Two billboards with the inscription ‘BAT 2023’ and a popular photograph of Bola Tinubu, a former governor of Lagos State and national leader of the ruling All Progressives Congress Party, has been mounted on a building a few meters away from the Lagos State Government Secretariat in Alausa, Ikeja.
The large billboards are so obvious that anyone coming from Allen Avenue towards Alausa, or from Ojodu Berger towards Ikeja would notice it a distance away from the building on which it is mounted.
Although the APC chieftain has yet to say anything concerning his political ambition for the 2023 elections, there have been rumours that he is planning run for the Presidency in 2023.
It will be recalled that a former Senate President Bukola Saraki had claimed last year that the former governor was supporting President Muhammadu Buhari’s re-election with the hope that Buhari would, in turn, support him in 2023.
Tinubu’s recent statement concerning the death of the Afenifere Chieftain, Pa Fasoranti’s daughter by suspected herdsmen has spurred controversies among Nigerians, many of which have been asking if Tinubu was just being apologetic to the northern elites and President Muhammadu Buhari to get their support for his 2023 ambition.
It will be recalled that earlier in July, Tinubu’s spokesperson, Tunde Rahman, had reacted to pictures, caps, T-shirts, shirts and even leaflets with Bola Tinubu 2023 embossed on them.
Rahman had said, “We have seen pictures of caps, T-shirts, shirts and even leaflets with Bola Tinubu 2023 embossed on them purportedly by a faceless group which christened itself ‘Asiwaju Reloaded Ambassadors’.
“Neither the group nor its souvenirs are known to Asiwaju Bola Tinubu. We hereby, through this medium, categorically deny any knowledge of the group and dissociate Asiwaju Tinubu from the group’s unsolicited and unwarranted materials.”