Former Lagos State Governor and President-elect, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, has debunked stories making the rounds that he held a secret meeting with the Chief Justice of Nigeria (CJN) Olukayode Ariwoola in London in order to gain the favour of the judiciary as he sets to face his opponents in the 2023 presidential election as the battle for his mandate hots up.
The story of a secret meeting went viral on Thursday after several media outlets carried a story of the CJN disguising as a cripple on a wheelchair and seen being wheeled into an unknown location, with the news being that he was heading for a secret meeting with Tinubu.
But in a statement signed by the Director, Media and Publicity of the All Progressives Congress (APC) Presidential Campaign Council (PCC), Bayo Onanuga, denying the allegations, Tinubu said there is no iota of truth in the story as he is currently in France and could not have also been in London at the same time holding the said meeting.
“Our attention has been drawn to the grossly fake, misleading and malicious story about the Chief Justice of Nigeria Olukayode Ariwoola disguising to meet President-elect Bola Tinubu in London,” the statement said.
“The story was a pure concoction from the hallucinating minds of hatchet men bent on creating doubts and public distrust about the legitimacy of our recent election, which was won by Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu.
We refute emphatically that there has been no clandestine meeting between the President-elect and the respected Chief Justice of our country, any where. It’s pure fabricated news, groundless in fact and authenticity.
“To show that the story was a mere salacious fiction, meant to draw traffic to the discredited purveyor, it claimed the Chief Justice left Nigeria for London on 11 March, on a wheel chair to board a plane.
“The President-elect left Nigeria on 21 March, 10 clear days thereafter. What kind of appointment or secret meeting will the two men have arranged in London, with so wide disparate arrival dates, except in the imagination of the false news merchants?
“We can confirm that the President-elect, who left Nigeria Tuesday has not been in London. He is right now in France to have a deserved rest, after a hectic campaign that began in January 2022. He will go to London thereafter before proceeding to Mecca for the lesser Hajj.
“As we move towards inauguration on 29 May, 2023, Nigerians should expect more false and salacious news from a section of the Nigerian media, on the payroll of the opposition,” Onanuga said.
