By Mogaji Wole Arisekola
After the APC primary that served Olasunkanmi Tegbe an unpalatable political breakfast, Baba Isa Funtua urgently summoned an APC stakeholders’ meeting in Abuja. At that tense gathering, he implored all candidates to rally behind the party’s governorship flagbearer, Chief Bayo Adelabu.
But curiously—and suspiciously—the incumbent governor, Senator Isiaka Abiola Ajimobi, was nowhere to be found.
I was instructed to call his phone repeatedly.
No response.
Truth be told, my relationship with Ajimobi had already gone sour for two major reasons:
1. The way he treated former Governor Ladoja.
Ladoja had supported him—both financially and morally—when he contested against Akala. We were always together whenever we visited Ladoja at the Secretariat or late at night. Ajimobi’s ingratitude was bitter.
2. His infamous interview during the controversial Ibadan chieftaincy saga.
I strongly detested the way he addressed the late Olubadan of Ibadanland, His Imperial Majesty Oba Saliu Adetunji. That episode left a permanent scar.
One day, after another phone call went wrong, we ended up in a heated shouting match.
I’ve always had a personal policy: I never seek contracts, and I never lobby governors for favours. Once a governor is sworn in, I keep my distance until the end of their tenure. I have my reasons.
But before I digress—
In Abuja, we heard whispers that the opposition parties had formed a mega-alliance. We weren’t disturbed—at least not initially. What truly raised the alarm was the attitude of the state governor himself. We suspected his behaviour could cost us the election.
We expected Ajimobi to swallow his pride and reconcile with the defeated APC governorship aspirants.
Politics is a game of numbers.
So we began calling people to gauge their opinions. Some predicted victory; others predicted doom.
Then something extraordinary happened.
An IT expert who had just flown in from Canada told me bluntly that Seyi Makinde would win the election. He begged me to tell Baba to grant him an audience. I was shocked into silence. He even gave me projected figures—numbers that later aligned almost perfectly with INEC’s official results.
Personally, I believe Bayo Adelabu actually won that election, but he suffered collateral damage from the silent enemies of the late Isa Funtua camp.
By then, the power tussle between the Villa cabal and the Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu camp had already begun to boil.
Former CBN governor Godwin Emefiele, former Minister Chris Ngige, former Governor Ibikunle Amosun, and former VP Yemi Osinbajo were top contenders for the southern presidential slot. No one took Kayode Fayemi seriously—everyone already knew he was going nowhere.
Tension was sky-high.
Some APC members outside Oyo State were secretly opening channels to the PDP candidate, Engineer Oluseyi Makinde.
They promised to support him if he would support their own candidate in 2023.
A week before the 2019 gubernatorial election, I met Baba Bisi Akande at the Ibadan Airport. We were about to board an Overland plane to Abuja.
We started gisting about the next election, and Baba Akande suddenly asked me, “How is your friend doing?”
I replied, “Who, sir?”
He said, “The one you brought to my house a few years ago.”
I couldn’t remember; I kept mute.
He continued, “Seyi.”
I said, “He is doing fine, sir. He is even the gubernatorial candidate of the PDP. He is very honest and dependable, sir.”
Baba then turned to me and said, “Ooh, that’s nice then.”
He ended the conversation.
You get it? If you don’t get it, forget it.
That is the irony of life:
When your time comes, even your enemies will rush to align with you to make your journey successful.
It is no longer news that Governor Seyi Makinde proved he is a promise keeper and a very dependable Ibadan man by supporting Asiwaju Ahmed Tinubu in 2023.
He put his political future at risk. He ought to have been rewarded with many political appointments for delivering enough votes for Tinubu in 2023.
But like so many people who worked for Asiwaju, they are yet to be compensated—maybe next month.
For naysayers who are purveyors of fake news and dirty rumours, let me put the story straight once and for all:
Governor Wike did not recruit Engr. Seyi Makinde into Tinubu’s camp in the 2023 election.
Gov. Makinde knew Tinubu before Wike, and to be honest, he actually convinced Wike to get closer to Asiwaju.
Politics is dirty—filthy, even—and nothing is certain until the last vote is counted.
Chief Bayo Adelabu did not lose that election through ballot papers.
He lost it to the vicious power struggle over the soul of the APC before the 2023 presidential election.
He was thrown into the murky waters of betrayal and deceit—territory where veteran Nigerian politicians swim like sharks.
He was new to the political terrain then.
But when I met him last week at an event, I saw a new Bayo—stronger, wiser, politically battle-tested.
Atiku Abubakar always says:
“In politics, a million friends are not enough, but one enemy is too many.”
Chief Adebayo Adelabu must reconcile with both friends and foes. In politics, there are no permanent friends and no permanent enemies—only permanent interests.
The APC governorship primary is fast approaching. As usual, the winner will not emerge on the day of voting. Long before then—months or even a year ahead—the true candidate already knows himself.
There will be rigging; the one who masters the game will emerge victorious.
Let us not deceive ourselves—there has never been an election in Nigeria completely free of manipulation.
Egba la ma fi gbọn wèrè kúrò l’ára aṣínwin.
(We will use the cane to reset the madman’s brain.)
After all, what medicine cures madness better than the cane?
Ire o.
Mogaji Wole Arisekola, Publisher, The Street Journal Newspaper, writes from Ibadan.
