The Chief of Staff to the President, Femi Gbajabiamila has recalled how he almost lost his appointment in 2025 due to the alleged involvement of Desmond Elliot in the impeachment plot against the Lagos State House of Assembly Speaker, Mudashiru Obasa.
Leadership crisis rocked the Lagos House of Assembly as lawmakers moved and adopted a motion to impeach Speaker Obasa on January 13, 2025, while he was vacationing in the United States.
The motion was adopted by the majority of the House of Assembly members, leading to the emergence of his deputy, Mojisola Meranda, as the new Speaker, becoming the first female to occupy the position.
Upon returning to the country, Obasa rejected the impeachment as illegal and unconstitutional, insisting that due process was not followed.
After 49 days in office, Meranda stepped down as speaker, and Obasa was reinstated following President Tinubu’s intervention.
Speaking in a now-trending video on social media on Thursday, the CoS disclosed that President Tinubu summoned him to his residence in Abuja at the height of the Obasa impeachment saga.
According to the video, Gbajabiamila narrated how he was confronted by the president over intelligence reports linking Elliot, who represents Surulere Constituency I in the Lagos State House of Assembly, to efforts to destabilise the state legislature.
The CoS, while addressing stakeholders during the All Progressives Congress (APC) meeting in Lagos, said the involvement of Elliot nearly cost him his job.
He said, “I almost lost my job as chief of staff last year because of Desmond Elliot. He’s alive today; you can go and verify with him.
Gbajabiamila said he defended Elliot and insisted the lawmaker was not among those behind the crisis in the Lagos assembly before speaking with him.
He said, “Immediately, I said to Mr President, no, no, no. Desmond is not part of them. I haven’t even spoken to him. I didn’t know whether he was part of that. I said, no, he’s not part of them.
“Of course, the president will not believe that Desmond will do such a thing, and I don’t know about it. If it were not that I had the kind of relationship I had with the president, I wouldn’t be here today.”
Gbajabiamila said after the meeting with Tinubu, he called and cautioned Elliot, ordering him to issue a press statement to distance himself from the impeachment move if he was complicit.
The CoS also disclosed that three days after meeting the President, the director-general of the Department of State Services (DSS) called to inform him that there were allegations that he was backing Elliot in the impeachment scheme.
Gbajabiamila said, “Three days later, the Director General of DSS called me and said there’s a problem. Your name is being mentioned all over the place. I told the DSS, I’m going to have to talk to Desmond.”
The president’s chief of staff also accused Elliot of stoking religious tension in the Surulere constituency and causing division between the Muslims and the Christians.
“I’ve never prepared for this, where people bring religious division to this our constituency. For Desmond to be getting Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN), to be writing official letters to the party and to me, and causing division between the Muslims and the Christians,” he said.
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