Recent developments within the Labour Party in Ondo State, which is the party’s national stronghold, show growing discontent among party leaders and members against Governor Olusegun Mimiko, Associate Editor, Dare Odufowokan, reports
After years of what appeared to be the ability of Governor Olusegun Mimiko of Ondo State to hold the ruling Labour Party in Ondo State together, there are strong indications that the party is beginning to experience its share of internal crisis. Recent developments within the party in the state, which is the LP’s national stronghold, show that growing discontent among party leaders and members against Mimiko may be taking negative tolls on the popularity of the ruling party across the state.
A flash of skirmish between the governor and top chieftains of his party, just before the last House of Representatives bye-election in Ilaje-Ese Odo Local Government Area of the state, left members of the party wondering if all is well within the party. Prominent party leaders, mainly from the southern senatorial district of the state, had cried out over what they described as the criminal neglect of their part of the state by the Mimiko administration.
The public complaints of the LP leaders back then had been frowned at by the governor’s men who saw it as anti-party acts especially at a time when the party was going into an electoral contest in the same area of the state. But the leaders stood their ground, insisting that they have very little to campaign with among their people.
“We are not against Governor Mimiko. We are not against our party, the Labour Party. What we are against is the criminal neglect of our parts of the state by the same government and party we led our people into years back. We are saying, for LP to continue to win election in Ondo South, there is need for the government and the party to compensate the people for the support it had enjoyed from our people in the past.
As we speak, we have nothing to campaign with among our people. What are we to tell them? They want to know why they should continue to vote Labour Party? We really don’t have much to tell them. Apart from the market in Igbokoda, the OSOPADEC House at Igbokoda and the mega school at Igbokoda, we cannot point to any other project anywhere else in our vicinity after years of supporting this party,” Ondo South Eminent Leaders’ Group (OSELG), led by Chief Jerome Shemudara, had said then.
But rather than listen to the complaints of the leaders, the party leadership had summoned and lambasted them, accusing them of working for opposition parties ahead of the bye-election.
“The party leadership accused the leaders of plotting against the victory of the LP in the scheduled bye election. While the leaders insisted they have genuine reasons to complain, the party told them their approach was wrong and as such, their action is suspicious. The development degenerated into exchange of strong words between the two camps and not much was done to address the issues raised by the leaders,” our source said.
That was the situation as at the time the bye-election in Ilaje-Ese Odo was held a couple of weeks back. As predicted by the elders, the LP was unable to record victory as the election was declared inconclusive by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).
That was when the simmering crisis blew open as a prominent leader of the ruling party in the state, Barrister Benson Enikuomehin, described the five years of Dr. Olusegun Mimiko in charge of the state’s affair as a huge failure given the total absence of meaningful development in most parts of the southern senatorial district of the state.
Blaming the government for the inability of the party to win the House of Representatives bye-election in Ilaje-Ese Odo, Enikuomehin said all is not well within the ruling party because it is being administered as a one-man empire.
Enikuomehin, a legal practitioner and immediate past commissioner of the state on the board of the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC), said the inability of the ruling party to register an outright victory during last weekend’s bye-election in Ilaje-Ese Odo was because the people of the area are dissatisfied with the current administration over the many unfulfilled promises made to them in the past.
The LP chieftain said “in spite of the about N800million that should accrue to the council monthly as an oil producing area, there is nothing to show to the people as the dividends of the same democracy they have diligently supported with their votes and efforts in the last five years.
“Billions of naira come to the state as derivation on a monthly basis. 40 percent of this should come to Ilaje Ese Odo as an oil producing area in the state. If you calculate that in five years, that is a lot of money. The question the people are asking is where is this money? They are asking because there is nothing on ground in terms of development to show that huge amount was spent anywhere near our locality.
“It is this situation that the people revolted against on Saturday by not voting for our party the way they used to do. I am a member of the Labour Party. We have complained severally but nothing came out of our complaints. We urged the governor to do something about the neglect of the area. He didn’t do anything. He only came around on Thursday to flag off the campaign for the election. Just two days before the election. That was why we lost in my ward.
