No rift between me and Atiku over BoT chair - Tinubu

• advises Nigerians to ignore rumour mongerings

ABUJA – National leader of All Progressives Congress, APC, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu has denied any rift between him and the former Vice President, Atiku Abubakar over their interest in the Chairmanship of the party’s Board of Trustees, BoT.

Bola Tinubu

Urging Nigerians to ignore rumour mongering, Tinubu stated that both of them and indeed, the party’s utmost priority was to galvanize support for President Mohammadu Buhari to succeed.

Tinubu, also a former governor of Lagos state who was accompanied to the presidential villa on Wednesday with the former interim national chairman of APC, Chief Bisi Akande to meet with president Buhari spoke to State House Correspondents.

The APC leader also submitted that president Buhari was not going to rush in the appointment of ministers to avoid regrets later.

He said: “Don’t listen to rumous, there is no struggle. Our party is not even looking at the direction of power struggle or anything of such. The support structure is to encourage and support the President as you have heard from Chief Bisi Akande, to help him institutionalize his goal, principle and vision for a new Nigeria

“There is pitfall in rushing, quick fix, depending upon the depth of the rot. And that rush can cascade into mistakes of unimaginable magnitude. There is equally glory and recovery in slowness, when you have a slow fix of a bad foundation. So to me, I would rather take the one that will last the country and endure for a longer period of time than the rush hour shopping.”

On the speculation that he has brought list of names for ministerial appointment, he said “What can I do about that, they have the right to speculate, they have the right to their lies and I have the right to debunk”.

Tinubu who was reminded that the opposition party, the People’s Democratic Party, PDP had picked holes in the delays for ministerial appointments, calling him a dictator, Tinubu asked the party to “keep quiet”, saying that the party plunged the country into the present economic crisis.

“I disagree with that. He was elected on a platform of democracy, he has adhered to rule of law so far. What is dictatorship about what he has done? He has helped to stimulate the economy in the various states and that is where the people are. So what is dictatorship? And the institutional paralysis had occurred in the country.

“It is very important for a steady man like the President to really help the nation recover from the paralysis and that is what he is doing so I don’t see what is dictatorial about that. If they don’t have anything to say, they rather be quiet. They created what is wrong here today and we can’t sweep that under then carpet. There must be rule of law.”

Also speaking, chief Akande said they were in the villa to discuss the rot perpetrated by previous governments.

“Since Obasanjo’s first term and I understand that President Buhari inherited piles of rot in the Villa and I say let me see him, talk to him and report to my party with a view to knowing how to encourage him to change the rot to good. It is the rot, piles of rots upon rots”, he said.

 

No rift between me and Atiku over BoT chair - Tinubu