Meranda, Sanwo-Olu At Crossroads As Real Presidential Directive Unveiled, New Speaker May Resign

Except the unexpected happens, the newly appointed Speaker of the Lagos State House of Assembly, Rt. Hon. Mojisola Meranda is expected to resign early this week. Despite widely circulated online newspapers’ reports that President Bola Tinubu, GCFR has directed that Rt. Hon. Mudashiru Obasa should be returned as Speaker of the Lagos State House of Assembly, a very reliable Presidency sources reliably confirmed to Theliberationnews that the president did not explicitly gave such an order.

We reliably gathered that the president only gave the Governor’s Advisory Council(GAC) members that visited him recently the condition that must be met before Meranda’s installation can stand.

According to our presidency sources, the commander-in-chief of the armed forces of the Federal Republic of Nigeria took time to lecture his GAC guests from Lagos on the significance of political consultations and zonal balancing.

The president’s GAC guests had gone to Abuja to brief him on the surreptitiously orchestrated removal of Obasa as speaker on January 13,2025 while on break in faraway United States during the Assembly’s last recess period.

Theliberationnews sources revealed that the president allowed his guests to state their mission at the Presidential Villa while he listened with rapt attention. It was the chairman of GAC, the revered elder statesman, Prince Tajudeen Olusi that led the presentation on why they visited the president.

After his presentation, the president, in unmistaken terms, clearly expressed disappointment at the hasty manner Obasa’s removal was done without enough stakeholders’ inputs. The sources said the president felt scandalised that “he was made to know about Obasa’s removal like every other persons on the streets which he vehemently considered highly discourteous.”

Theliberationnews sources further confirmed that the president rightly believes that being an important stakeholder in the Lagos project, the GAC leaders, including the party leadership and their allies in the executive arm who masterminded the legislative coup against the removed speaker should have extended the courtesy of briefing him before embarking upon such a volatile political voyage.

Theliberationnews sources revealed that President Tinubu pointed out an unforgivable political gaffe committed by the legislative coupists in terms of their unthoughtful choice of Meranda thereby insensitively altering Lagos State zonal political configuration. “How do you expect me to explain to Lagosians that l stood by and allowed the governor and the new speaker to come from Lagos Central geo-political zone while also the current deputy governor and the deputy speaker both hailing from the Lagos East part of the centre of excellence while leaving out Lagos West where Obasa hails from,” the president declared.

The president considers above created scenario as “indefensible and unjust to the good people of Lagos West with the highest number of local governments, population and voters in Lagos State.”

A breakdown of figures using the twenty constitutionally listed local government councils areas explicitly underscored the president’s constructive position.The Lagos West senatorial district controls ten(10) local council areas including Agege, Ajeromi-Ifelodun, Alimosho, Amuwo-Odofin, Badagry, Ifako-Ijaiye, Ikeja, Mushin, Ojo and Oshodi-Isolo.

Lagos Central controls only five(5) local government councils including Apapa, Eti-Osa, Lagos Island, Lagos Mainland and Surulere.

Lagos East equally controls five(5) local government councils’ areas that includes Epe, Ibeju-Lekki, Ikorodu, Kosofe, and Somolu.

In the president’s justifiably sensible reasoning, the current unfair arrangement foisted by the stakeholders in the legislative coup that removed Obasa cannot stand and should not be allowed to stand by all fair minded people in the centre of excellence.

President Tinubu, according to Theliberationnews sources, has in clear terms directed the GAC leaders that visited him to go and do either of two things for the sake of meaningful geo-political balancing of Lagos State. “Go and tell your people in the state assembly to either remove Moji Meranda, the new speaker or, remove governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu for the sake of equitable balancing and political peace across the zones in Lagos,” he unequivocally was said to have directed.

Theliberationnews can authoritatively reveal that this presidential advice has left the Sanwo-Olu and Meranda camps in serious quandary because they know that such epochal advice from the president is nothing but an order that must be carried out.

Governor Sanwo-Olu, according to Theliberationnews feelers in Lagos House, is not ready to sacrifice his position for Meranda to stay as speaker. The president is awaiting the arrived decision of the GAC leaders and other stakeholders soon. The ball is in the court to pick either of the laid out presidential options.

Currently, high wire political networking and meetings are ongoing between Sanwo-Olu and the Meranda teams that might be left with no other option but sit round-the-table with the removed speaker so as to fulfill the presidential options dished out to them, in record time. This fact has indeed been conveyed to the assembly legislators who are currently considering available options for them including possibly approaching their removed speaker.

Obviously, with the ongoing unexpected fallout from the legislative coup, Meranda might be certainly advised to step down anytime this week since the governor seems hell bent on retaining his position.

Lagosians and other Nigerians are watching. Probably with a thread of providence, it is not impossible to see Obasa regaining his seat for reasons of political expediency.