Emilokan, Eleyi, O lule, “A ma dibo, a ma wo’le”, all memorable electioneering chirps and slogans, made their ways into the Nigerian electoral lexicon, at crucial stages of the run-up to the 2023 general elections. 3 June 2022: Emilokan, Eleyi, O lule entered the electoral fray. The phrases were so catchy that former President Olusegun Obasanjo was among the first to celebrate them.
After later meeting with APC presidential candidate, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, who went to update him on his presidential quest, Obasanjo triumphantly announced the dawn of those brand new campaign soundbytes.
Obasanjo would later back LP’s Peter Obi. But little did he imagine his candidate would “lule” (crash); and that his Tinubu “reject” would fulfil his near-prophetic, positive self-assertion: “Emilokan”: Yoruba for “It’s my turn”.
Since then, it’s been throaty lamentation from the Obasanjo/Obi camp: with Obasanjo drawing vicious flak for nudging President Muhammadu Buhari (PMB) to cancel results and arrange fresh elections, when he knew Obi “ti lule” and “Emilokan” had won it.
Why, even Portable, irreverent artiste, riling and mocking, had called out Ogun State Governor Dapo Abiodun, as “Iwo Eleyi”, irreverently punning his name, Dapo, in a particularly niggling way!
That was during the APC primaries and titanic tussle for the ruling party’s ticket. Tinubu won the ticket hands down.
“A ma dibo, a ma wole” came from the dead heat of campaign for the election proper, with the Naira and fuel scarcity biting hard — the one from the miscarried Naira redesign project; the other from alleged intra-APC sabotage — to allegedly scuttle Tinubu’s otherwise bright chances, at the presidential poll.
On the stumps in Abeokuta, Tinubu blurted, to a thick crowd of roaring partisans: “Let them increase the price of fuel and hoard it; let them hoard money, the Naira. We will go and vote and we will win. Even if they change the ink on Naira notes; whatever their plans, it will come to nought. We are going to win. Those in the PDP will lose (won ma lule).”
“A ma dibo, a ma wo’le” was born! It would prove another Emilokan prophecy!
Again, it was sublime and supreme bluff of the ultimate risk taker in Tinubu, when the stakes were high! It’s doubtful if any other candidate could have spun such a huge stumbling block into a massive stepping stone.
That was clear from how PDP’s Atiku Abubakar and LP’s Obi resorted to cant, in the fond hope both would benefit from the Presidency’s blunder.
Like Emilokan that sent electric shocks through the party’s spine, this latest challenge put everyone in virtual disarray — the Presidency, Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) and Godwin Emefiele, its recalcitrant governor; and authorities at the Petroleum Ministry/Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation Limited (NNPCL).
It was the ultimate shock therapy that virtually reset election-season duty of the government towards citizens.
PMB set up a committee to comprehensively look into the crippling fuel scarcity. For seven previous years, fuel scarcity had almost become history. Yet, at the virtual last minute of his eight-year tenure, and on the cusp of sustainable local refining of crude oil, it had made a stubborn return.
The battle on the Naira scarcity front was even fiercer, culminating with the Supreme Court eventually voiding the exercise, ruling that both old and new Naira denominations remained legal tender till year end 2023.
Incidentally, these picturesque soundbites were birthed in Abeokuta, now capital of Ogun State but the cradle of journalism in Nigeria, with the founding of Iwe Irohin, the CMS proselytizing medium, in 1859.
Might Abeokuta then be part of the near-magical Tinubu march to the Nigerian Presidency, despite the thick plots and counterplots, at every critical juncture of the hard and tortuous journey?
The most intricate of those manoeuvres played out in the Presidency, in the dead heat of tussle for APC presidential nomination.
For starters, the Vice President, Professor Yemi Osinbajo (PYO), hitherto Tinubu’s protege and beneficiary for Vice President, ogled the APC presidential ticket — his body language radiating his own Emilokan, having served President Muhammadu Buhari (PMB) with loyalty, dignity and decorum.
Indeed, not a few contrasted the PMB/PYO partnership with the dysfunctional Olusegun Obasanjo/Atiku Abubakar pair (1999-2007); and fairly acclaimed the difference was — and still is — clear, as in the famous 7Up advert.
That verdict resulted from the bonding and mutual respect between both, despite one being a Fulani Muslim; and the other being a Yoruba Pentecostal pastor.
