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Tag: PDP

  • Field Wike, lose Rivers, PDP group warns

    Field Wike, lose Rivers, PDP group warns

    A group in the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in Rivers State, Rivers PDP Third Force Movement, has warned the party against fielding the Supervising Minister of Education, Nyesom Wike, next year.

    The group said if the party must win in the state, then it must present another candidate.

    It condemned the decision of members of “Wike’s Forum of PDP Local Government Chairmen in Rivers State”,  who called on the minister to vie for the governorship slot.

    The group’s General Secretary, Oprite Amachree, maintained that a widely-acceptable candidate should be presented by the PDP.

    He said: “Wike’s political antecedents have proved him to be a greedy politician, who is in it for himself rather than for the state.

    “He is not the type of candidate that PDP should think of presenting for the Rivers State governorship race.

    “If Wike is fielded, PDP will fail in Rivers State and the  effects will jeopardise President Goodluck Jonathan’s chances of winning in Rivers State.

    “For Wike, nothing matters more than presenting a situation of political rancour and building on such disunity to solidify his  governorship ambition.

    “Wike’s sincerity to the PDP has been called to question because he has been more interested in binding the party structure at the national and state level in chains.

    “We urge the national leadership of the PDP and President Jonathan to consider strongly, the antics of Wike and his politics that negates the principle of zoning, which is in the PDP’s constitution and most recently buttressed by the decision of the delegates to the national conference.”

    The Rivers PDP Third Force movement also maintained that allowing Wike, who is the grand patron of the Grassroots Development Initiative (GDI), to represent the party would make the All Progressives Congress (APC) candidate to win.

  • LP candidate denies defecting to PDP

    LP candidate denies defecting to PDP

    The Labour Party (LP) standard-bearer in Osun State governorship election, Alhaji Fatai Akinbade, has debunked the rumours that he was planning to defect to the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).

    Akinbade was the Secretary to the state government under the Olagunsoye Oyinlola’s administration and also chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).

    His media consultant, Mr. Kayode Oladeji, in a statement, also dispelled the speculation that he had been disqualified from participating in the governorship election.

    He assured that he would not only contest, but would win the poll.

    Akinbade linked the rumours to his co-contestants, whom he claimed were threatened by his enviable and closeness to the grassroots.

    According to him, he was no longer a member of the PDP and would not go back to the party, adding that the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has already cleared him to contest the election.

    He said: “My opponents are threatened by my track records and acceptability among the people, especially the grassroots. They know that at the coming polls, I will beat them silly and that is why they are cooking all kinds of stories against me.”

  • PDP accuses Oshiomhole of instigating violence in Edo

    The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has said the All Progressives Congress (APC) and Edo State Governor Adams Oshiomhole are causing crisis to stop its rising popularity in the state.

    The party accused Oshiomhole of stirring up the political crisis in Edo State to prevent an official investigation into findings that he has been squandering the state’s resources “to finance his vice presidency campaign”, instead of settling down to develop the state.

    A statement by PDP’s National Publicity Secretary, Olisa Metuh, said the governor was also embittered by the admittance of his aides, legislators and influential APC leaders into the “popular PDP train”.

    The statement said: “Having lost the confidence and support of the people, Oshiomhole has resorted to violence and blackmail to intimidate and subdue them in line with the APC agenda.

    “The macabre dance playing out in Edo Assembly is an expression of defeatism or rather a terminal symptom of a decadent regime.

    “What else would have prompted the relocation of the state legislature to the governor’s office on the stage managed renovation of the assembly complex if not a calculated plot to intimidate and compromise the lawmakers?

    “We however wish to inform the governor and the APC that their machinations will lead them to nowhere.”

    The government, in a statement, said: “We are not surprised at Olisah Metuh’s fabricated tales and his allegations against the comrade governor.

    “Nigerians know Olisah Metuh as a publicist who thrives on falsehood and propaganda.

    “The crisis in Edo Assembly is a product of PDP’s desperation for power in its attempt to capture anything in sight. It is the same theatre of desperation that is pervading the entire political landscape as a consequence of PDP’s show of raw power.

    “The governor’s record of performance has become a reference point in the history of performance and good governance in Nigeria.

    “His tremendous achievements across the state could only have been possible through prudent and transparent management of resources, especially in a state that was run aground by the PDP for 10 years.

    “We are not aware that the governor ever sought to contest for vice president. In fact we would have loved a situation where he would run for president to take us away from this regime of tactlessness.

