Alhaji Shettima Yerima, National Leader of the Arewa Youth Consultative Forum, has stated that the President Bola Tinubu he knows as a “pro-democracy activist” is no longer occupying the Aso Rock Presidential Villa in Abuja.
Those who were pro-democracy campaigners in the trenches with the president to enthrone the nation’s embryonic democracy now have misgivings about him, according to Yerima.
The National President of the AYCF, a former Youth Director of the political pressure group NADECO, which fought the late General Sani Abacha military junta in the early 1990s, stated that based on the current policies of the ruling APC administration, he hoped that President Tinubu had not been hijacked by the usual “Aso Rock Cabal” as experienced in the immediate past regime.
He specifically questioned several of the president’s nominations, which he believes favor the old battalions over the young.
“Some of us now have reservations about the President,” Yerima told Arewa PUNCH. The Bola Tinubu I know and with whom I formerly worked in the trenches is no longer the same person. I hope this isn’t what I’m thinking, and I don’t want to believe he’ll be hijacked by the same people.
“I expect that by the coming of Tinubu, certain things would have happened where he would begin to believe in this present generation than the old men of the past who had worked with him and the same people coming back tactically behind the doors. Some of them have a lot of influence on the government. I hope that he will not allow himself to be carried away.
“He should learn from what happened to his predecessor. I hope he will be remembered positively because my prayers are that this present government that I ascribed as ‘our government’ should live up to expectations.
“I have my reasons when I said it’s our government. It is our government because it’s a product of our struggle. Even though I have worked closely with him and recently, from a far distance, I still relate very well to him. I am one of those behind the scenes with my counterpart, Muhajid Asari Dokubo, making statements for Tinubu’s presidency.”
The youth leader admonished the president to learn from former President Muhammadu Buhari, who surrounded himself with those who caged him while presiding over the affairs of the country between 2015 and 2023.
Sahara Reporters