The stage was set for the exit and entrance of two Governors of Lagos State. Bola Ahmed Tinubu was exiting, Babatunde Raji Fashola was coming in. On Tuesday, 22 May 2007, the last state Executive Council was held. At the end of the meeting, the Exco was dissolved but the government was still running because it still had seven days before it would expire.
On Friday, 25 May 2007, a send-off ceremony was organised for the exiting Governor at the Governor’s House, Ikeja. In attendance were the creme-de-la creme of the state such as judges, magistrates, legislators, the exiting Governor and his wife, the in-coming Governor and his wife, business monguls, bankers, entrepreneurs and other government officials, including members of the dissolved Exco. We, members of the “Ministry of Special Assistants”, were also honoured with a table – a sign that our last minute effort (the production of the document) was highly appreciated. They did not just arrange chairs for us, we were on the protocol list officially. I was sitting with my members at the table allotted to us when the MC came to inform me that I was going to speak at the ceremony. That was strange because I had no idea that I was going to do that. Stranger still was that, of the three of us selected to speak, I was going to speak before an exiting Commissioner, Mr Tunji Bello, and a Permanent Secretary, Mrs. Damọla Akran. That was a novel protocol order.
Since I was not aware that I was going to speak at the ceremony, I had to look for what to say even though the MC had told me that we were meant to say what we knew about ‘Oga’. Before the programme would get to that part, I started thinking of all the events I could remember. The one that came to my mind was somehow not good for public consumption but, in the final analysis, it was what I chose to speak on when they gave me the mic.
Here is the excerpt of what I said at the gathering: “The Governor is a very humane person. He loves the poor and cares about them not just as a governor but as an individual. I have written about this in so many newspapers. It was titled the ‘Suwebatu metaphor’. In explaining the metaphor, I narrated two cases to illustrate. First was the story of Suwebatu and how she sneaked into the parable of power: The Governor was coming from Adeyemi Bero Hall, inside the Secretariat, Alausa, after attending a programme there. His eyes caught an old woman, few metres away, struggling to walk. He made a sign to me and I drew closer to him. He told me to take her to my office and find out what we could do for her. Eventually, we set up a retail business for her”.
The second was about Gbenga Adeboye. He was my friend and a popular national comedian. He had kidney problems. His family could not afford the treatment. I informed the Governor. He took up the bills for the dialysis. After about two months, Gbenga died and the Governor financed the burial. He made sure no state funds were used. I knew about everything because I was in charge”.
In contextualising these narratives, I told the audience that: “I couldn’t understand why the same humane Governor was not forthcoming on the issue of severance package for the Special Assistants who had worked diligently and assiduously for the government within the last eight and four years. After approving severance package for Commissioners and Permanent Secretaries, I met with the Governor and appealed to him to also consider extending a similar privilege to the Senior Special Assistants and Special Assistants. My reason was that some, if not most, of these people resigned their jobs to come and work for the government and would need some “stabilisation fund” to take care of themselves after leaving the government and before getting new jobs. To add insult to injury, as the cliche goes, an overzealous officer issued a memo two days ago that we should return the new cars given to us 10 months ago. I told my colleagues to ignore the memo until I must have discussed it with Oga not knowing that a day like this would come. For almost one month plus that we had been debating the issue, the Governor didn’t do anything about it despite my several pleas. For the Government to have abandoned these people at the end of their meritorious service to the state appeared to me as ‘used and dumped’. This is not a good parting impression of a compassionate Governor. Thank you for listening”.
That was how I ended my speech. I refused to look at any direction other than my table as I moved through the silence my speech had created to my table. My colleagues were proud of me but I whispered to them that there should be no handshake. It was a “reminder speech” not a “public indictment”. The MC, a loquacious fellow, possibly flummoxed by my audacity, refused to comment on my speech. He simply called the next speaker. Tunji Bello, my colleague and friend of many years, went straight to his remarks. He spoke glowingly about Oga without commenting on what I said. While he was talking, a Commissioner friend and a Permanent Secretary found their way to my seat and said: “Ipata gba ni e Dapo (Dapo, you are such a rascal)”. I decided not to reply them by keeping a straight face at no object in particular. Mrs Damọla Akran spoke next. It was another fine comment about Oga. Till the end of the event, nobody mentioned anything about my comments. We all dispersed. At least, I have said my own.
