Former governor of Ekiti State, Kayode Fayemi, has said he would have become the President of Nigeria if he did not step down for President Bola Tinubu in the build-up to the 2023 elections.
He made the statement in an interview on State Affairs, a podcast hosted by Edmund Obilo.
The host had made the claim in a statement addressed to Fayemi during the interview, and the All Progressives Congress (APC) chieftain said yes affirming the submission.
Meanwhile, Fayemi recently compared former President, Goodluck Jonathan, and President Bola Tinubu’s approach to subsidy removal.
Fayemi, while speaking at the Oxford Global Think Tank Leadership Conference in Abuja, was reported to have reflected on Nigeria’s economic policies, leadership values and the courage to make tough governance decisions.
Fayemi said that Jonathan did not have the courage to implement the removal of the fuel subsidy during his administration, despite having the support of key stakeholders at the time.
He said contrary to what the public believed, many of the governors under Jonathan’s administration including himself, supported the removal of fuel subsidy, even though the then-opposition party, Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN), opposed it politically.
Fayemi criticised Jonathan for giving in to political pressure rather than standing firm on what he believed was an economically sound policy.
Unlike Jonathan, Fayemi praised Tinubu for taking bold leadership to end the fuel subsidy on the first day of his administration, even as it was met with economic and political backlash.
