HOW MALAMI, BUNI IGNORED VP OSINBAJO’S DIRECTIVE
Worried by the narrow escape of the All Progressives Congress (APC), in retaining Ondo State and the broader implications of the pronouncement by the Supreme Court, particularly, as it relates to the position of the National Chairman of APC, Mai Mala Buni, President Muhammadu Buhari, had directed Vice President Yemi Osinbajo to take charge of the legal concerns and come up with a decision in the overall interest of the party.
Osinbajo, too, wasted no time in summoning a meeting of all the lawyers in the cabinet to deliberate on what to do as the congresses were just a day away, Saturday to be precise.
At the meeting, competent sources said, the consensus of opinions was that the party should pause the congresses before weighing other options. But only Malami objected, arguing that the exercise should go ahead, regardless.
After what allegedly turned out a heated debate, everyone at the meeting, agreed that the first step to addressing the “elephant in the room” was to suspend the congresses, which unfortunately, held last weekend.
But Malami would have none of it. “He disagreed with the submissions of others and the President, and insisted that the congresses will go ahead.”
“The resolution reached was to suspend the congresses,” a source privy to the meeting stated.
Having reached the decision to pause the congress, Osinbajo decided to call Governor Buni on the resolution to suspend to congresses.
But to his shock, Buni flatly rejected his directive, insisting like Malami, that the congresses would go ahead as planned. Malami and Buni belong to the CPC tendency of the APC.
It was a bemused Osinbajo, who watched helplessly as Buni refused to obey his directive to suspend the congresses.
According to sources, Malami and Buni’s hesitance to discard experts’ opinions despite glaring danger might have been because some people identified as cabal in the Presidency did not want to lose their current hold on the party especially, that they were believed to have had a choice Presidential candidate in mind, of which a change in the course of the party could undo.
