Category: Sentry

Last Thursday, Kola Abiola, eldest son of the late Chief Moshood Abiola, acclaimed winner of the June 12, 1993 presidential election, picked the N10million People’s Redemption Party’s (PRP’s) expression of interest and nomination forms for next year’s presidential election. With that, he made good his promise to run for office.

With that move also, he confirmed fears that the household of the late M.K.O. may become divided by the incursion of the politician’s children into partisan politics.

A few weeks ago, Hafsat Abiola-Costello, daughter of the late business mogul, and a younger sister to Kola, was named the Director-General of the Governor Yahaya Bello Presidential Campaign Organization. The Kogi State governor is a presidential aspirant on the platform of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC).

While receiving his forms from the National Secretary of the party, Mr. Babatunde Alli, at the PRP’s headquarters in Abuja, Kola reiterated his earlier stand that APC has failed to meet the yearnings of Nigerians, promising to help the PRP send the party out of government in 2023. But his younger sister, Hafsat, who prides herself as the first female DG of a presidential campaign organisation in the country, is not leaving anybody in doubt about her commitment to her assignment and her new political party.

Sentry heard some observers wondering how the current development will affect the late Abiola’s family, especially after tempers rose when Hafsat likened Bello to her late father and was tongue-lashed by Tundun Abiola, another of her siblings for daring to compare her new boss with the late politician.

Now that Kola and Hafsat will be mounting podiums on opposing sides to canvass for support, what more will politics do to the Abiola family? Time will surely tell.

Amid wide speculations during the week that the former President Goodluck Jonathan was poised to contest the 2023 presidential election on the platform of APC, a queer confusion arose over his membership of the party.

There were unconfirmed claims that he had joined the party in his Ogbia ward in Bayelsa.

While some supporters of the former number one citizen were ready to swear with their life that he had defected to APC, the Bayelsa State chairman of the party, Dennis Otiotio, denied was a member.

While Otiotio’s rejection of Jonathan on behalf of Bayelsa APC was yet to challenged by anyone, PDP National Publicity Secretary, Debo Ologunagba, compounded the confusion when he said the former President had not resigned as a member of the PDP.

He said: “As far as today, I am not aware of any resignation from the membership of the party [PDP]. I would assume it is safe to say that he is a member of the party.”

More than forty eight hours after the speculations became alarmingly strong, neither the former president nor any of his aides have said a thing to clear the air by telling the world Jonathan’s current political party.

It is safe to say they have gone absent without leave: the man, conveniently so in some West African capital, while his aides have disappeared from all GSM networks.

Cross River State governor, Ben Ayade, is one of the numerous aspirants who have declared their intention to run for the presidency at the 2023 general elections under the platform of the ruling All Progressive Congress (APC).

He announced his intention shortly after meeting with President Muhammadu Buhari at Aso Villa in Abuja last Tuesday. But feelers reaching Sentry suggest that the governor, who will be finishing his second term next year, may still have his eyes on the Senate seat of his native Cross River North senatorial district, even without saying so.

It was further gathered that the governor may have perfected a plan to keep the APC ticket for the senatorial district within his reach while he continues his presidential chase. Sentry got to know that an ally of his has been drafted into the race to clinch the ticket and hold it.

Sources within the party claimed that the desire of the governor is to return to the senate. “But he had to yield to pressures on him to step forward and lead the entire country. Of course, if he is not given the nod by the party, he will have the senate ticket as planned,’ a party leader explained – lending credence to the proxy claim being bandied in some quarters.

Elder statesman and leader of the Pan Niger Delta Forum (PANDEF), Chief Edwin Clark, is not a happy man as we speak. According to him, he currently lives in fear of tomorrow as regards the 2023 presidential elections. He is afraid that some presidential aspirants from the southern part of the country are actually in the race to betray the region.

Sentry gathered that the Delta-state born Ijaw leader has been telling those who care to listen that the large number of presidential aspirants from the southern part of the country was something to worry about. In fact, Clark would rather have the aspirants screened thoroughly and some of them disqualified in the interest of the region.

He has been publicly expressing his fears about the matter. “There are some people that have gone to be bottle bags to play double games. So when it comes to where we say no, some people would come out to say yes, we are contesting. So they know why some of them are there,” he said at the weekend.

Rather than give up, the old man is going about enjoining southern politicians not to accept running mate positions from any northern candidate, while warning that many of the aspirants from the south who have declared their presidential interest to contest for president in 2023 are playing double games with their eyes on the running mate slot.

