There are always three sides to a story: the first side, the second side, and the truth. Not a few people who witnessed the dirty public fight between the Chief Executive Officer of Oando Wale Tinubu and one of its major shareholders, Dahiru Mangal must have wondered if there wasn’t more to their squabble than meets the eye.

It will be recalled that Wale, the cousin of APC national leader Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, almost sank without trace in the flood of public scandal that followed Mangal’s petition to the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and the resultant suspension of Oando shares on the floor of the stock exchange. It took the intervention of Emir of Kano Muhammadu Sanusi II to quell the tide of scrutiny which almost cost Wale his job atop Nigeria’s largest indigenous oil and gas producer.

Some have alleged that the tiff between Tinubu and Mangal, the head honcho of AFDIN Group, is not unconnected with political manoeuvres by President Buhari and Asiwaju Bola Tinubu ahead of 2019 elections, with former VP Atiku Abubakar waiting in the wings to benefit from the power struggle. What is certain is that Tinubu and Mangal no longer see eye to eye even though their public image forces them to maintain a veneer of civility to each other.

But the real reason they fell out allegedly has to do with the failed acquisition of the Nigerian arm of ConocoPhillips. The deal reportedly cost $1.5 billion out of which Mangal contributed $250 million. The whole transaction however largely proved to be a white elephant, meaning that Mangal incurred huge loses. Since then, Mangal’ ire towards Tinubu has known no bounds. He has even taken the company to court over the issue, alleging mismanagement and fraud.