Ceaseless campaigns of calumny against Vice President Yemi Osinbajo are being masterminded by people with interest in the 2023 presidency, his Senior Special Assistant on Media and Publicity, Laolu Akande, has said.
However, he said the second citizen was currently not thinking about succeeding his boss in the next general election as his traducers have come to believe.
Akande disclosed this in an Instagram Live session with ace celebrity journalist, Dele Momodu.
The VP’s spokesman said his boss’s traducers were trying to tarnish his image ahead of the 2023 polls by sponsoring ridiculous stories against him.
Recall that a US-based political blogger, Jackson Ude recently accused Osinbajo of receiving N4 billion from suspended Acting Chairman of the Economic and Financial Commission (EFCC), Ibrahim Magu.
The vice president vehemently denied the allegation and petitioned the Inspector General of Police, Mohammed Adamu to investigate the matter.
Also, the VP’s daughter Kiki was alleged to have got N800 million from her father to buy a property on Durban Street, Wuse 2 area of Abuja, where her shop GLAM’D Africa is located.
Kiki and the property owner denied the allegation.
According to Akande, the lies and false reports about Osinbajo in the traditional and social media space will not be enough to distract him.
“It is ridiculous and incredible, some of the types of stories that are out there. What I have found out is that being the vice president and is a very active vice president that understands how to connect with the people, that rising profile itself, in a political atmosphere that is extremely murky, I think those who have all kinds of unscrupulous ideas, people with despicable agenda have reasons to try to smear the person that is holding that office.
“Like I said, because of the position that he holds, next to the president and because of all the kinds of imaginations that people have to think about him, I think, up to a point, he has become a kind of a political target,” Akande said.
He added, “Personally, I don’t have a doubt in my mind that there are people who have political objectives who might consider him (Osinbajo) a threat. But what I like to tell Nigerians is, I’m his spokesperson and all I know he wants to do is to do this job that he has been given very well and he doesn’t have any other plans right now about any such thing. I can tell you that clearly.
“He has said to me several times; see Laolu, this is not a monarchy, we are going to be here for four or at best eight years. Let’s just focus and do the work so that when we are gone, people will say we did this and that. So, he is entirely consumed with the job. I’m his spokesperson and we have not talked about what he is going to do in 2023. What’s the point?”
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