I went home to reflect on what I did at the event. After some backscattering, I was convinced that I acted correctly by fighting for my group. I asked myself if I should have said all those things at such a big gathering and on a day that my Oga was being honoured. As far as I was concerned, that was the last opportunity I had to make Oga change his mind and do the needful. It was an issue we had both discussed in his office on several occasions. We had been on it since he approved it for the Commissioners and the Permanent Secretaries. Almost two hours after the event, around 9 pm precisely, my phone rang. It was Mr. Sunny Ajose, the Special Adviser to the Governor. He said Oga wanted to see me in his office immediately and that I should come with the list of my members. I was there with the list in seven minutes since my house was not far from the office. On the manifest that day, Oga was to be at another event organised by “Friends of the Governor”. Instead of attending the event, Oga chose to reconstitute the Exco he already dissolved on Tuesday, 22 May 2007 to address the issue I raised at the send-off ceremony. He presented our request to the Exco and all our prayers were approved that night and everybody was happy. We got money, we got cars. I was happy. My people were happy and Oga was happy. It was a happy send-off for all of us.
By Tuesday, 29 May 2007, when most of the political appointees who worked with Governor Tinubu had left, I didn’t leave. I was waiting for Fashola to resume as the new Governor before leaving. Though before that day I had written a letter to my school to notify the management of my readiness to return to work, I stayed back in order to receive the new Governor as the most senior and visible political appointee in the Governor’s Office. I could remember telling Oga about my staying back but there was no official position on it. I took it as my personal decision. So, the first day Fashola assumed duties, I was there with other civil servants. There wasn’t much ceremony. In less than 15 minutes, all familial niceties were over. As the former Chief of Staff, the transition from one office to another office was seamless. As he entered the Governor’s office to occupy the seat of his “ancestor”, sorry, mentor, I followed him. Even though he was not singing it out, I knew the popular Christian song: “se mí na re Oluwa…..(So, this is me, Oh God)” was on his lips. I knew him to be business-like, so, I didn’t want to stay long in his office. In fact, by the time he was saying: “Dapsy, se kò sì much (Dapsy, hope no problem)”, I got the message. I said: “There are two issues I have come to discuss with you. One, I have written a letter to the university informing the management of my return. But I was waiting to hear from you if there was any need for me to stay back. Two, I think it is important you attend the next Holy Ghost service for thanksgiving since you came for their votes, nay, prayer during the campaign”. To my first question, he said:”Dapsy, this is our government. We are going to do it together. So, don’t go anywhere. We will handle that part when the time comes. As for the second issue, please work it out with the protocol and let me know the date”. I left as soon as I was done.
During his first week in office, I was always the first person to see him. Exactly, the same way I was doing with Oga. Throughout that week, all we were doing was just to greet each other. Nothing substantial was mentioned about my role in government. Then he started making a buffet of personal appointments bringing in different aides and assorted assistants. I had no problems with that because I was not expecting him to appoint me his Special Assistant. I didn’t know what I was expecting but we kept greeting each other every morning. He would say: “Dapsy” and I would reply with: “My H.E (His Excellency)”.
