Babachir David Lawal, an elder statesman who served as Secretary General of the Federation under former President Muhammadu Buhari’s administration, has shared a conversation he allegedly had with Bola Tinubu when Buhari became president
In a video recently shared on YouTube by Daily Trust TV, Lawal said during the early days of Buhari’s presidency, many people were calling Buhari “Baba Go Slow” because they felt his government was not making progress. He said in a casual chat, Tinubu compared Buhari’s government to a pilot who takes an aircraft to the takeoff point and then switches off the engine, causing everything to stop.
Lawal said Tinubu told him that to make the government work better, they needed to focus on two key positions: the Secretary to the Government of the Federation and Chief of Staff. He said Tinubu told him that having the right people in these roles would make a big difference. He also said this conversation happened before he was made SGF by Buhari.
In Lawal’s words: “Tinubu told me Buhari’s government is like pilot who drives aircraft to takeoff point and switch off the engine, nothing was moving. He started saying that we must work on Buhari and two people that he needed at that time was the Secretary to the Government of the Federation and the Chief of Staff. Bola will tell me, ‘if he gives us these two people, we don’t need to go to him, we can work with these two people’ which is the truth”
Watch the video of the interview from 30:28
