CLEARLY, former Lagos State Governor and National Leader of the All Progressives Congress, APC, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, is the major winner of the just concluded presidential primaries of the party. He won the hotly contested ticket after weeks of high-wire intrigues and horse-trading.
Other winners include President Muhammadu Buhari; the APC for holding a successful convention after much postponements; all the presidential aspirants, for surviving attempts to shut them out of the primaries through “screening,” “pruning down” and “consensus”. They all took part in the primaries and those who stepped down or refused to attend like Chief Emeka Nwajiuba, did so, on their own volition.
The seven aspirants who stepped down for Tinubu are winners. They are Dr Kayode Fayemi, Senator Ibikunle Amosun, Senator Ajayi Boroffice, Mr. Dimeji Bankole, Governor Abubakar Badaru of Jigawa, Mrs. Uju Ohanenye and Senator Godswill Akpabio.
Winners
Other winners include those agitated for power shift to the South such as Southern governors and 14 APC Northern governors, and members of the party’s National Working Committee, who fought against attempts to impose Senate President Ahmad Lawan as consensus candidate.
Losers
Although the aspirants are winners as a group those who refused to step down, contested and lost are losers. They include Mr. Rotimi Amaechi, Vice President Yemi Osinbajo, Senate President Lawan, Senator Rochas Okorocha, Governor Yahaya Bello of Kogi, Dr Ogbonnaya Onu, Pastor Tunde Bakare and Mr Tein Jack-Rich.
For trying to impose Senate President Lawan as consensus candidate, Senator Abdullahi Adamu, APC national chairman is also a loser as the imposition would have hurt the party direly.