Still, PYO would appear conflicted, running against his leader and umpteenth benefactor. But he also felt, well, entitled to earning PMB’s backing for nomination, having been a loyal and supportive Vice President.
The only militant voice from the PYO camp appeared Femi Ojudu, former journalist and senator, who went on early offensive to push PYO’s case. He didn’t gather much traction but that didn’t stop PYO from declaring his intent online.
But aside from PYO, other party and presidency power centres dropping the president’s name, were neck deep in the court intrigues: promising sundry hopefuls they had the president’s ears to make their dreams come true.
From the blue, Abdullahi Adamu, the APC national chair, announced PMB had picked Senate President, Ahmed Lawan, as “consensus candidate”. That sent virtual electric shock down the party’s spine!
With PMB from the Northwest, and having taken the first APC ticket for president, and on the last lap of his second term, it was inconceivable that APC’s next presidential ticket would remain in the North.
The most powerful regional blocs in the opposition alliance that formed APC were from North West and South West.
In terms of what each brought to the table, however, Tinubu’s Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) entered APC with more governors and more National Assembly legislators than any other legacy partner: PMB’s Congress for Progressive Change (CPC), then Borno Governor, Kashim Shettima’s All Nigeria People’s Party (ANPP) and Rochas Okorocha’s splinter segment of the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA).
ACN’s prominence in APC’s founding history gave PYO much hope, if only PMB would endorse him. The president never did. He told PYO what he told everyone: go into the primaries and try your luck.
Still, contrasted to PYO’s hope to cash in, Tinubu was the driving force and clear living symbol of that North West-South West entente that delivered APC.
For that “crime”, the likes of Chief Ayo Adebanjo, later joined by the Yoruba Nation lobby, had started the whispering campaigns that Tinubu had “sold” the Yoruba to the Fulani.
It was therefore obvious that should the honorific APC “National Leader” make a bid for the ticket, it would be his to lose, judging from his contribution and personal sacrifices in forging the alliance.
Besides, the Adamu announcement sent the APC northern governors, led by Kaduna’s Nasir El-Rufai, scuttling to PMB for confirmation, while irrevocably committing themselves to zoning the APC presidential ticket to the South. PMB disowned the Adamu kite.
While all of that was going on, a “split” Ogun Governor Dapo Abiodun was doing a delicate balance, playing the end against the middle.
A part of him rooted for PYO, given their common Remo, Ijebu nativity. But the other part slunk back with a pang of conscience.
When former Governor Ibikunle Amosun was determined to undo Abiodun’s nomination — even with PMB seated at the APC Abeokuta campaign in 2019 — it was Tinubu that seized the initiative and handed Abiodun the APC flag.
Gbenga Daniel, Amosun and Abiodun had quite a history. The trio were part of Obasanjo’s PDP storm troopers that took over Ogun in 2003. Daniel won the governorship. Amosun won the Ogun Central senate seat, before falling out with Obasanjo. He later became two-term APC Ogun governor and now, sitting senator.
But for whatever reason, Amosun was dead set against Abiodun succeeding him. Yet, here was the same Abiodun dithering between Tinubu and PYO!
That provided the grist for the first of the colourful sound bites, Eleyi, by Tinubu who was clearly piqued by it all!
Eleyi (“ungrateful you”, in contemptuous Yoruba) was the ultimate verbal lampoon for an ungrateful Governor Abiodun, from an angry Tinubu’s lashing tongue! The Eleyi of Ogun State took the fury in rare equanimity. Henceforth, he appeared to shift his support from Osinbajo.
From Abiodun, the Emilokan heat scorched the president himself. After crashing thrice – read the picturesque “O lule” – and even swearing he would never contest again, Tinubu said it was he who went to Kaduna and nudged him to run again on APC ticket. The rest, to echo that popular phrase, is history: a two-term PMB presidency.
It was from this white rage that the inimitable “Emilokan” was born. Tinubu roared: “After eight years of PMB, the ticket should move South. Even in the so-called South, it’s the turn of the Yoruba. Among the Yoruba, it’s my turn: Bola Ahmed Tinubu.”
Enter Emilokan, the most gripping of the famous sound bites. It was frozen in rock, as hard and solid as Abeokuta, where it was first proclaimed. It marked a rocky and gritty ride to the Nigerian Presidency!