[size=14pt]Man in The News: Bola Tinubu: Expansionist agenda in trouble? [/size]
Friday, 16 September 2011

Senator Bola tinubu
Following the summons of the leader of the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN), Bola Tinubu, by the Code of Conduct Bureau on several allegations, Regional Editor (News), Olawale Rasheed, writes on the rippling effects of the case, submitting that Tinubu’s sudden rise may, indeed, have reached its peak.

Senator Bola Ahmed Tinubu is a politician ensnared in his politics of opportunism. These are days he would never pray to come. In a few days time, he will be in the dock for allegedly breaching the code of conduct laws of the land. He is accused of maintaining foreign accounts as governor of Lagos between 1999 and 2003, in defiance of the nation’s laws. The senator‘s empire is convulsing. He is cornered by his sordid past and his expansionist agenda is “slowly but surely” grinding to a halt.

The national leader of the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) is a politician of multiple controversies, a former senator with horrid baggage from the past, an activist with hanging questions, a former governor with many unresolved issues of personal integrity. As a politician, he commands an array of combatants who he sees as mere pawns in his chess board. Indeed, at the launch of a book on his former Attorne-General, Professor Yemi Osinbajo, SAN, Tinubu described the Senior Advocate as one of the “weapons” in his personal, “political armoury.”

Tinubu desperately wants to be Yoruba leader, but sadly for him, he lacks the personal integrity, openness and democratic credentials of Obafemi Awolowo; the humility and piety of Adekunle Ajasin, the selfless patriotism of Abraham Adesanya; the erudition and intellectualism of Bola Ige. At another level, Bola Tinubu is not an M.K.O Abiola of unrivalled philanthropy and definitely not Olusegun Obasanjo of many raw landmarks.

The former senator is a man of shrouded beginning, an accountant with challenges of veracity, a self-made businessman-politician in the Italian mode, and a man with uncanning capacity to play the ‘Samuel’ in a world of ambitions. His admirers worship his questioned rise from nowhere; his adversaries loath the taints and dirts on his ladder of successes.

In his world of untamed and unregulated ambitions, he even got one of his key rivals a term in jail while he, like a super human Italian mafia boss, walked the street unencumbered. Notwithstanding his negative baggage, he overthrew political thrones, daring any one to confront him. In a zone of proud, upright citizens and statesmen, Tinubu built a machine, oiled by an extensive overlay of patronage, enforcement and punishment system which drives an undisguised expansionist agenda to ultimately capture national political power.

While in a sly manner dramatically appropriating the toga of progressivism, he silenced many, ‘empowered’ many into his fold and created a culture of impunity around his ruling clique. His wife is a distinguished senator of the Republic and his son-in-law is a member of the House of Representatives.

The senator and his men have become so confident that they are now launching into other zones, angling to occupy Lord Lugard House in Lokoja and take Ilorin from the established political order. Earlier attempts in the East of the Niger were disastrous for Tinubu and his cabal. He had a bloodied nose in Akwa Ibom, other South-South and South-East states and a decapitating show in the core North. The expansionist agenda is gasping for breath, as the boss himself now faces a personal battle of integrity.

A cunning and insistent schemer, the former governor, in his bid for a widening political empire at times, sees no wrong in eating with the devil and the angel at the same time. He claimed to have supported the Jonathan/Sambo ticket at the last minute in the last election, but soon deployed his legislative troops to rubbish the Jonathan Presidency in the contest for House of Representatives Speakership. Supposed smart politics played at the extreme by Bola Tinubu has double sharp edges, with the script writer capable of being a victim.

At the zenith of his power, his past constantly appears in his present, his local and international baggages hunt his trail, and buried matters are washed up by subsisting currents. Questions not asked in the past are popping up. The judicial advantage is dismantled and succession politics is beginning to grow dirty and messier within his own very political machine.

The past is now today; yesterday can no longer be forgotten; and yesterday and today will determine tomorrow. As the former governor prepares his defence, this may be the beginning of the unravelling of an empire built on questioned patronage. As put by one of his arch-rivals, Adedeji Doherty, this development may be the beginning of more investigations into a 12 year reign of the Bourdillon cabal. The jitters, the fears, are mounting, even as the slow wheel of justice appears to be moving, getting set to open up the pandora box of Lagos public finance and governance.

Boastful Tinubu has, however, declared his readiness to face the impending trial and clear himself of all the allegations and charges, an interesting declaration from a man whose opponents say does not even bear his real names. The coming trial, to such persons, should be used by the former governor to shed light on others issues such as the controversy trailing his birth, education, work history, the revenue collection issue in Lagos State and other related sundry issues. The nation is excited to be part of a no-holds-barred “truth commission” to be played out in the next few weeks.

Whatever comes out of the trial, the reality is that the Tinubu machine can never be the same again. The unfolding stories of betrayals and backstabbing are increasingly beyond the capacity of the leader to curtail. The resort to self-help by caucus members is generating a free-for-all and remote controlling of Alausa on the 2015 power game is proving difficult. Fashola at Alausa is resisting meddling in Lagos affairs by Tinubu’s Khalifa; Rauf Aregbesola from Osogbo; very ominously, the man in Agodi Government House, Ibadan and his colleague in Abeokuta , Ogun State are proving very independent-minded.

Will this man dodge this arrival of justice? Can he marshal containing tactics and strategies to hold the crumbling empire together? Only time will answer these questions. But for now, the hen has come home to roost.

http://tribune.com.ng/index.php/politics/28303-man-in-the-news-bola-tinubu-expansionist-agenda-in-trouble

Another crooked career is drawing to and end.
Tinubu meets Ibori. Lol!

www.nairaland.com/attachments/139268_BolaTinubuHeroinforfeiture_jpgb084d334c74cec7150ee9588a3aed2fc

From "Toronto" certificate to drugs. Its really sad.

When i newly joined Nairaland and reading peoples comment on national issue i tot u r one of d unfortunate sharp guy in d country but nw u've proved me wrong with ur sentiment on Bola Tinubu issue i hope u wnt die of heart attack cos of the Man of the People (BAT)

Do your research and find out how much was in the accounts your are cry on ?

When last was the account operated ?

Owners of the Account ?

Olodo rabarata,