Obasanjo Restates Commitment To Nigeria At Meeting With APC As Tinubu Urges Fmr President To Lead Rescue Mission

APC LEADERS ITH FORMER PRESIDENT OLUSEGUN OBASANJO IN ABEAOKUTA, OGUN STATE ON SATURDAY

A high-powered delegation of All Progressives Congress (APC) leaders, who visited former President Olusegun Obasanjo on Saturday at his hill-top mansion in Abeaokuta, Ogun State, were given a warm reception as the former president openly threw his weight behind the party.

It was learnt that the APC leaders at the meeting pleaded with Mr. Obasanjo for his support of the party in the 2015 general elections.

The visitors started arriving at Obasanjo’s expansive mansion around 5:22pm.

A former governor of Lagos State, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, led APC leaders, including the party’s Interim National Chairman, Chief Bisi Akande; former Head of State, General Muhammadu Buhari; former speaker of the House of Representatives, Aminu Masari; former Borno State governor, Senator Ali Modu-Sheriff; Senator Osita Isunazor; Senator Bukola Saraki; and APC Interim National Publicity Secretary, Lai Mohammed to the meeting.

Governor Murtala Nyako of Adamawa State, former Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commissioin (EFCC) and one-time presidential candidate, Malam Nuhu Ribadu; the former minister of aviation, Chief Femi Fani-Kayode and others were driven into the former president’s compound in a convoy of three black jeeps.

Other APC governors at the meeting included Rochas Okorocha (Imo), Ibikunle Amosun (Ogun), Abdulfattah Ahmed (Kwara), Rabiu Kwankwaso (Kano), Senator Abiola Ajimobi (Oyo), Babatunde Fashola (Lagos) and Rotimi Amaechi (Rivers), who drove himself to venue of the meeting with former FCT Minister, Malam Nasir el-Rufai in the passenger’s seat.

The former Chairman of the defunct New PDP, Kawu Baraje led some of his members including the former Kaduna State Chairman of the faction, Yero Makama, to the meeting.

Presenting the party chieftains and the APC governors to Obasanjo during the opening of the meeting, Akande said the party was in support of the former president’s 18-page letter to President Goodluck Jonathan.

The APC National Leader, Tinubu, who during his tenure as governor of Lagos State, was constantly locked in a battle of wits with then President Obasanjo, alluded to the former president’s contribution to nation building, but lamented that the country was divided more than ever.

In seeming reference to Mr. Obasanjo’s recent scathing letter to Mr. Jonathan, Tinubu urged the former president not to shy away from speaking the truth.

Tinubu added that the APC had resolved to rescue Nigeria and appealed to Obasanjo to lead the mission.

“You’ve come out of tribulation and held the highest position in this country. We are here because of your courage. Nobody can say he has information more than you. You have surmounted a number of crises. Nigeria is divided more than before; to realise stable Nigeria, we want to encourage you to continue to speak the truth. We’re resolved and determined to rescue Nigeria. We want you as navigator”, he said.

Inn his response, Obasanjo, who stressed that he remained a card-carrying member of the ruling Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, described himself as an “incurable optimist” totally committed to Nigeria’s well-being.

He said, “I am a card carrying member of the PDP but the politics I play traverses Nigeria, Africa and world in that order. I am a democrat and one of the essential ingredients of democracy is opposition. A democracy that has no opposition built into it is not democracy.

“As an opposition, you are enhancing democracy.  You are at home, you are welcome. I will just appeal that the politics you play is politics without rancour, without bitterness, with decency, that has Nigeria at heart. I am an incurable optimist about Nigeria, I am totally committed to Nigeria and nothing will divert me from that commitment”.

At the end of their two-hour meeting, Tinubu, in a parley with reporters, denied that the APC had come to woo the former president to join its fold.

“It is to be able to set Nigeria on the right path and for all men of goodwill to come together to rescue Nigeria. It is not a matter of wooing (him), an elder statesman”, he said.

Tinubu added: “Yes, he is a very unique person in his own way based upon the experience of life, tribulations one way or the other; he saw power, tribulations and then back to power. If you want to grasp the life of this man from zero to grace, zero again and then to grace. And then you will see what you get in such a person.

“And you will need that wisdom not necessarily to join our partisan politics, but just to draw from the experience of an elder statesman”.

Shedding more light on what transpired at the meeting, Fani-Kayode, a staunch supporter of the former president, said that he [Obasanjo], embraced the APC.

According to him, “The ex-president told us that APC has taken the first step in the right direction towards making Nigeria great. It was an excellent meeting”.