Late President Muhammadu Buhari had contested Nigeria’s presidential elections three different times: the 2003, 2007 and 2011 elections, and lost in all three. He contested the results from the Court of Appeal to the Supreme Court, but victory eluded his quest for the number one seat in the country at the time. In 2011, he bid a tearful bye to politics and retired. It was supposed to be his last contest, but destiny was not done with his presidential bid after all.
When the 2015 elections came around, the northern political elites felt that power ought to return to the north, as late President Umar Yar’Adua had died just two years into his tenure, and President Goodluck Jonathan had been sworn in as President in place of Yar’Adua. President Jonathan had gone on to contest and win the 2011 elections, thereby denying the north its fair turn. All this was shortly after an eight-year tenure under President Olusegun Obasanjo. The northern political elites went shopping for a candidate they could support to run against an incumbent and give him a run for his money. Mind you, they had former Vice-President Alh. Atiku Abubakar to opt for, but they didn’t, and they decided to go for the retired general who had also retired from politics.
The northern political elites picked late Buhari for a number of reasons. He solidly had 11 million votes that stood by him, whichever political party he ran with. He was just short of a few million votes from the south and a fair amount of support from a number of states to clinch the presidency. He was respected, trustworthy, and could be trusted with the nation’s leadership, along with its resources. Late Buhari’s presidential quest just needed the right political marriage to make it succeed. He needed a southern political group or person with the right amount of support and followership in the south, similar to the one he had in the north. His group held talks with President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s group back in 2011, but the talks broke down, and a deal could not be made for the two groups to work together for the realisation of the Buhari presidency at the time.
In a recently released video, the Commissioner for Local Government Affairs in Kaduna State, Alh. Mamman Lagos, revealed how President Tinubu, back in 2014, travelled to Kaduna to visit late President Buhari and broker a political deal that would see him and the ACN support a Muhammadu Buhari presidency under a new party, which would be formed through the merger of the CPC and the ACN. The APC was formed from this merger, and other parties, such as the ANPP and the nPDP, were to join later. Alh. Mamman Lagos was part of the delegation that received President Tinubu and his delegation and was also part of the merger discussions. In the video, Alh. Mamman Lagos did not hold back about how President Tinubu funded the formation of the APC, as well as providing the financial and logistical support for late President Buhari to clinch the party primaries and become the presidential flagbearer of the APC in 2015, eventually becoming President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
“President Tinubu made it possible for late President Buhari to become President. I was there, and I witnessed all the groundwork, the logistics, the finances and the preparations. Without President Tinubu, late President Buhari would not even have made it through the primaries, let alone won the 2015 elections. President Tinubu funded President Buhari’s campaigns in almost all the states of the federation,” Mamman Lagos said in the video.
“Even after late President Buhari’s first term, President Tinubu was there to support him for his second term. Without President Tinubu’s support, late President Buhari would not have won his second-term elections,” Mamman Lagos added.
“So here we are today, and history is about to repeat itself. As northerners, our word is our bond, and we are known for keeping our promises, so we must answer our names as true northerners and sons of our fathers. How can we betray President Tinubu when he needs us the most? Wasn’t he here to support our candidate? Didn’t he continue to support our father, President Buhari, for a good eight years? So it is a duty to support President Tinubu to have his second term,” Mamman Lagos continued.
Mamman Lagos spoke glowingly about President Tinubu and what he has done for Kaduna State. “President Tinubu has done a lot for our state. We are no longer borrowing to execute projects while we continue to service our debts. The Kaduna-Abuja highway is being completed. He promised the Birnin Gwari road, a road of over 170 km, and it has been completed. The Kaduna-Kano rail project is also being completed. The spate of attacks by bandits has gone down tremendously, and they only go after soft targets now. We can only say alhamdulillah.”
The Mamman Lagos Theory highlights that one good turn deserves another. He insists that the north should support President Bola Ahmed Tinubu for a second term. It would be unwise to fragment or distort the present political equation. The north can have its turn come 2031 for 8 years all things being equal. President Tinubu was there for the north when it sought a 2nd term and this is a political favor that must be repayed.
It is however expedient for the northern political elites to have a roundtable with the President, to discuss the projects and programmes that they would like to see delivered in the north, during Mr. President’s 2nd term. Mr. President has had more than a fair fight against banditry and he is winning it. A complete eradication is possible and can be achieved if given more time. I am with Mamman Lagos on this theory and I will support President Tinubu come 2027.