Buhari didn’t support Tinubu or Osinbajo to be his successor, but Tinubu outsmarted him — Ex-Aide

A former Special Adviser to the President on Political Matters, Babafemi Ojudu, has alleged that his principal, former President Muhammadu Buhari, did not want either his then, Vice President, Professor Yemi Osinbajo (SAN), or former Lagos State Governor and now President, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, to emerge as his successor.

The former presidential aide made the disclosure when he featured on a podcast: “Edmund Obilo’s State Affairs,” broadcast on Monday.

Ojudu, who served in the Office of the Vice President during the Buhari Administration, said: “I knew Osinbajo was going to lose the primary.

“I saw it coming because of the system we operated and still operating. I kept saying at our meetings that all of the efforts we are making like traveling around, convincing people, and addressing delegates, are only 40 per cent.

“Sixty per cent of it lies in Buhari’s hands unless and until Buhari mobilises people around him, the governors, his aides, we are going nowhere.

“I used to refer to Buhari as a one-man majority, and he never mobilised his team towards Osinbajo, and I think Tinubu outsmarted him in so many different ways.”

Ojudu compared Osinbajo to the late Premier of the Western Region, Chief Obafemi Awolowo.

He said: “I supported Osinbajo to be president. I was convinced having seen him up close.

“The way he worked, his philosophy, his breadth of knowledge and the kind of patriotic verve in him, I just think that he was the best person at that time to govern Nigeria that I have seen up close to be on the part of danger.

“Osinbajo would have been good for this country. For me, it is like losing Awolowo for a second time because he was at Awolowo’s level in terms of capacity, ability, dedication, and commitment.”