Bola Tinubu, a national leader of
the All Progressives Congress (APC), says “O to ge”, the slogan used to
dislodge Senate President Bukola Saraki is not applicable in Lagos.
Loosely translated as “enough is
enough”, the slogan yielded massive rewards for Kwara APC as the party
displaced all the three sitting senators in the state, won all house of reps
seats and President Muhammadu Buhari defeated Atiku Abubakar, presidential
candidate of the Peoples Democratic (PDP), with over 150,000 votes in the
state.
Some politicians and activists
opposed to Tinubu had attempted to use a similar strategy to stop the emergence
of Babajide Sanwo-Olu, his preferred candidate.
But fielding questions from
reporters after casting his ballot at polling unit 047, ward 3, Ikeja local government area of
the state, Tinubu said in Lagos, the people should consider “o to pe”,
translated as “it’s worthy of praise”.
He said there is a limit to
copying concepts from other states, expressing confidence that his party would
emerge victorious in the exercise.
“The O to ge slogan is for
Ilorin; Lagos is not Kwara state, and there is a limit to copying. Lagos should
be O to pe, not O Toge,” he said.
“We are going to win because we
are the only party in Lagos state, others are pretenders; they come and they
will go away. Leopard cannot change his skin.
“Lagos belongs to the
progressives; we are progressives and we will remain progressives. For Lagos,
it has seen tremendous development since I was the governor; before then, the
highest internally generated revenue (IGR) was N600 million, per month, now it
is over N30 billion.
“No other state has achieved what
we have achieved, financial independence, as Lagos state; no other nation, they
all depend on allocation from the federal government. Lagos State today will
not depend on any allocation before we take care of capital needs; we build
roads and bridges everywhere from Oregun to many parts of the state.
“The real estate value of Lagos
state has exponentially increased than any other state in the federation. We
are the fifth largest economy in Africa; let me see that governor who will do
better than that.”
Tinubu said the the violence
which erupted in the Okota area of state during the presidential and national
assembly elections, is not enough to give the impression that the state is
prone to violence.
He blamed the media of giving
hype to negative stories, saying that such attributes would not bring the
necessary progress.
“I take exception to what
happened in Okota two weeks ago. I am very upset about that incidence placing
Lagos as if we are violent-prone,” he said.
“We have about 1,325 polling
units in Lagos State and only five units were affected in Okota. That should
not mean that the election was a failure in the state.
“If we should rate it, the
election should be about 97 per cent rate of success if right mentally. An
incident in Okota should not be used to generalise the whole election in Lagos
State.
“The success rate should have
been the story, not the ugly incident that should be the story. For the media,
how can five units out of 1,325 units constitute a violent election and were
given hype that Lagos is violent; we cannot do justice to that.
“How can we have development to
the economy and the medium of information? In terms of security, Lagos has
always been ready to celebrate democracy, and violence free. The security
officials are doing well and the INEC has started well too with the logistics
well managed.
“We will continue to welcome
everybody to Lagos State. We cannot stop
people from coming to the state. If Lagos is not good enough, they won’t come.
If the state is plagued with disease or insecurity or unemployment, people
won’t come. Those leaving their states to come to Lagos are welcome, they are
not a threat.”
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