    “But so far, the comrade governor has not indicated interest in any elective office for now. When he does indicate interest, we will inform Olisah Metuh.

    “The four lawmakers who tried to usurp the powers of the House only got a teaser of what they bargained for. To play around with a governor who was popularly elected by the people meant that they will incur the wrath of the people.”

  • History as Hubris

    History as Hubris

    (Looking back in amazement and amusement)

    With the electoral scalp of Ekiti still dripping blood from its infamous hunter’s bag, the PDP rigging guillotine is now turning its attention to Osun State. It may yet presage the end of the Fourth Republic. Osun state is the cosmopolitan jugular of the Yoruba nation. But as somebody famously observed of a Nigerian military despot, it does seem as if the rigging collective is not intelligent enough to know fear. The PDP is the modern equivalent of the Yoruba folklorist Ogboju Ode ninu Igbo Irunmole. (the brave hunter in the forest of mystery)

    Before our very eyes, Nigeria has become a forest of evil in which there is no paddy for jungle—as they say.  Yet one must marvel at the hubris of it all. As it was in the beginning so has it been at the end. Why is it that there is so much hubris in our history? Hubris, or pride and overweening self- regard , afflicts individuals, races, people, societies and nations. But it also seems to afflict certain historical epochs. Albert Einstein’s law of insanity—doing the same thing all over and expecting different results—seem to take over.

    As usual, the PDP political panzer division is led by renegade Yoruba children who do not care a hoot about the society and the nation as long as their personal ambition is fulfilled. It is not enough to say once again that they shall not pass. We need to ask far more fundamental questions. Is there something wrong and fundamentally rigged against rationality about the Yoruba leadership recruitment process, or is the Yoruba nationality gridlocked by fate to a fractious and eternally polarising political elite as decreed by Alafin Aole just before committing suicide?

    Ten years ago, on March 15, 2004, snooper laid the question bare to a distinguished audience of Yoruba elite and leading politicians at the inaugural Afenifere lecture. Why is it that each time the Yoruba nation achieves a significant degree of elite consensus and mass mobilization with grit and gruelling resolve, the wheels immediately begin to come off the armoured vehicle? The spoils of office and the politics of preferment and patronage begin to get in the way.

    As it was with Awolowo in 1962, 1979 and 1983, so it was with Abiola in 1993 and with Obasanjo’s doomed mainstream nonsense in 2003. Now in 2014 and with so many darts and poisoned arrows lobbing into Bourdillon, one is beginning to feel a sense of Déjà vu. Are the Yoruba too independent-minded for their own good, or too politically sophisticated to be locked into permanent romance and wedlock with a particular leadership formation?

    The old folks and usual suspects are restive again and anything might happen. As it is usually the case in Yoruba history, lucrative incentives from outside usually facilitate internal treachery. The Fulani conquest of their old empire was facilitated by internal perfidy. The ranking Yoruba warlord had become a law unto himself in a futile and ultimately suicidal bid for supremacy.

    According to Johnson, the fabled historian, even the fabled Prince Atiba, with an eye to his own future hegemony, deliberately allowed his flank to collapse in the decisive military confrontation. Now, conquest looms from another direction and mum is the word from those who are fixated on old battle formations. As they say in ancient Italian language, oggi a me, domani a te. (Today it is me, tomorrow it is you!)

    Sometimes, it is important to take a strategic gaze into the immediate past in order to unlock the dynamics of the immediate future. Ten years ago, when the issue of  endemic disunity among the Yoruba political elite was broached at that lecture at the Muson Centre in Lagos, there were at least three AD governors, Senator Bola Ahmed Tinubu, Aremo Olusegun Osoba and Otunba Niyi Adebayo, who bonded very well and were sworn to collective action.

    As at this moment, the trio of political musketeers have gone their different ways, and the falcon can no longer hear the falconer. One must shudder to imagine what would happen to the current ACN/APC governors in ten years time. Would they still be in the same political fold, or would they have been driven by political exigencies to bitter political enmity?

    Still looking at the ever widening Yoruba political gyre, it is useful to recall that ten years ago at the inaugural Afenifere lecture, the Publicity Secretary of the organization and one of the prime organisers of the lecture was none other than Prince Dayo Adeyeye. This very week, snooper looked on with ironic amusement as the same Ise Ekiti nobleman appeared before the senate nattily dressed and dandified  to be screened as a minister in the PDP government. Adeyeye, a former Assistant of Chief Olu Falae and two time senatorial candidate of AD/AC, left the fold as a result of the fallout of the gubernatorial dispute which led to the emergence of Kayode Fayemi as the flag bearer for Ekiti State.