It was an unusual spectacle. Governor Adegboyega Oyetola of Osun State led the mammoth crowd that held a reception in honour of Senator Iyiola Omisore in Osogbo, the capital of the state during the week. Speaker after speaker at the event praised the former Deputy Governor of the state and now National Secretary of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) and welcome him back to the progressives fold after many years in what they described as political wilderness. It was obvious to all that Omisore, sitting among the people, was more than happy.

He is not a stranger in the camp of the progressives. He started as one of them and only left the Alliance for Democracy (AD) in 2003 to pursue his still unrealized governorship ambition. His return to the fold after many years in the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and a short stint in the Social Democratic Party (SDP) is more like a second coming. And he is leaving nobody with any doubt that he intends to make the best use of the chance offered him by fate.

An elated Omisore described his emergence as APC National Secretary as a victory for all that will ensure all-round victory for the party at the Osun governorship polls and in next year’s general elections.

He urged members to continue to work for unity and progress of the party while thanking party leaders including APC National Leader, Bola Tinubu, Chief Bisi Akande and all the party’s governors for their support. Surely, there’s nothing like a homecoming.

Nigerians have been left asking questions after the House of Representatives decided not to sanction those who imported methanol-blended contaminated PMS in January this year.

Sentry learnt from the grapevine that some groups and individuals are planning to publicly reject the verdict of the lower house. To them, justice has not been done in the matter. The question on the lips of many is: what has changed?

Tempers rose on Thursday when the Representatives said nobody would be sanctioned for the supply of adulterated petrol which caused a major crisis in Nigeria’s fuel chain and untold hardship.

It would be recalled that at the plenary of the House on February 10, 2022, several members called for sanctions against Federal Government agencies and officials who failed to carry out due diligence before passing the product to marketers.

But it appears many of many of the federal legislators have had a change of mind on the matter. Or is it that they are now better informed than they were then? Something definitely changed.

At the plenary on Thursday, the House simply adopted the reviewed report on the investigation by its Committee on Petroleum Resources (Downstream), which exonerated both the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited, former Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), and the suppliers in the Direct Sale-Direct Purchase deal between the Federal Government and the importers.

With the House now giving a clean bill to all accused in the matter, Sentry is still wondering ‘who dunnit?

Numerous social media users on Facebook, Instagram and other platforms are asking Kogi State Governor, Yahaya Bello, to show the world the thousands of young millionaires his administration made out of Kogi youths.

The governor on Friday stated that his administration had turned no fewer than 2,000 persons in the state into millionaires. Bello made this known in Abuja at the ongoing “Second Annual GYB Seminar for Nigeria’s Political and Crime Correspondents”.

Hardly had the statement hit social media than the governor started trending with many commentators asking him to prove his claims. “2,000 millionaires in Kogi? Gov pls where are they? They must show love oo,” a commentator, @Lookma, said.

A Facebook user, Onozasi Oches, wanted the governor to unveil the millionaires so they can motivate others. “It will be good you unveil them so we can be motivated,” she said.

Bello, responding to a question about his economic plans for the country including his recent pledge to make 20 million Nigerians millionaires by 2030 if he succeeds President Muhammadu Buhari, said: “We have made nothing less than 2,000 millionaires in Kogi”.

The governor had also stated that he intends to appoint Nigeria’s first female Vice President, if he receives his party’s presidential ticket for the 2023 elections and approval to choose his running mate.

Determined to realise his ambition of governing Osun State, Hon. Lasun Yusuf, former Deputy Speaker, House of Representatives, during the week defected to the Labour Party (LP) to enable him to contest the July 16 governorship election.

Sentry gathered that the former All Progressives Congress (APC) governorship aspirant told his supporters that it was compulsory for his name to be on the list of gubernatorial candidates in the state this year.

Sources claimed that majority of those Lasun called to a stakeholders’ meeting before joining the Labour Party actually told him to forget the idea of winning this year’s election in the state on the platform of any other party outside APC or the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). “But Honourable told us that he must contest the governorship election this time around,’ a source told Sentry.

Yusuf was immediately affirmed by the party as its governorship candidate same day he joined the Labour Party in Osogbo. With that, he appears ready to actualize his dream of being a governorship candidate this year.

He had earlier resigned from the APC on March 25 after losing the governorship primary election to Governor Gboyega Oyetola on February 19.

During the direct primary, Yusuf scored 460 votes, while Moshood Adeoti, preferred candidate of the Minister of Interior and former Governor in Osun, Rauf Aregbesola, scored 12,921.

“If I emerge victoriously, my administration will focus on subsidizing education, farming, infrastructure, health, and exploitation of mineral resources,” he said after being handed the governorship ticket of his new party. Lasun immediately picked Mr. Adeola Atanda, from Iwo as his running mate.