The Presidency has dismissed comments made by former Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Boss Mustapha, which appeared to downplay the role of President Bola Tinubu in the emergence of Muhammadu Buhari as the presidential candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in 2014.
Senior Special Assistant to the President on Media and Publicity, Temitope Ajayi in a statement on Wednesday, said Mustapha’s remarks at a public book launch amounted to a deliberate misrepresentation of recent political history.
He described the attempt to sideline Tinubu’s contributions as inaccurate and Historically misleading.
He said: “Let’s even leave the general election that the then General Buhari won to become president in 2015, there was no way he would have won the election to be president without first becoming the presidential candidate of his party APC.
“Buhari would not have won the APC primary election at the Teslim Balogun Stadium, Lagos, in 2014 without President Tinubu, who mobilized the APC governors and the South West delegates to move Buhari’s way.”
Buhari, who had contested and lost presidential elections in 2003, 2007, and 2011, only secured victory in 2015 under the APC, a new party formed through a merger of key opposition blocs.
Ajayi argued that Buhari’s success at the polls followed his emergence as the APC candidate, a development that would not have been possible without Tinubu’s pivotal support. He criticised Mustapha’s statements, warning against what he called revisionist narratives aimed at diminishing the contributions of key political figures.