Reasons have emerged on why Osinbajo, Lawal, Mustapha, Dogara were excluded from Tinubu Campaign Council
By Emeka Alex Duru
Contrary to the claim on Saturday, by the Presidential Campaign Council of the All Progressives Congress (APC) that President Muhammadu Buhari gave a directive that the names of Vice President Yemi Osinbajo and the Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF), Mr. Boss Mustapha, be excluded from the list of the council to enable them concentrate on the task of governance, there were other reasons behind their exclusion from the list.
Osinbajo’s name was missing as the ruling APC finally released the full list of the Presidential Campaign Council consisting of 422 members. He was one of the presidential aspirants that contested at the APC primary election held between June 6th and 8th where senator Bola Tinubu emerged as the presidential candidate bearer of the party.
Also omitted were Mustapha, former Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF), Babachir Lawal, erstwhile Speaker of the House of representatives, Yakubu Dogara and the Senator representing Adamawa North, Elisha Abbo. They are all Christians.
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In a statement explaining their omission from the list, Spokesperson of the Presidential Campaign Council, Festus Keyamo, said President Buhari gave a directive that the names of Osinbajo and Mustapha be excluded from the list.
“For the avoidance of doubt, President Muhammadu Buhari is the Chairman of the Campaign Council. As a result, Mr. President has specifically directed that the Vice President and the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Mr. Boss Mustapha should be left out of the Campaign Council to concentrate on the governance of the country and administration of government”, he stated.
It has however emerged that that their exclusion may rather have to do with internal crisis rocking the APC, especially the controversies surrounding the Muslim-Muslim ticket of its presidential candidate, Bola Tinubu and his running mate, Senator Kashim Shettima, which the Northern Christian members of the party and other Nigerians are seriously opposed to.
A South West senior member of the party who spoke with our correspondent in confidence, confirmed that the Muslim-Muslim saga is very deep one that has caused enormous crisis of confidence in the party, leading to obvious mistrust within its leadership. “This is an issue that is too difficult to be handled. The mistake has been made in Asiwaju (Tinubu) picking Shettima. Apart from Osinbajo feeling betrayed at the outcome of the convention, he is a senior Pastor in the Redeemed Christian Church of God (RCCG). Babachir, Mustapha, Dogara and Abbo are also Christians. How do you think they would be comfortable campaigning to fellow Christians in the North and other parts of the country to vote a Muslim-Muslim ticket in a religious sensitive setting as ours? That is a big challenge, no matter how we may wish to downplay it”, he said.
According to him, the combination of the affected chieftains not being favourably disposed to being part of the campaigns and the Tinubu Campaign Council not confident of their loyalty, accounted for their exclusion from the list. He insisted that bringing in the president as an excuse for the omission, is an after thought and a face-saving measure.
Even the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN), the umbrella body of Christians in the country has faulted the Tinubu-Shettima Muslim-Muslim ticket, describing it as an exercise capable of widening the worrisome religious divides among the adherents of the two major religions in the nation – Christianity and Islam.
Dogara and Lawal have fiercely registered their opposition to Tinubu’s choice of a Muslim like himself as running mate. Even Senator Abbo has not hidden his distaste at the development. In a recent outing in Abuja, Dogara had observed that the adoption of the Muslim-Muslim ticket by the APC for the 2023 presential election is a fruitless political effort that has been doomed to end in spectacular failure.
The former Speaker said; “In their convoluted posturing, they have placed state-building ahead of nation-building; a task never before achieved in history and we need no seer to tell us that such endeavor is guaranteed to end in spectacular failure. No divided people have ever built any civilization”.
On his own, Lawal, former secretary to the government of the federation, has vowed that the Muslim-Muslim ticket of the APC for the 2023 presidential election will be resisted with prayers.
Lawal who made the statement at an APC northern Christian Leaders summit, added; “Clearly, there is an agenda to politically, religiously, and economically suppress and oppress the Northern Christian. But we are up to the task. We will protect ourselves. The PVC and our prayers will be our weapons of choice and we will massively deploy them in 2023.”
Our source said that it was against the backdrop of the fierce opposition of these Northern Christians to the same faith ticket of the APC presidential candidate and his running mate, that made the Campaign Council exclude them from the list.
