Bola Tinubu, the candidate of Nigeria’s ruling party, APC, has been declared the winner of the presidential election by the country’s electoral commission, INEC.
Tinubu secured victories in several states, including Rivers, Borno, Jigawa, Zamfara, Benue, Kogi, Kwara, Niger, Osun, Ekiti, Ondo, Oyo, and Ogun, and defeated 17 other candidates in the process.
With a total of 8,794,726 votes, Tinubu surpassed all other candidates and met the first constitutional requirement for victory. He also earned over 25% of the votes cast in 30 states, which exceeds the constitutional requirement of 24 states.
The Beginning of Tinubu’s Political Journey
Bola Tinubu’s political road to the top has been a torches encompassing political persecution, attack, victory, and character assassination, beginning in the vanguard of the 1993 democratic fratricidal conflict.
Following his declaration to run for President of Nigeria in early 2022, his impeccable political character and entitlement were met with bayonets from political opponents who flooded his personalities in the marshy south while he was christened with Komadugu water.
Tinubu’s early political career was one of service and solidarity, beginning under the great Awo of blessed memory and under the tutelage of his mother, Abibatu Mogaji.
In his early political career, which ended in prison, Asiwaju campaigned for the triumph of the powerful Awo during the 1979 Presidential election, whose mandate was afterward usurped by the firm-gripped Kakistocrat. Despite losing in 1979, Tinubu never deviated from his political enthusiasm, which was completely revitalized in the 1990s.
Many dismissed him as a mere clerk to MKO when he returned to politics after the Babangida regime’s promise of a new democratic system, but he stayed steadfast until he earned his first political seat as a senator representing Lagos in the 1990s.
Tinubu’s Return to Politics and the Struggle for Democracy
As the Babangida administration snuffed out democracy in 1993, Tinubu and the NADECO became significant veterans of the democratic struggle, challenging and crying for the return of democracy during the dark years of Nigerian history.
Tinubu was a key figure in the pro-democracy movement that sought and declared the end of military dictatorship. He sought shelter in the United States after fleeing the country as an Almajiri to Benin in the aftermath of the pro-democratic movement’s persecution by the then-military ruler of the state, General Sani Abacha.
Tinubu returned to the democratic spotlight in Nigeria after the death of lauded despot Abacha in 1998, when he was given the mandate to run for governor of Lagos under the defunct Alliance for Democracy (AD), which he won. Tinubu’s unwavering political commitment and ability to master the art of politics before returning to Nigeria make him a force in Nigeria’s newly declared Fourth Republic.
Against the wishes of the cabals led by his kinsman, Olusegun Obasanjo, he questioned Nigeria’s one-party system. Asiwaju refused to grovel and cave to OBJ’s threat, even if it meant withholding the state grant. Tinubu’s presence in Lagos state made the Federal Government pee in the tight of their thigh, as he was acknowledged as a known politician and thinker.
Tinubu’s Political Genius and Influence
He grasped Machiavellian politics and understood the rule of powers, earning him the title of political genius throughout the country. Despite leaving political office in 2007, Tinubu remained a menace to his opponents, and the political adventure he embarked on rattled the world’s largest and most populous black country.
His capacity to forego his own interests in order to establish and invest in brilliant brains gave him a team of intellectuals with whom he expanded his political horizons across the Southwest region. He was termed the monarch of kingmakers, the Mao Tse Tung of modern Lagos, the riddle of business concepts underlying Lagos’s flowing economy.
Tinubu, due to his magnanimity, founded a well-concrete political party, whose simple call rocked the entire black race; he imagined himself alone in the Igbo Oru forest, where he dined and put livings beneath his feet. He went into the untamed forest and returned as a lion known as the magnificent lion of Bourdillon.
During his eight years as governor of Lagos, Tinubu established a society of technocrats, a circle of schemers, a movement of tacticians, and a modern political environment. He educated and trained outstanding minds about politics, and he shared his well of epistemic political endowment with his opponents, with whom they formed a conducive political association in the country.
Jagaban’s influence on Nigerian politics is undeniable since he was named a political professor by many in the country. He rose to prominence as the leader of the All Progressives Congress (APC), which deposed incumbent Goodluck Jonathan and imposed the Buhari-Osinbajo administration.
His perseverance and constancy in Nigerian politics make him the finest candidate for the country’s top political position, which many sought. His political savviness, persistence, and knowledge provided him an advantage over several politicians following the APC’s victory in 2015. He willingly conceded to the opposition in his camp but crawled slowly to deal forcefully in 2019.
He ended the political careers of many of his contemporaries who reached the pinnacle of power in 1999, while he smashed the developing fetus that threatened his political empire.
Tinubu’s Presidential Ambitions and Political Challenges
Tinubu has been labeled the most investigated politician in Nigeria as a result of mischievous interesting facts on his source of money, age, and state of health that followed him up until his presidential declaration. Tinubu remained unfazed and unaffected by the stories that swirled about him. During the campaign, he stated, and I quote, “I’m not competing in wrestling, nor am I racing for a marathon, but rather the president is a labor of brain, not bodybuilding.”
He never fought a war without being challenged by the cabals, and he emerged victorious over the cabals as a simple governor, but many questioned how he could avoid the earthquake coming his way from another cabal after he had reached 80 percent of his peak power.
Tinubu’s political trajectory was not only appealing but also exciting, as his rich ambitions for leadership drove him to overcome all barriers in his path. Tinubu’s route to the presidency was aided by his jingoist disposition in his determination to make history, rather than a mere outcry on social media.
His political style has been that of an inclusive representative who is not bound by ethnic or religious allegiances; he belongs to everyone and nobody; he adopted every tribe as his without engaging in partisan politics because he sees leadership as a tool for collaboration for the greater development of the country.
Despite being the focus of political witch-hunts from other tribes, he remained formidable with his political allegiances and loyalties by developing branches across every socio-cultural organization by seizing the bull by the horns as he continues to construct a powerful fortress inside his cohorts.
From 1999 to the present, he has been steadfast in his party allegiance, despite massive carpet-switching by his peers and loyalties.
He astounded the public with his new style of political winning, in which he purposefully lost areas in which he had invested substantially, even losing his own background to his political opponent.
Many people regard his political win as a film trick, with him losing his stronghold to his opponents but pulling the greatest stunt by shifting the tide of the game where it was least expected.
He diverted his opponents by focusing heavily on his strongholds, but unknowing to them, he was playing a game of bone and dog with them, producing a political division within his opponents. Tinubu’s winning stunt not only confirms him as the type of leader the country requires, but his credentials and track record place him above all his contemporaries as the most qualified and capable to manage the country.
In the aftermath of the Fourth Republic, he led the Yoruba races to another electoral success while also masterminding one of the unacceptable Muslim-Muslim tickets in a multicultural and religious group.
He founded his politics on merit rather than ethnicity or religion, which led to the selection of his vice president, Kashim Shettima, who is likewise regarded as a game-changer in the history of Bornu politics. His achievement in gaining the pinnacle of political power in the country despite numerous challenges not only put him ahead of his fellow politicians but also labeled him as the greatest politician to traverse the dark continent in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries.
Despite the formation of Forces against him, Tinubu’s win has dismissed most of his political clouts who intended to drag Nigeria’s political domination with him. He has demonstrated his worth as the Jagaban of the Borgu kingdom and the Asiwaju of Lagos, as well as in African politics in general.
