Daily Independent (Lagos)
Olusola Balogun
2 January 2009
Last week's open rapprochement by former President Olusegun Obasanjo with his estranged kinsman, Senator Ibikunle Amosun, is giving Ogun State Governor, Gbenga Daniel, goose pimples with members of the governor's think-tank working round the clock on how to stave off a possible backlash on the governor.
Amosun, the flag bearer of the All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP) in the April 2007 governorship poll is presently in court challenging Daniel's victory.
Amosun is claiming that he won the election and should be so declared, adding that Daniel was sworn in due to the manipulation of the ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). The case has been listed for full hearing at the Court of Appeal, Ibadan on January 23.
Daniel has also endured a love lost relationship with several leaders of PDP over what a source described as "his penchant to want to dominate the party and lord it over everyone."
The Governor's fragile relationship with former President Olusegun Obasanjo boiled over recently when the counsel to the former leader, Afe Babalola (SAN), petitioned the Inspector General of Police, the Director General of the State Security Service (SSS) and President Umaru Yar'Adua, alleging that Daniel was after the life of Senator Iyabo Obasanjo-Bello.
However, attempts were made to play down speculations of a rift between Obasanjo and Daniel as the governor visited the PDP Board of Trustees (BOT) Chairman in his expansive hilltop residence in Abeokuta as part of New Year festivities.
Daniel, who has also fallen out with several key leaders of the party in the state like former Minister of State for Finance, Jubril Martins-Kuye, Speaker of the House of Representatives, Dimeji Bankole, and former Minister of Mines, Sarafa Tunji Isola, surprised watchers of Ogun politics when after a thanksgiving service at the Cathedral of St. Peters, Ake, Abeokuta drove in a convoy to Obasanjo's residence where he was received by the former President, members of his family including Major Adeboye Obasanjo and Doyin Okupe among others.
However, a competent source close to Daniel told Saturday Independent that the open show of conviviality between Obasanjo and Amosun "worries the governor to no end."
The source claimed that "he (Daniel) saw that show as a very dangerous development for him as a person and for his position as Governor. That was a bad move on their part and it is very dangerous in all respects. Amosun is still at the tribunal challenging our victory in 2007 and his case is coming up soon. So this development is giving everybody a problem.
"I can tell you we cannot afford to have 'Baba' and Amosun working together and that is the crux of the matter. They must not work together on the petition, if they do, then we will be in hot soup," he noted.
The source added that the Governor is already working on assembling a group of traditional leaders and other elders to meet with Obasanjo to discuss further.
Although, the source was not very optimistic about the possibility of the team achieving success, given the acrimony that attended the last effort by leaders of the PDP in the southwest to reconcile the warring factions in the state.
The source, however, hinted that the governor is already considering other options should the party suddenly become too hot.
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