THE TINUBU SCHOOL AND THE ONDO QUESTION: WHY DISCIPLINE GRADUATES LEADERS
Governor Aiyedatiwa Upholds Party Supremacy As Ondo APC Faces Final Examination On Consensus
The ongoing consensus arrangements in Ondo State have reignited a popular saying across the South West: no Ondo State indigene registered in the Tinubu School of Political Mentorship has ever truly graduated, not because the school lacks teachers, but because the students from Ondo often drop out due to arrogance, greed, desperation, self-seeking styles, and disrespect for institutions and leadership. The other five South West states send students to the same school. They sit in the same classes, take the same lessons, and they graduate. They become governors, ministers, senators, and party custodians. Ondo students write the same entrance exam, but they rarely collect a certificate. The reason is not intelligence. It is temperament.
The Tinubu School has a simple curriculum. First subject: Party is supreme. Second subject: Leaders are not your mates. Third subject: Wait for your turn. Fourth subject: Bring value before you demand power. Fifth subject: When the caucus decides, you obey. In Lagos, Ogun, Oyo, Osun, and Ekiti, students repeat those five subjects until they become reflex. Babajide Sanwo-Olu waited. Dapo Abiodun waited. Gboyega Oyetola waited. Biodun Oyebanji waited. Dr. Obafemi Hamzat waited in 2011, waited in 2015, and when the Governance Advisory Council asked him to step down in 2018, he did not argue. He said “the party is supreme” and he graduated that day into the Deputy Governorship. Today he is the most senior executive in Lagos after the Governor. That is what graduation looks like.
The Ondo story is different, and it is why the saying persists. The students arrive brilliant and ambitious. They learn the theory of loyalty in the morning, but by afternoon they tell the teacher that the syllabus is outdated. They are told to collapse their structure for the consensus candidate, and they reply that their structure is bigger than the party. They are offered compensation, and they call it insult because they want the crown today, not tomorrow. They hear “the elders have decided” and they rush to Orange FM to say the elders are cabals. They obtain nomination forms after the family has agreed on who should go. In the Tinubu School, that is not called courage. It is called failure, and failure does not graduate.
This is the context for the present consensus arrangements in Ondo State and for Governor Lucky Aiyedatiwa’s calculus. The Governor is not inventing a new doctrine. He is applying the old curriculum that has produced every successful APC leader in the South West. The stakeholders met, as the GAC meets in Lagos. They zoned, as the GAC zones in Lagos. They appealed to certain aspirants to stand down, as Tinubu appealed to Hamzat in 2018. The Governor adopted the position, as Tinubu adopted the GAC position in 2018. That is the school in session.
The dissident aspirants who disrespected the stakeholders’ decision and went ahead to obtain forms are repeating the old Ondo pattern that the saying warns about. The pattern has five marks. First is arrogance. The belief that “I am too big to step down” even when Hamzat, a PhD holder and prince, stepped down. Second is greed. The refusal to take a board or a cabinet slot today because only the ticket is good enough, even when Hamzat took Deputy Governor and turned it into a platform. Third is desperation. The rush to court and to radio within forty-eight hours, instead of the patience that made Sanwo-Olu wait from 2007 to 2019. Fourth is disrespect for institutions. The claim that a caucus of sitting governors, senators, and elders is “imposing”, when the same process in Lagos is called “leadership”. Fifth is selective amnesia and political entitlement. Many of these dissident aspirants are direct beneficiaries of the same party structure they now attack. Four years ago, when the indirect primary was tilted in their favor, they did not call it “imposition.” They did not grant press conferences on Orange FM to condemn the process. They did not rush to court. They took the ticket, smiled for the cameras, and called it “internal democracy.” Today, when the same party structure asks them to sacrifice for the collective, they suddenly discover that the process is “undemocratic” and the elders are “cabals.” In the Tinubu School, you do not accept a manipulated primary when it crowns you and then burn the party when it doesn’t. That is not principle. That is entitlement.
Governor Aiyedatiwa’s response is not personal vengeance. It is pedagogy. He is insisting that this set of Ondo students must graduate. Graduation means you accept the consensus. Graduation means you do not obtain a form after the family has decided. Graduation means you take the compensation and work for the party, like Hamzat took Deputy Governor and delivered Alimosho. Graduation means you do not grant interviews to attack the Governor who is only enforcing the syllabus. In Lagos, the students who graduated are now principals. In Ondo, the students who refused to graduate are still writing JAMB.
The comparison with other South West states is not to shame Ondo. It is to show Ondo the mirror. Ogun had a bitter primary in 2019. Dapo Abiodun’s main challengers were asked to step down. Some grumbled, but they did not go to court. Today they are commissioners and board chairmen. They graduated. Ekiti had a crowded field in 2022. Biodun Oyebanji emerged through consensus. The others were compensated in forty-eight hours. They did not go to radio. They graduated. Osun had chaos in 2022 and the party paid for it by losing the state. Ondo lost seats in 2023 for the same reason. The lesson is uniform. Where students obey the teacher, the school produces governors. Where students abuse the teacher, the school produces commentators.
The present arrangements in Ondo are therefore a final examination. The Governor has placed the question paper on the table. It has only one question: “Do you accept party supremacy?” Hamzat answered yes in 2018 and passed. Jandor answered no and failed. The dissidents in Ondo are writing their answers now. If they choose arrogance, greed, desperation, disrespect, and selective amnesia, the saying will be proven true again. Another set of Ondo students will have attended the Tinubu School without graduating. If they choose loyalty, patience, and obedience, the saying will be broken and Ondo will produce its own Hamzats who will govern tomorrow because they agreed to wait today.
Party supremacy is not about silencing ambition. It is about sequencing ambition. The Tinubu School teaches that you can be anything, but you cannot be everything at the same time. You step down today so you can step up tomorrow. You accept Deputy so you can become Governor. You obey the GAC so you can one day sit in the GAC. That is the curriculum. That is the calculus. And that is why Governor Aiyedatiwa is right to insist that Ondo students must either graduate this time or the party will move on without them, just as Lagos moved on without Jandor and won everything.
The school is still open. The teacher is still talking. The only question is whether Ondo students will drop out again, or whether this time, for the first time, they will stay, listen, obey, and finally graduate.
Signed:
Amb. H. K. Bello
Political Strategist
Ehinogbe Ward 1, Owo
Ondo State
For Media Enquiries:
Office of Amb. H. K. Bello
Owo, Ondo State
Email: mggelhkb@gmail.com
Tel: 08034404217
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