The 2023 presidential candidate of the Social Democratic Party (SDP), Adewole Adebayo, has asserted that President Bola Tinubu is not a bold statesman.
Adebayo said Tinubu messed up with the opportunity given to him to put his signature to electoral acts.
Naija News reports that Adebayo made the remark in an interview with Daily Post, when asked about the primaries of political parties, especially the consensus or direct primary.
He said, “My point is that President Tinubu is not a bold statesman. He has mismanaged the opportunity given to him to put his signature to electoral acts, which he messed up. However, democracy cannot fall or rise based on one person who is misusing his own office. Politicians, even though we are complaining about the imperfections in the act, we need to remember that there was a time we were under colonial rule. We had elections and we got independence. There was a time when we were under military rule, we still had elections and Abiola won.”
Adebayo also dismissed plans of merging with the African Democratic Congress (ADC) to challenge the All Progressives Congress (APC) in 2027, citing the political style of politicians in the party.
According to the SDP chieftain, the ADC is a branch of the APC, stressing that some of them are aggrieved because they are not being favoured presently.
He said, “What I care about is that whatever position I take on politics would align with where the people of Nigerians want to go, align with the constitution of Nigeria and align with the objectives of our founding fathers and where they think the country should be at this point in time.
“If 36 governors decide to go to one party, it is not my business to comment on that because I have been in the SDP since 1991 and I am not going anywhere. I am okay with it. I have been here since I was 19. They are more mobile and they go from season to season. That’s their responsibility. That’s their style of politics which does not concern me. If you complain that governors are moving to the APC for example, then, why are you celebrating when some lawmakers move to your side at the national assembly. This hypocrisy is not my line of thinking.
“What is important to me is: what is the quality of these people who are moving? Are they moving with the people? Their own ratings are quite low, all of them. They are not solving any of the problems. There is no state in Nigeria that is safe, secure, good employment record, accountability record, there is none that is not having one corruption issue or the other. No state that is handling its business properly, such that these failed incumbents all have one thing in common. If all of them are migrating to one side, it is not a problem for me.
“Regarding who the main opposition is, first we are not in the parliamentary system of government. The fact that the ADC decides to be a copycat shouldn’t bother me. The APC is wooing and receiving governors into their midst and the ADC, maybe because they are of the same stock as APC since many of them came from the APC, they too thought that that is how to be strong as they also started looking for all manners of people whether they believe in what they stand for or not. We are not worried about that.
”That is still the politics of incumbency and we have always maintained in the SDP that ADC is a branch of the APC and APC is a scion of the PDP. They are the same altogether. They are in a relay of failure, handling the baton from one failed administration to the other and what the ADC people are trying to do is to jump the queue because in this rotational inefficiency and failure, some of them have taken their turn and they are not being favoured presently. They are trying to rearrange themselves.”
