On the day of the presidential election, if you don’t have up to N1bn, you have no hope of winning - Falola

macfranc007 February 04, 2018 Nigeria News today & Breaking news ▷ Read Nigerian newspapers 24/7 Nkem Ikeke

- A History professor at the University of Texas, Toyin Falola, has warned thatBola Tinubu may decide to withdraw support for President Muhammadu Buhari

- According to him, if this happens that will be the end of Buhari's second term agenda

- He said in the next 12 months, there will be no governance in Nigeria as all politicians will be doing is make empty promises ahead of 2019 elections

A professor of History at the University of Texas, Toyin Falola, has said President Muhammadu Buhari is at risk of losing popularity before the 2019 elections.

Speaking to The Punch, he said if the national leader of the All Progressives Congress (APC) Bolaji Ahmed Tinubu dumps Buhari, that might be the end of his regime.

“We don’t know what Bola Tinubu will do because if he says that he will not support Buhari, the southwest is gone. Already the south south, southeast, middle belt and the Kanuri are gone. The Boko Haram insurgency is a (source of) deep anger of the Kanuri against the Fulani that has merged into the pre -existing Boko Haram issue.

“Once Tinubu leaves him, that is the end of his regime. That is one scenario,” said.

According to Falola, Buhari has the power to rig the election if Nigerians don’t want him.

He explained: "The second scenario is that he (Buhari) controls the whole security apparatus and the Independent National Electoral Commission. He will drop electronic voting and win the election. You don’t have to ask me why. He only has to fill the ballot boxes and he is back in Aso Rock. So, he also has his own nuclear option which is ‘if you don’t want me, I can rig the election’.

“He has the power to do that. In the next 12 months, there will be no governance in Nigeria. What we are going to have is politicking; nobody will be talking about development anymore. They will talk about it as empty promises, which is what they are clever at doing.”

The professor stated further that Nigerian politics is all about money. He said system, even the media is over-monetised.

“On the day of the presidential election, if you don’t have up to N1bn, you have no hope of winning,” he added.

On the issue of the proposed cattle colony by the federal government, he described it as a very dumb idea.

Falola said: “I think the government is not going to do that because you cannot go to other people’s land and turn it to a colony for people who do not belong there to stay.”

In an earlier report by NAIJ.com, the adviser to the president on National Assembly matters, Alhaji Suleiman Abdurahaman Kawu Sumaila, said nobody can stop President Muhammadu Buhari from contesting in the 2019 presidential election.

According to him, even the combined former president Olusegun Obasanjo and Senator Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso cannot stop Buhari for securing a second tenure.

He disclosed this during the visit of the Vice President Yemi Osinbajo to Kano state for a private wedding on Saturday.

EXCLUSIVE: Be patient with President Buhari, Femi Adesina tells Nigerians - on NAIJ.com TV