Our first tango, paradoxically, started in the House of God when he came for the July Holy Ghost service on 6 July, 2007. At the governmental level, I had been in charge of the traffic management of the church since we received a letter from Prof. Fola Aboaba sometime in 2005 requesting for personnel support from the government to complement what the church had. Oga passed the letter to me. We had already established LASTMA by then, it was therefore not difficult to send between six and 10 LASTMA staff to assist them. Being a resident in the Redemption Camp and a member of the church, I was already on ground for the coming of the new Governor and I had alerted the Protocol department about his coming. When he arrived, he came with his wife and his Deputy. His wife sat by his left, while I sat by his right with the Deputy Governor, Sarah Sosan, sitting next to the Governor’s wife. He received a very thunderous ovation when his name was mentioned as one of the VIPs attending the service. He decided to leave some minutes after Pastor E. A. Adeboye mounted the pulpit. I was escorting him to his car when he fired a departing salvo: “Dapo, I saw the article you wrote about me. I will reply you at the appropriate time”. The moment he called me Dapo, I knew that there was no more respect or familial courtesy. Definitely, he was referring to a syndicated article I wrote about him on the day of his inauguration – 29 May 2007. The article was titled: “Of Crowds and Power: The Fashola Story”. What rattled me was the venue of disclosure. This guy was seeing and greeting me everyday since he assumed office in the Round House, Alausa. Why he chose the RCCG auditorium and the Holy Ghost service to discuss an article published 39 days after his inauguration would forever remain a riddle that only him could solve. Again, did he just read the article 39 days after it was published or he was just copping out because I didn’t see anything offensive in that article? As far as I was concerned, he is highly cerebral, so, I wouldn’t expect him to spend 39 days deciphering and dissecting a harmless article. I remained unruffled. Though I had started packing my personal belongings from the office, I was still physically visible. I kept shuttling between the school and Alausa. I continued to hold on to what he said: “Dapsy, this is our government. We are going to do it together”. If anything had changed, I wanted him to be bold enough and tell me straight to my face.
Now, this: Before he constituted his Exco, he had been having some debriefing sessions with the Permanent Secretaries. Three weeks into the exercise, I never attended any of the sessions. This particular day, while the officials were waiting for the Governor’s arrival, the Head of Service, Mr Yakub Balogun saw me at the Round House and started hyping me. He was asking me why I had not been attending the sessions and I told him that I had not been invited to attend. He queried: “Does the right hand man of the Governor need to be invited to such a programme”? I laughed. Even within the government, people did not know the politics that was going on because they usually saw the two of us greeting each other familiarly not knowing that politicians’ greetings are mere cosmetics of fraternity. When a politician greets you so excitedly in the public, just take it as sociology of deception. I was not that naive not to know that the two of us (the Governor and I) had been engaging each other in “loyalty and territorial politics”. He didn’t trust me because of my closeness to Oga. In his mind, I would be a good spy for Tinubu. True, Fashola worked for Tinubu but he didn’t walk with Tinubu. I did both. I didn’t trust him too because of the high premium he placed on his cabal. I knew them. They were my friends and area guys. Fuad Oki is my childhood friend and a younger brother. I am a Paddington/Milo stock while he is a Love Garden breed. We can never fight ourselves but we must respect our territories and borderlines. Fuad knew my loyalty was to Tinubu and he respected me for that. I knew Fuad was the emerging leader of the BRF cabal and I had no problem with that. Staying back was my personal decision. Tinubu had nothing to do with it.
By the way, why this sudden suspicion of Tinubu? Was it not this same Tinubu that brought you in as his Chief of Staff? Was it not this same Tinubu that made you the Governor? So, why did he need to plant a spy in your government?
Anyway, when the Governor arrived for the debriefing, the Head of Service dragged me to the conference room where the session was holding. As I entered the room, the Governor also came in but he didn’t notice that I came in with the Head of Service. We greeted each other the normal way: “Dapsy” and “My H.E”. We both pretended as if nothing happened in the church. I sat at the back where I could see everything that was going on. It was a perfect observatory as I could see the HOS kneeling beside the Governor while the latter was passing a message to the former. From where I sat, I couldn’t hear what they were saying but my instinct told me it could be about me. I would have ignored their side but both of them seemed to be enjoying their gossip that they forgot that they were delaying the session. The Permanent Secretary, Engr. Muyideen Abayomi Akinsanya, who was to address the session, had been standing by the projector for almost 15 minutes. Finally, the session commenced after they finished their discussion. The session lasted an hour plus before the Governor signalled that it was time for tea break.
I was moving out of the conference room when the HOS called me aside. I knew it. It was all about Dapo Thomas. He took me to the conference room balcony and told me that..
To be continued
