Bola Tinubu: The Man Who (Re)Built Nigerian Opposition.

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He might not be the darling of all, but Bola Ahmed
Tinubu, a two-time governor of Lagos State, has
carved a niche for himself in the 14-year history of
the rebirth of democracy in Nigeria. His persona
excites as much awe as fear from the people,
especially the political class.
He has through his doggedness and can-do spirit
earned a name for himself as one of the foremost
politicians of the nation's fledgling Fourth Republic.
Although Tinubu's participation in the politics of the
Fourth Republic was not his first foray into politics,
it was in the current dispensation that he made a
name for himself.
As a senator representing Lagos West Senatorial
District in the aborted Third Republic, the
dispensation did not last long enough for him, just
like many others, to make his mark. The annulment
of the June 12, 1993 election by the Gen. Ibrahim
Babangida-led junta, put paid to efforts to return
Nigeria to civil rule after almost a decade of military
interregnum. In the heat of the civil protest that
trailed the annulment, he teamed up with others in
the defunct National Democratic Coalition
(NADECO) to rally the people behind the campaign
to force the military back to the barracks. Like
many leaders of the anti-military group, he was
forced to flee to exile, especially under the late Gen.
Sani Abacha dictatorship that resorted to state
brutality to subdue the opposition.
Whatever Tinubu might have done to advance the
cause of democracy before the Fourth Republic,
has paled to insignificance with his avowed
commitment, in the extant dispensation, to
champion the cause of sustaining one of the
cardinal principles of democracy: the people's right
to choose. In this quest, he has become the face of
the alternative force in a nation that for all intent
and purpose, has been tending towards a one-
party system since 1999.
With the return of democracy in 1999, Tinubu
joined his comrades in NADECO and others in the
now comatose Alliance for Democracy (AD) on
whose platform he won the Lagos State
governorship election. The AD was the ruling party
in the South-west, controlling the administration of
the six states in the region. It was a domination
that brought the party under intense pressure,
especially given the fact that the then President
Olusegun Obasanjo of the ruling Peoples
Democratic Party (PDP) got into power without the
support of his Yoruba kinsmen. Like AD, Obasanjo,
whose presidency was hobbled by its lack of
support from his kinsmen, was also under pressure
to redress the situation.
Obasanjo bid his time and in the run-up to the
2003 general election, he deployed guile and
diplomacy to outwit the leadership of the pan-
Yoruba group, Afenifere, to ensure that the Yoruba
supported his re-election. In the election, the PDP
swept the polls and of the six AD governors then,
only Tinubu returned for a second term in office.
Tinubu survived the Obasanjo onslaught as he saw
through his shenanigans during his negotiations
with the Yoruba leaders such as the late Chief
Abraham Adesanya, Chief Ayo Adebanjo and Chief
Olanihun Ajayi.
His victory was to redefine the relationship between
the duo during their second term. A chagrined
Obasanjo never forgave Tinubu for outfoxing him.
At every point in their official interaction, he did all
he could to frustrate the Tinubu administration.
When Tinubu made moves to build the first
independent power plant in Nigeria, the Obasanjo
administration frustrated it.
The frosty relationship between them was to
further deteriorate when Lagos made moves to
create more local government areas in deference to
the yearnings of the people. The state, after going
through the constitutional process, finally created
37 additional local government areas, which the
Obasanjo administration refused to recognise. The
creation of additional local governments in the
state turned out to be a battle of wits between
Obasanjo and Tinubu. To force Lagos to revert to its
20-local government structure, Obasanjo directed
the seizure of funds to local governments in the
state, totalling over N10 billion, from the Federation
Account. Not even a Supreme Court judgment,
which described his action as illegal, could make
the former president back down.
The duo were to be locked in a fresh political battle,
reminiscent of that of 2003 in the 2007 general
election. By then, Tinubu had pulled out of AD to
form the Action Congress (AC), which later
metamorphosed into the Action Congress of Nigeria
(ACN). Obasanjo, as the outgoing president wanted
to ensure the continued domination of the PDP in
the South-west, to consolidate his position as a
respectable leader of the party.
On the other hand, Tinubu was set to reclaim the
geopolitical zone from the rampaging PDP
machinery. In the end, PDP retained its five states
with ACN retaining Lagos. But it turned out to be a
pyrrhic victory for the ruling party because with an
uncommon determination, Tinubu engineered and
encouraged the legal battles that finally led to the
reclamation of Ondo, Ekiti, Osun and Edo States
from the PDP.
From the scratch, he built the ACN to a formidable
political party that within a short time became the
major opposition party in Nigeria. He deployed his
resources, energy and political acumen to give the
ruling party a fight in the political space.
In his avowed determination to ensure the defeat of
PDP, he tried to form an alliance in the run up to
the 2011 general election with Gen. Muhammadu
Buhari, another respectable opposition leader.
Under the scheme, the ACN and Buhari's Congress
for Progress Change (CPC) were to work together.
But the alliance, which began rather late, failed due
to irreconcilable differences between the two party
leaders.
Nevertheless, they were not discouraged. What
Tinubu and Buhari failed to pull off in 2011, they
did in 2013. With their encouragement, focus and
determination, they were able to bring the major
opposition parties in the country to come together.
They adopted a novel, though complicated process
that eventually led to the formation of the All
Progressives Congress (APC), which in its short
existence has been nibbling at PDP's stronghold.
Starting out with 11 governors after its formation,
APC recently increased the number of governors in
its fold to 16 following the defection of five
aggrieved PDP governors to the party. APC has
since turned the PDP, the behemoth that had a
stranglehold over the political space in Nigeria since
1999, into a minority party in the House of
Representatives. Effectively, as the PDP grows
weaker by the day, the APC waxes stronger.
As the nation approaches another election year in
2015, the electorate is assured of a choice: it is
either PDP or APC. This largely has been due to the
unwavering commitment of Tinubu who has given
his all to nudge the opposition in the right
direction. For his foresightedness and unrelenting
determination to deepen Nigeria’s democratic
space.