Lagos: Tinubu Finally Endorses Fashola

Posted by admin Lagos, State News Wednesday, January 5th, 2011

After almost two years of face-off between Lagos State Governor Babatunde Raji Fashola (SAN) and his benefactor and predecessor, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, the former governor formally endorsed Fashola as the flagbearer of the party at the forthcoming 2011 governorship poll yesterday.

The endorsement put to rest various intrigues and battle for supremacy between the two politicians in the past two years, which have heightened anxiety and insinuations that Fashola would not be allowed to return for a second term in office.

While giving the endorsement during the stakeholder’s meeting of the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) at the party secretariat in Acme, Lagos, Tinubu who used the opportunity to castigate his opponents, said the endorsement was the fallout of consultations with party leaders at the state, national and international level.

â€œBy the power conferred on me by the ACN as the leader of the party and after consultations and agreement with all party leaders at home and abroad, at the state and the national level, I am announcing to you today the final endorsement of Babatunde Raji Fashola for a second term from the forthcoming election, Tinubu said amid loud acclamation from party members.

He dismissed rumours of his estrangement with Fashola peddled by those he called political rodents and enemies, saying such people never knew how he came across his successor. While presenting Fashola publicly as the party’s candidate in the next governorship election, the former governor gave the incumbent 85 per cent performance rating in the past three years of his government.

He said Fashola remains the best man for the job of state governor. He is my son. Those who were peddling rumours are those that did not know what endeared him to me. They are agents of destruction, political rodents, enemies and scavengers in the corridors of power who want to continue to loot the state funds without working to deliver dividends of democracy.

They said I was jealous of his achievements and all sorts of things. If you have a son who has surpassed your records, you celebrate him. I am the pathfinder. He is the navigator. I am the one that identified the talent,he boasted.

Tinubu who said Fashola’s administration has been very eventful, assured that his next four years would offer a greater and better sense of performance, recalling that when he brought him out in 2007 and described him as the best man for the job, my friends became my enemies, some rained curses on me, but through the party structures, they came back and said â€˜Bola Tinubu, you are our leader, wherever you go we are going. You believed in me. You said no matter what, if you tell us this man is good, that means heâ€™s good. We fought the battle and we fought it well; we won the battle and we won it well.

Some people said let’s employ tactics to divide them. I don’t want to mention names, but the joy of it is that we had good success. With the broom revolution, we swept and defeated their might. Goliath fell by Davidâ€™s stone. I told you that this is the best man for the job, he restated.

In his acceptance speech, Fashola who said yesterday was not the day of speech making, thanked all party members for their support as he promised that he would not disappoint the state and the party. He also praised Tinubu whom he described as the man who risked everything just for me to serve Lagos State.

– ThisDaywp_posts