    And there were others, particularly the stoic and decorous Dare Babarinsa, who left never to return. The three leading grenadiers of the current PDP onslaught on the Yoruba nation, Musliu Obanikoro, Iyiola Omisore and Jelili Adesiyan, all belonged at one time or the other to what is known as the progressive tendency. As it was at the beginning of the Action Group crisis, so it has been at the injury time of political football

    Given the current political configurations or reconfigurations as the case may be, and the ongoing deadly power struggle in the South West, one may not be surprised if Chief Olu Falae shows up at the coronation to wish his former boy a happy tenure, after all in politics the enemy of your enemy is a friend. It is all in the nature of these things.

    Last weekend in far way Santa Monica, yours sincerely was briskly roused from sleep at 2 A.M western coast time by a frantic call from Nigeria. It was from Wole Olanipekun, SAN, and one Nigeria’s leading legal luminaries. Wole is an outstanding Nigerian patriot and militant Yoruba nationalist with broad progressive tendencies. Like many of his Ekiti compatriots, he could also be brutally frank.

    It is a friendship that has lasted over forty years, dating back to our days together in the trenches against military dictatorship in Nigeria.  While Wole served as the Secretary General of the University of Lagos Student Union, yours sincerely was the elusive and mysterious chairman of the Unife Joint Action Committee with concurrent accreditation to four un-nameable campuses. We had met when snooper appeared at the Unilag campus as a non-executive member of the Ife students’ union executive which was then visiting.

    Wole’s beef was with how the fallout of the Fayose resurgence was being managed. He had obviously read this column. In his view, the Yoruba nation was poised at the edge of a precipice which has to be carefully managed to avert a calamitous endgame. Fayose was the proverbial fly perched precariously on the most sensitive part of the anatomy which requires considerable diplomatic exertion and engagement.

    With current developments in the old West, it is now even clearer that the Yoruba Question is an integral part of the National Question. There is no way out as long as everybody is boxed into this colonial cage of contraries. Despite the bold strides of its many outstanding and talented individuals to put Nigeria on the world map, it is obvious that Nigeria is dying from the kwashiorkor of failed leadership.

    The leadership lottery and the structural configuration of Nigeria are such that they will never allow the best and the brightest to step forward to rescue the nation. It is like going into competitive soccer with your tenth eleven. It is a hopeless mismatch. The lack of a visionary and integrative leadership and of a national consensus in critical areas of nation-building is telling, and it rears its head in profoundly ironic and totally unexpected ways..

    Political developments in Nigeria are often stranger than fiction, and they sometimes best the most imaginative efforts of the masters of magical realism. Had he been born a Nigerian, Gabriel Garcia Marquez would long have been driven out of business. Actual reality is so unrealistic that the budding novelist must not attempt to enter into any competition with it.

    Once again, the Nigerian nation is stumbling precariously on a steep political escarpment. The Yoruba nation is critically endangered. Huge conflagrations in Nigeria are usually preceded by civil war among the Yoruba political elite. Is history about to repeat itself? The next few weeks will answer that question. For the second time, and by popular demand, we bring you an article which took an early look at the fate of the post-colonial nation in West Africa. Written in 1961, it reads like the horoscope of disaster foretold.

  • Amala, rice, corn politics

    Following the surprise victory of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) candidate in the Ekiti State governorship election,  Ayodele Fayose, it is understandable why supporters  and sympathisers of the All Progressive Congress (APC) are worried about the fate of the party in the forth coming Osun State gubernatorial election and future elections in the South West.

    There are those who fear that the APC may lose its dominant status in the region if the party’s governors do not take necessary measures to prevent a repeat of the Ekiti experience. There have been claims that one of the major reasons Fayose won the election was because he was able to ‘connect’ with the majority of the citizens of the state by providing  ‘stomach infrastructure’  instead of propounding some grandiose policies  of what he hopes to accomplish if he is elected.

    Abimbola Adelakun, a columnist in The Punch captured the joke which the Ekiti election has been reduced to with a facebook post in which she wrote: The lesson of Ekiti Election, serve your rice raw.

    Consequently, APC governors and candidates of other parties have been bombarded with unsolicited advice about the need to adopt what they termed the Fayose’s populist political campaign style to ensure victory.

    Apparently irked by this line of thought, which he said has even been suggested to him by some members of his cabinet, the Ogun State governor, Ibikunle Amosun, has said he will not reduce governance in his state to ‘Amala’ politics of  sharing rice and money instead of neglecting infrastructural development.

