Laolu Akande, former spokesman to ex-Vice-President Yemi Osinbajo, has challenged claims by former Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF), Babachir Lawal, that ex-President Muhammadu Buhari thought of Osinbajo’s 2023 presidential ambition inappropriate due to his relationship with President Bola Tinubu.
Akande mentioned Buhari had personally provided to assist Osinbajo’s presidential aspiration on not less than 4 events in the course of the build-up to the 2022 All Progressives Congress (APC) presidential major.
In an announcement issued on Saturday, Akande described Lawal’s account of the occasions resulting in the 2023 election as false, insisting that he was conversant in selections taken within the Presidential Villa throughout his time as Osinbajo’s spokesman between 2015 and 2023.
Lawal, who served as SGF from 2015 to 2017, had reportedly mentioned Buhari would have discovered it troublesome to assist Osinbajo in opposition to Tinubu due to the previous president’s longstanding relationship with the previous Lagos State governor.
He additionally claimed that Buhari thought of Osinbajo’s choice to contest the APC presidential ticket “highly immoral and distasteful”.
Rejecting the declare, Akande mentioned Buhari had expressed willingness to again Osinbajo’s ambition.
“On the claim that President Buhari considered Osinbajo’s 2022 aspiration ‘immoral’, this is false,” he mentioned.
“On at least four separate occasions, President Buhari personally offered to support the Vice-President, telling him plainly: ‘If I don’t support you, who will I support?’”
Akande added that Buhari had publicly praised Osinbajo’s marketing campaign throughout a Federal Executive Council assembly, commending the previous vice-president for conducting an issues-based marketing campaign nationwide.
“That is not a President who found Osinbajo’s ambition distasteful. That is a President who broached it, encouraged and applauded it,” he mentioned.
The former spokesman additionally disputed Lawal’s account of an alleged memo itemizing greater than 20 employees members really useful by Osinbajo. Lawal reportedly claimed that Buhari’s chief of employees had withheld the memo earlier than he personally took it to the president.
Akande dismissed the account as fabricated, insisting that no such doc existed.
“Mr Lawal’s claim that Osinbajo wrote a memo containing over 20 staff names, which was sat on by the President’s Chief of Staff, and which he, Mr Lawal, then took to President Buhari, is a complete fabrication. There was no such memo,” he mentioned.
He additionally rejected Lawal’s account that Buhari had referred to the proposed appointees by their ethnicity, arguing that the alleged comment was inconsistent with the previous president’s conduct.
Akande mentioned Osinbajo had direct entry to Buhari and routinely submitted memos to him for approval earlier than forwarding them to Ade Ipaye, his deputy chief of employees, for communication to related authorities businesses.
“At no stage did this require the SGF, except for the subsequent issuance of appointment letters for staff,” he mentioned.
He additional challenged Lawal’s declare that the alleged memo had been delayed for 3 months, saying he resumed work within the Office of the Vice-President in June 2015 alongside a number of different officers whose appointments Lawal had questioned.
“There was no three-month delay,” Akande mentioned, including that Osinbajo submitted a number of memos at completely different occasions however by no means produced a single checklist framed alongside non secular or ethnic strains.
Akande additionally argued that Lawal’s account ignored the circumstances surrounding his departure from workplace as SGF. He mentioned Buhari, slightly than Osinbajo, eliminated Lawal from the place over allegations of corrupt practices.
The former spokesman rejected claims that Osinbajo favoured members of his church in appointments to his workplace, describing it as numerous in non secular and regional illustration.
He cited Ipaye, a Muslim lawyer, as probably the most senior official in Osinbajo’s workplace and mentioned three of the previous vice-president’s 4 particular advisers had been Muslims, together with two northerners.
Akande additionally disputed Lawal’s account of the appointment of former Minister of Industry, Trade and Investment, Okey Enelamah, whom Lawal allegedly linked to Osinbajo’s church.
According to Akande, Enelamah was really useful by two individuals within the monetary companies business. At the identical time, Buhari’s then chief of employees, the late Abba Kyari, knowledgeable Osinbajo of the president’s choice to nominate him.
Akande concluded that private grievances shouldn’t be used to justify allegations he considers unfounded, suggesting that Lawal’s account was influenced by resentment over his elimination from workplace.
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