Asiwaju Bola Tinubu
| credits: File

A former Governor of Lagos State, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, says a former Minister of Aviation, Mr. Femi Fani-Kayode, left the All Progressives Congress because the party desisted from influencing the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission to drop the charges against him.

Fani-Kayode, who is the spokesman for the President Goodluck Jonathan Campaign Organisation, is currently standing trial before a High Court in Lagos for alleged money laundering.

However, Tinubu in a statement by his media aide, Mr. Sunday Dare, noted that since Fani-Kayode returned to the Peoples Democratic Party, the case the EFCC had built against him had been weakened as 38 out of the 40 charges had been struck out.

Tinubu said this while reacting to an allegation by Fani-Kayode that within six months of an APC government, Tinubu would order the party’s Vice-Presidential candidate, Prof. Yemi Osinbajo, to step aside, and he (Tinubu) would take control of the Presidency.

He said, “Bola Tinubu helped build the great platform for change; he wholeheartedly supports the APC ticket because he believes it is the last best hope to rescue Nigeria from the disaster Fani-Kayode and his ilk will want to continue.

“I pray Nigerians will not allow them to misgovern us a day past May 29. If Fani-Kayode pretends not to know of Tinubu’s efforts to build and support the APC, it comes as no surprise. Fani-Kayode tried before to be part of the party but left when he found out there was no room for his games. Because the APC could not help to free him from the EFCC and the aviation fraud, he ran away to the party that blocked the EFCC on his behalf.”

Tinubu said the fact that Jonathan chose Fani-Kayode – who is in court for alleged financial impropriety – to be the image maker of his campaign organisation shows what the PDP stands for.

He urged Fani-Kayode to continue to attack the APC presidential candidate, Maj.-Gen. Muhammadu Buhari (retd.) as the attacks were making Buhari more popular.

He said, “That Fani-Kayode is the best a ruling party can present as a spokesman speaks volumes about the PDP. They are bereft of talent and character. They are filled with lies and chicanery. Fani-Kayode is simply the worst and most outspoken of a bad lot. However, we welcome his interventions. They are of such low quality and base character. His utterances frighten people but not in the way Fani-Kayode intended.

“Instead of scaring people away from the APC, his work scares people that someone so unfit is so close to the seat of power, someone so unhinged is given free rein to spit bile and call that public discourse. One must wonder who is unbalanced, the misfit or he who hires him. Keep at it Fani-Kayode. Continue!”

The APC leader said Fani-Kayode was known for peddling lies and urged Nigerians not to take him seriously.

The former governor said the fact that Fani-Kayode could cook up such lies showed that the PDP was already imagining defeat.

He said, “Fani-Kayode is not as smart as he thinks. If you read between the lines of his hysteria, you see another extreme sentiment: that of surging desperation. His statement indicates that even he now realises that his paymaster has lost to Buhari/Osinbajo.

“The game is over. The whistle has blown. What the fantasy man seeks to do is change the game. He seeks to run against Tinubu in hopes the outcome will be better. Fani-Kayode now grasps at straws in the night wind.”