As Tinubu, De facto Governor Of Lagos For 22 Years Returns From Medical Tourism To Reinvigorate His Presidential Aspiration

 As Tinubu, De facto Governor Of Lagos For 22 Years Returns From Medical Tourism To Reinvigorated His Presidential Aspiration

The national leader of the All Progressives Congress (APC) Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu who has been the de facto governor of Lagos State for 22 years but failed to build a befitting hospital that would stop him from embarking on medical tourism to United States and United Kingdom is back to the country to reinvigorate his fledgling presidential aspiration.

Oh, you think that Tinubu stopped being governor of Lagos State when his tenure officially ended in 2007 after serving for eight years! As the maximum Godfather of Lagos State, Tinubu has remained the governor since 1999. In my book, THE MAKING OF A FANTASTICALLY CORRUPT COUNTRY, see link: THE MAKING OF A FANTASTICALLY CORRUPT COUNTRY: UWADIMA, PAUL: 9798491798841: Amazon.com: Books I cited Professor Claude Ake who explained to the world how Godfatherism and holding power by proxy works in Nigeria.

Describing the role of the Godfather, Ake noted “that the person who holds office may not exercise its powers, the person who exercises the power of a given office may not be its holder, informal relations often override formal relations, the formal hierarchies of bureaucratic structure and political power are not always the clue to decision making power. Positions that seem to be held by persons are in fact held by kingship groups.”

Another person who has helped us to understand the dynamics of power is former military president, General Ibrahim Babangida. When he was the president he had threatened those challenging his government by saying that “we are not only in government, we are also in power.” He said this because one can be in government without being in power. You can say that Babatunde Fashola, Akinwunmi Ambode and Babajide Sanwo-Olu have been in government as governors of Lagos State at various times but they were never in power.

It can therefore be said that the person who has been in power in Lagos in the past 22 years is Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu and he failed to build a world class hospital that would stop him and others from embarking on medical tourism abroad. It is estimated that Nigerians spend $2billion annually on foreign medical tourism. That is a huge drain on the scarce foreign exchange of the country, and in the case of Tinubu he is in a position to do something to stop medical tourism, but failed to do so in the past 22 years.

His supporters are quick to tell us how he ‘transformed’ Lagos, yet Lagos remains one of the worst cities to live in in the world, so much for its transformation. They used to remind us that if Lagos was a country it would be the fifth largest economy in Africa. It therefore means that the de facto president of the fifth largest economy in Africa failed to build befitting medical facilities to take care of his health and that of others within his territory.

Why Tinubu’s medical tourism is coming early is the Lord’s doing, so that Nigerians would 'shine their eyes' in choosing the next president, although 2023 presidential election without electronic transmission of results would be massively rigged to the level that the National Party of Nigeria (NPN) ‘landslide’ rigging of 1983 elections would look like a child’s play.

If Tinubu happens to emerge Nigeria’s president in 2023 his defenders who are legion would remind us that he has been going abroad for medicals before he became president and that we have no reason to complain. Trust Tinubu he would surround himself with the best of spin doctors and propagandists that would make Hitler’s propagandist Paul Joseph Goebbels look like a novice in the art of propaganda.

Recently German journalists Heiner Hoffmann and Bernhard Riedman, after visiting Lagos wrote an interesting article titled, “A Week in The World’s Most Chaotic City”, published in SPIEGEL International, the biggest online newspaper in Germany. To me, the German journalists’ article is the summation of Tinubu’s 22 years in power in Lagos. And Lagos has been one of his selling points. His supporters say if he becomes president he would replicate what he is doing in Lagos nationwide. And I say to them, if Lagos is your standard for the future of Nigeria, your standard is rather too low!