“Government must put in effort to persuade the people of our area. The hen that lays the golden egg shouldn’t be abandoned this way. The inability of the party to win is the reaction of the people to the inaction of this administration in the area. I am not saying the governor, but the government. This government has failed the people of Ilaje Ese Odo.
“I pray we win the re-run election but if the people of the area decide otherwise, we should see it as a lesson for us as a party. W should simply accept it as a message from the people that they are unhappy with our government and our party. That will help us to correct our mistakes. Our chances in this election is similar to that of a dying man on life support with the gas running out,” he said.
Enikuomehin said in spite of the fact that the governor practically relocated to the area to canvass for votes, his party could only manage a 1,000-vote lead margin closely followed by the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). According to him, this is a sign that the party is no longer popular amongst the people of the area.
“I will tell you this, from what I know of politics, it is largely about development of the people and about things accruing to the personalities involved. No single footbridge has been constructed in my place in five years by this administration. I know some people will say this is anti party, but I don’t care. They may say I am working for the PDP. But I ask, what will the PDP give me? Money or what? Without being arrogant, I am a modestly successful person.
“I know what I am saying. I cannot help saying these because I am used to saying the truth. The LP in Ondo State today is a government of one man for one man by one man. This is the truth. As I speak, the secretariat of our party in Akure is under lock and key. Who do we complain to, “ he lamented.
Sources within the party told The Nation that the leadership of the LP may be considering sanctioning the former NDDC top shot for his comments. “He should know better than to criticise the party and government that much if he is still interested in the membership of the party,” another party chieftain said.
But Enikuomehin said he is not disturbed by the rumoured attempt to discipline him. “If the LP is angry over what I have said here, they have just two options. They can summarily throw me out of the party or summon me and question me. But if they don’t do any of these two, I remain a member of the Labour Party in Ondo State. If they throw me out, I have options too. We have the APC there and we have the PDP. Any other party that I feel will advance the cause of my people is a choice; I will gladly follow,” he added.
This is not the first time the unity of the ruling party would be threatened by rift between the governor and other party leaders. In November 2012, tension rose between the leadership of Ondo State House of Assembly and the executive over the sack of nine local government caretaker chairmen in the state. The council chairmen were removed from office for their refusal to submit staff audit in their councils, and other related offences.
But Mimiko, apparently unhappy with the state legislators’ decision, condemned the action of the State Assembly for sacking the former council bosses. At a meeting summoned by an aide of the governor, the new caretaker chairmen were allegedly ordered not to resume office until Mimiko returns from his overseas trip.
The Chairman of the Assembly Committee on Information, Oyebo Aladetan, said the House took the decision in accordance with the nation’s constitution. He said the decision to sanction the council bosses was taken to put them on their toes and make them accountable to the people. However, one of the sacked Chairmen, Femi Ofakurin, said the decision of the House was not taken in good fate.
The crisis was eventually resolved following interventions by party chieftains and elder statesmen, including the national leadership of the party.
But by December 2013, 17 out of the 26 lawmakers elected into the Ondo State House of Assembly, shunned Mimiko’s 2014 budget presentation, sending signal of another breakdown in the relationship between the governor and the lawmakers. Only nine lawmakers were present at the Assembly. It was gathered that majority of the lawmakers who shunned the presentation did so out of grudge, particularly over what they described as poor implementation of the 2013 budget.
The minority leader, Akpoebi Lubi, did not hide his feelings over the crisis. He rated the 2013 budget implementation in the state as 30 percent. He added that the House rejected the governor’s request for a review of the 2013 budget in December.
Lubi said, “The budget presentation ceremony was illegal,” submitting that the governor needed a two-third majority of the members of the House to present the budget.
The state Commissioner for Information, Kayode Akinmade, while reacting to the charge, said the budget represented the hope for the development of Ondo State and its people. He argued that the people could not be kept waiting and their yearnings threatened by any form of politics. According to him, there was no need to overheat the polity, because the governor was in a hurry to deliver projects that would transform the lives of the people.
Akinmade explained that the seeming conflict would certainly be resolved, but the state would need stability for robust politics. Somehow, the issue was resolved and the party returned to its peaceful ways until the recent standoff between the governor and party chieftains reared its head, threatening to tear the ruling party apart.
