Atiku’s Aide Slams Tinubu Over Onanuga’s Comment on Buhari, Demands Immediate Sack

Phrank Shaibu, Special Assistant on Public Communication to former Vice President Atiku Abubakar, has called on President Bola Tinubu to immediately dismiss his Special Adviser on Information and Strategy, Bayo Onanuga, over what he described as a disrespectful and politically motivated attack on the late former President Muhammadu Buhari.

The controversy was triggered by a now-deleted post Onanuga made on X (formerly Twitter), where he shared a video of a massive crowd with the caption: “A video to rejig the memory of those who claimed that only Buhari’s 13 million votes gave him the presidency in 2015 and 2019.” The post was shared on Tuesday, while arrangements for Buhari’s burial were underway in Daura, Katsina State.

In a fiery response posted on X, Shaibu condemned Onanuga’s remarks as a disgraceful low for the Tinubu administration, accusing the presidency of launching a propaganda war against a deceased leader in a bid to deflect attention from its failures.

“This is how low the Tinubu presidency has sunk,” Shaibu wrote. “Fighting ghosts because it cannot face Nigerians. Blaming a dead man because the living one in Aso Rock is clueless.”

He argued that the fact Onanuga posted such a message during Buhari’s burial preparations indicates a deliberate move sanctioned from the highest levels of government.

“No presidential aide attacks a former head of state who is not even buried without clearance from the top,” he stated. “If Tinubu did not approve this gutter-level assault on Buhari’s legacy, let him prove it—sack Onanuga now.”

Shaibu accused the Tinubu administration of using Buhari’s legacy as a scapegoat to mask its own shortcomings, including rising inflation, naira depreciation, fuel shortages, and widespread insecurity.

“Let’s be honest. Tinubu has failed in record time. His ‘renewed hope’ is now renewed hunger,” he said. “This is not governance. It is a circus of insecurity, where those in charge panic at the truth and lash out at the dead because they’ve lost control of the living.”

Calling the post a “cowardly hit job,” Shaibu said the presidency’s obsession with Buhari’s enduring popularity—especially his consistent 12 million-vote base—reveals insecurity and desperation within Tinubu’s camp.

“If Buhari was so irrelevant, why is the Tinubu presidency trembling at his shadow? Why drag his corpse into a propaganda war just to defend a regime choking under its own incompetence?” he asked.

Shaibu concluded by urging Nigerians to recognize what he called a dangerous pattern of scapegoating, and reiterated his call for Onanuga’s dismissal.

“If this is the best Tinubu’s media team can offer, then we truly have no leadership—only loud bitterness masking quiet failure,” he said.