Special Adviser to the President on Media and Publicity, Mr. Femi Adesina, has said that Nigerians are more attracted to President Muhammadu Buhari than some First Republic leaders like Nnamdi Azikiwe, Obafemi Awolowo, Shehu Shagari, and others

Adesina, in an article entitled, ‘The Essential Buhari: VP Osinbajo got it!’, the presidential aide said Nigerians everywhere swarm around President Buhari as bees do to honey.

The spokesman said Vice-President Yemi Osinbajo was right to have described him as “the most popular Nigerian politician that we ever had in this generation”.

Adesina said: “Vice President Yemi Osinbajo is an honest man. Whatever he tells you, please take it serious. You can even take it to the bank, as it’s a cheque that will never bounce.

“Last weekend in London, while speaking with top officials of the Nigerian High Commission, VP Osinbajo said of President Muhammadu Buhari, the Mai Gaskiya (Honest Man): “The President is possibly the most popular Nigerian politician that we ever had in generations. He is possibly the only person, who can go into a place or somewhere without bossing people to gather and they will come and listen to him speak.

“We need that level of credibility to be able to solve problems in our country. And I think because of his level of credibility, despite everything, he is still the only one that can call everyone, and even people who do not necessarily agree with him know that he is a man of his words.”

The presidential adviser noted further that, “There may be a tendency to say; what else do you expect a Number 2 man to say of his principal? He won’t excoriate or flagellate him in public, and because he may possibly need his support for the number one position at a time in the future, so he would say sugary things.

“For a typical politician, ambitious, cold, calculating, scheming, yes. But those of us who work with the duo know that Professor Yemi Osinbajo is not in that mould. He is honest, factual, totally dependent on God for whatever the future holds. Nothing is a matter of life and death, and so he could have chosen to keep quiet about the attributes of the President, so that he wouldn’t be misconstrued.

“When he said Buhari was possibly Nigeria’s most popular politician that we have had in generations, I believe it, not just by the hearing of the ear, but because my eyes have seen it.”

Adesina stressed, “I am old enough to have seen our colourful and even swashbuckling politicians in action. I have seen the great Obafemi Awolowo. The charismatic Nnamdi Azikiwe (Zik of Africa). Shehu Shagari. Aminu Kano. M.K.O Abiola. Bashir Tofa, and many others in action.

“But I have not seen anyone with the kind of attraction, magnetic pull, that Muhammadu Buhari has. And that is round the country, north and south. People swarm round him as bees do to honey.

“I have been round the country with the President. I have also been to several countries of the world with him. I have not seen any other Nigerian leader, past or present, with his kind of allure, pull, fascination, magnetism. And that is why VP Osinbajo is right to have described him as possibly “the most popular Nigerian politician that we ever had in this generation.”

The president’s spokesman also wrote about the return of the President from a medical trip abroad.

He said: “I remember that day in August 2017, when the President returned to the country finally from his medical vacation. From January of that year, he had been in and out a couple of times, but spending weeks and months outside, attending to his health. And finally on August 19, he returned home, triumphantly.

“…We entered the vehicles lined up, and the convoy moved. It was perhaps the longest journey I’d ever witnessed from the airport to the town. Where did they come from? Like locusts, they swarmed onto the road, at many times forcing the convoy into a crawl. I didn’t know that such huge population resided in the communities along the airport road.

“Not induced or procured in any way, the people trooped out in their thousands to welcome the President back home. Multitude of ordinary Nigerians, the ones bearing the brunt of whatever was happening in the country then. They came onto the roads, waving, cheering, heralding the man they loved back into the country. Many times, the convoy was forced to a dead slow, until the President had to wave at them, and they cheered uproariously.

“It took double or triple the normal time, before we could get to the Presidential Villa.

“When about a year later, those who thought they owned the country told the President pontifically to dismount from the horse, and not run for a second term in office, I thought they were overreaching themselves. And so it was. The President ran in 2019, and he won, even with wider margin than he did in 2015, when he had knocked a ruling party off its perch.

“So, when Professor Osinbajo says we possibly have the most colourful, popular politician with us, it is by no means patronizing. Even now, with all the challenges in the country, let President Buhari make a public appearance anywhere, he is still happily received, against the conjecture of naysayers and evil hearts, who conjure unrealistic things….”