*Says Tinubu Relocated To Avoid Humiliation Under Buhari
Senator Adams Oshiomhole, the former Edo State governor, former APC National Chairman, and current senator representing Edo North, has made a series of explosive allegations during an appearance on the Mic On Podcast hosted by Seun Okinbaloye, accusing Senate President Godswill Akpabio of having a personal interest in the NNPC because former GCEO Mele Kyari allegedly placed Akpabio’s daughter in “a juicy position” she did not merit, claiming that insecurity in Nigeria started under former Vice President Atiku Abubakar, revealing that President Bola Tinubu “relocated from Nigeria to avoid humiliation” during the Buhari administration, and alleging that the Senate President is “so paranoid” about him that “if he had his way, he would lock me out of the Senate.”
The wide-ranging interview, broadcast on Sunday, saw Oshiomhole address the Senate’s handling of the NNPC investigation, the bench warrant controversy involving Kyari, his feud with the Senate leadership, the opposition presidential candidates, and the state of the 2027 political landscape.
Oshiomhole’s most explosive allegation concerned Akpabio’s personal connection to the NNPC, which he said explained the Senate President’s conduct during the NNPC investigation controversy.
“I think the Senate President had personal interest. I simply walked in, nobody asked me anything, and then I saw the Senate Leader reading a motion or whatever it was,” Oshiomhole recounted.
He then made the specific allegation: “Now I know that the Senate President, they said his daughter was taken by Mele Kyari and put in, well as Nigerians we say, in a juicy position that he probably didn’t merit.”
Oshiomhole broadened the accusation to describe a system of nepotism within the national oil company: “They all have employed their children, their uncles, their cousins, their in-laws into various aspects of NNPC and put them in different positions. If they carry out the payroll of NNPC, you will find that they’ve turned the top level to a family business.”
He maintained that relatives of public officials were entitled to work at the NNPC provided they were qualified and recruited through proper processes: “You can only make an issue if you give them a job they did not merit, they are not qualified for, and you didn’t follow the right procedure. Well, somebody told me that the Senate President’s daughter was taken without, not through a regular interview, not through the normal, but that is his own problem.”
Oshiomhole defended the bench warrant issued against Kyari and his controversial “dead or alive” comment, which had triggered a Senate resolution seeking to distance the chamber from his statements.
He explained the context: Kyari had been invited nine times to appear before the committee investigating the NNPC-Dangote refinery dispute and had failed to appear on every occasion without writing to explain his absence. One senator reported that Kyari had promised to appear, while another said Kyari claimed to be hospitalised in Germany but had produced no medical report.
“Even in a court of law, if you are supposed to appear and the suspect or the accused person is not available for health reasons, you will have to have a medical report,” Oshiomhole stated.
He explained that the “dead or alive” phrase was spoken in response to senators who were claiming Kyari was hospitalised. “I was actually communicating with those people who are claiming he was hospitalised. Bring him here dead or alive. It is just an idiom. I do not believe he was hospitalised, and he did not inform us. I believe they were lying.”
He noted that after his statement, Kyari was “reported as saying he will soon be in Nigeria” — prompting Oshiomhole to ask: “So why didn’t he respond before then?”
Oshiomhole rejected the narrative that his colleagues had turned against him, claiming that more than 80 per cent of senators supported his position.
“More than 80 per cent of my colleagues were with me because what the Senate did was completely in breach of the rules of the Senate and the tradition of the Senate,” Oshiomhole stated.
He argued that the Senate’s resolution to “disown” his statements was procedurally improper: “Before you discuss a matter arising from the proceedings of a committee, the committee is asked to lay its report. The report will contain everything that transpired at the committee level and their recommendation. Now here you have a Senate President who decided that a resolution will be passed, and I think they took that issue in the night, and I believe they acted in a manner that lent itself to huge suspicion.”
He insisted that the power to issue bench warrants derives from the 1999 Constitution, not from the Senate President: “The views I parrot are mine and the powers I exercise are derived from the Constitution of Nigeria, not derived from the Senate President’s office.”
