President Muhammadu Buhari may have lost the battle to appoint immediate-past Lagos State governor, Mr. Babatunde Raji Fashola (SAN), as Chief of Staff, WESTERN POST can reveal authoritatively this weekend.
The president has reportedly indicated his readiness to appoint Fashola as CoS. He was said to have informed the National Leader of the All Progressives Congress, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, about the plan, but the former Lagos governor, Tinubu, had opposed the idea, saying if President Buhari wanted to give the position of CoS to the South-west, he should allow him nominate someone.
Competent sources, however, said Buhari was ready to go ahead with the appointment of Fashola and was already getting cosy with the ex-Lagos governor. Fashola was part of Buhari’s delegation to the G7 Summit in Germany in June and shared some close moments with the president.
But WESTERN POST has learnt that the emergence of former Lagos State Attorney-General and Commissioner for Justice Ade Ipaye as a possible Chief of Staff to Vice President Yemi Osinbajo may have put spanners in the work for Fashola.
Fifty-two years old Ipaye, a prominent legal practitioner, is already working in the Vice President’s office and is said to have been designated as Chief of Staff, though his appointment is yet to be announced officially.
If appointed, he will be Deputy Chief of Staff in the presidency.
“With Ipaye from Lagos as Chief of Staff to Osinbajo, it is unlikely that Fashola also from Lagos can be appointed by Buhari as CoS,” said a source.
Contacted over the matter of appointment of Chief of Staff, the President’s Special Adviser, Media and Publicity, Mr. Femi Adesina, said the appointment of CoS was the prerogative of President Buhari and “he will make the appointment when he chooses to.”
There has been no love lost between Asiwaju Tinubu and Fashola. Fashola rode on Tinubu’s back to become governor in 2007. But the duo had become estranged over the handling of some issues of the state not long after.
By the time of nomination for the 2011 governorship election, Fashola had lost Tinubu’s confidence and the APC national leader had to be strongly persuaded to back Fashola for re-election, though not supporting him would have engendered a bitter fight in the state.
In the build-up to the 2015 poll in Lagos, Fashola had sponsored his former Commissioner, Supo Shasore, to contest for APC governorship primaries against Tinubu’s preferred candidate, Akinwunmi Ambode, who won the party’s ticket and was eventually elected governor of the state.
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