Bisi Akande, a former governor of Osun state, has claimed that the #EndSARS protest of 2020 was “manufactured” by the ‘Obidient’ movement to stop the presidential ambition of Bola Tinubu.
‘Obidients’ are supporters of Peter Obi, presidential candidate of the Labour Party (LP) in the 2023 election.
Akande spoke in an interview with Edmund Obilo which was posted on YouTube.
The All Progressives Congress (APC) chieftain also claimed that the #EndSARS protest was conceived in and funded from the United States.
“EndSARS was aimed and designed to be the end of Tinubu. Those behind the EndSARS knew what they were doing,” Akande said.
“The Obidients were behind the EndSARS. It was manufactured from America just to stop Tinubu.
“The Obidients came from America to do EndSARS, which later became a movement. They could not form a party so they joined whichever party.
“It was well-planned and organised with a lot of money from America.”
Akande narrated how he persuaded Tinubu to contest the 2023 presidential election amid a paucity of funds.
He said Tinubu was reluctant to join the race ab initio.
“They called me and said, ‘come, there is trouble. Anybody that talks to him about the presidency, he was quarrelling with them’.
“I was in Lagos so I met him. He said, ‘Baba, do you have money? If I had the kind of money that people have to be president, I would rank with Dangote’.”
Akande said he told Tinubu that he would not be running for the presidency for himself but for the Yoruba ethnic group.
In October 2020, Nigerians protested against police brutality — under the #EndSARS banner.
The #EndSARS protest sprung from decades-old brutality and extortion of young Nigerians by a notorious police unit called SARS — an acronym for the Special Anti-Robbery Squad.
