state governors, commissioners of education, sector skills councils, regulatory agencies, employers, and development partners to build ownership at every level of the programme. Just as he stated that while the artisans would be paid stipends during their training, the mentors would equally receive stipends per student. Alausa said: “This is not a reinvention. We’re doing what the world’s most successful economies have already done. Technical skills built Germany’s economy 500 years ago, and they remain the industrial powerhouse of Europe today.”
Initiatives like this, if properly harnessed, should propel Nigeria to a level of self-sufficiency in skills development in the nearest future. Because it is also measurable, stakeholders can easily take on Alausa and his men if the policy starts faltering. I would, however, wish that this is backed by law and inculcated into the educational system rather than being an adhoc initiative. It is a pity that only a few ministers have produced such landmark offerings in the last two years. My take is that designing initiatives that address the challenges of the Nigerian society is the best way the political actors can earn their names, help the president and the country at the same time. Someone remarked recently that Chief Obafemi Awolowo ruled the Western Region more than 50 years ago, yet his name remained on the lips of his compatriots years after he has departed this shores. It should not shock you to note that many Nigerians are already forgetting the names of some governors who left office less than a decade ago. History and the people cannot be deceived by ephemerals.
(Published by the Sunday Tribune, June 1, 2025)