Oshiomhole made a damaging revelation about a separate NNPC investigation committee that the Senate itself had established. He disclosed that the committee set up by Akpabio to investigate the dispute between NNPC and Dangote Refinery over crude oil supply was never allowed to sit.
“I have not been removed as a member of that committee. That committee has not been dissolved. But that committee was never allowed to sit,” Oshiomhole stated.
He recalled that when the committee was inaugurated, journalists warned the chairman that “no inquiry that has to do with NNPC has ever seen the light of the day.” The Senate Leader, who chaired the committee, “confidently assured the journalist that this one will be different.”
“As we speak, we never sat one day,” Oshiomhole said, adding: “Those journalists who are Nigeria’s Google — the senators have come and go, but the journalists have remained in their profession. And they remind us that if it is NNPC, the committee will not sit and nothing will come out of it.”
Asked directly whether his feud with Akpabio was personal or related to speculation about future Senate leadership, Oshiomhole said the Senate President viewed him as a threat.
“Everybody in the Senate knows that if Akpabio had his way, he would lock me out of the Senate. He is so paranoid about anything that has to do with me,” Oshiomhole stated.
He attributed Akpabio’s hostility to political calculations: “He has misled himself into thinking that I am probably the devil he knows. And there are many agents he doesn’t know.”
Oshiomhole said Akpabio’s strategy was to project him in the worst possible light: “In his president’s narrow calculations, he believed that he projected me in the worst light. I believe he doesn’t appreciate that the leadership of any institution including Senate President of Nigeria is in the hand of God, not in the hand of man.”
Oshiomhole turned his fire on the opposition, particularly former Vice President Atiku Abubakar, the ADC presidential candidate, accusing him of having no substantive security policy beyond paying condolence visits.
“The last thing I heard from Atiku was that he would have visited Plateau or Benue. Is paying a condolence visit all that we need to change the security issues? They said, oh Tinubu is not sensitive, giving the mood of the nation. Do you believe that this is at the heart of insecurity? Insecurity started under Vice President Atiku Abubakar,” Oshiomhole stated.
Oshiomhole revealed that Tinubu “relocated from Nigeria” during the Buhari administration to avoid the humiliation arising from policies and decisions he disagreed with.
“Tinubu stood with Buhari even when he was ignored. Tinubu relocated so that he can be free from humiliation arising from either choice of policy, appointment of people and some of the decisions that Buhari was taking,” Oshiomhole stated.
“Remember that the first pronouncement of Buhari was that ‘I belong to everybody and I belong to nobody,’” the senator added, referencing Buhari’s famous post-inauguration statement that was widely interpreted as a signal that Tinubu, despite being the architect of Buhari’s political coalition, would not receive preferential treatment.
Oshiomhole also attacked NDC presidential candidate Peter Obi, tracing what he described as a pattern of political vagrancy from APGA to PDP to Labour Party to ADC to NDC.
“He left Labour Party. His vice-presidential running mate, Datti, who has shown that he can manage a situation, he’s not a trader, he’s built one of the most reputable universities in Nigeria today. He told Obi, ‘Sir, let us fix this Labour Party issue.’ The man said, ‘No, I’m not here to feed a party. I want to fix Nigeria.’ But he should know that the Nigerian Constitution does not allow individuals. It’s a party. It’s a collective,” Oshiomhole stated.
He described Obi’s movement between parties as evidence of an inability to build institutions: “If you cannot manage a room, if we allocate a student room to you and you can’t keep it clean, then you tell me you are going to be running a real estate with several buildings called Nigeria. How can you?”
Oshiomhole also accused Obi of failing to manage security in Anambra State, claiming it took his successor, Governor Willie Obiano, to “begin to destroy the properties of those who he believed had used their areas for kidnapping” and that Obi “could not fix the Bakassi Boys.”
When asked about 2027, Oshiomhole expressed confidence in Tinubu’s re-election. “He will win. Because Nigerians are sensible. Forget about some of the elites who are compromised,” Oshiomhole stated.