    I agree with Amosun that this advice, informed by those who want the governors to win at all cost is not only an insult on the intelligence of the people but a disservice to the electorate who elected them based on various electoral promises the governors made.

    While there may be lessons for the governors to learn from the Ekiti about matching polices with politics, it will be unfortunate if genuine developmental policies will have to be sacrificed to satisfy momentary needs and selfish political interests.

    Governors and other elected political office holders should strive to meet the expectations of those who elected them and improve on their standard of living, but this should not be done at the expense of the introduction of policies needed to raise the standard of productivity and service in the states.

    If some teachers voted against Fayemi in protest against the introduction of competency test as alleged, Ekiti State is the ultimate loser as it will have to continue to have teachers who are not competent to raise the standard of education as required to meet new realities.

    Edo State governor has reportedly backed down on the sack of teachers who failed the competency test for fear of the political backlash. I would rather have governors who would do what is right and in the best interest of the state now and in the future, instead of those who are so desperate to do anything to remain in office.

    The picture of a governorship candidate of a party holding roasted corn he bought on the roadside has gone viral on facebook. Obviously, the picture is meant to be a publicity stunt to portray him as a  ‘man of the people’ life Fayose,  but the real implication is how cheap the basis for getting elected into political office  has become.

  • Adeleke’s exit deflates Osun PDP

    Adeleke’s exit deflates Osun PDP

    In this piece, Erasmus Ikhide writes on the implications of former Governor Isiaka Adeleke’s defection from the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) to the All Progressives Congress (APC).

    THE exit of Senator Isiaka Adeleke from the Osun State Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has dealt an unimaginable blow to the party’s bid to reclaim the state from the ruling APC, after nearly four years. From the outset, this has been an uphill task for the PDP, owning largely to its earlier anti-people policies that brought the people in direct collusion with excruciating poverty and looting of the state treasury.

    The first civilian governor, Senator Isiaka Adeleke, defected at the Nelson Mandela Freedom Park, in Osogbo, the state capital. He implored the electorate not to cast their votes for the PDP candidate on  August 9.

    In the face of mounting rejection, the PDP is seems hauntingly lost in its braggart pastime to undone the electorate, feigns electability and hosts preeminently the banner of deserved victory. This is overt in several comments made by some of the oppositions’ media minders in response to Senator Isiaka Adeleke’s defection some days ago. They won’t concede that a major depletion has forlorn their rank. Adeleke is the most eminent in the PDP in his countryside as the first civilian governor of the state, but the oppositions would not have any of it, and preferred to cast shadows in the dial.

    Senator Akinlabi Olasunkanmi and Oluwole Oke saw the defection of  Adeleke, a governorship aspirant, as a development that would not affect the winning streak and the electoral victory of their party. The  PDP chairman, Alhaji Gani Olaoluwa, ruses Adeleke’s and PDP members defection as “those whose political relevance has waned and have been huge liabilities to the party.”

    Describing the decision of Adeleke as unfortunate, taking into recognition the quantum of benefits that had accrued to him since he joined the party,  they contended that it was laughable and amounted to ingratitude on his part to dump the party that made him politically. In separate press statements issued by their  media aides, Mr Ayo Aluko-Olokun and Mr.Yemi Giwa respectively, Olasunkanmi and Oke assured that the former governor’s exit cannot have any negative effect on the chances of the party at the election.

    Olasunkanmi, who is a former Minister for Youths, said: “We believe in that tenet of democracy, which guarantees every individual the right of association. The defector has taken a decision which he believes would best serve his interest best under this dispensation and we cannot condemn, abuse or commend him for it. It is his right.”

    “But, we wish to assure you that his exit would not diminish the chance of the PDP winning the August 9, governorship election. We shall strengthen our hold on Osun West Senatorial District, where he comes from. It is, however, unfortunate that a person that has benefitted so much, using the PDP platform, would jump ship despite all his repeated promises and pledges to vote and mobilise support for President Goodluck Jonathan and the PDP”, he added.

    Reacting,  Oke remarked: “He is a pillar in PDP. I wish he stays and fight within the party. There is no party that is crisis free. I still hope that he would change his mind. If he doesn’t, I wish him well. It is a free world”. A check on the political intrigues that led to the exit of Senator Adeleke from the PDP and the thousands of followers that left with him defect the claims of Senator Rasheed Akinlabi Olasun-kanmi and Hon Oluwole Oke.

    Adeleke attested to that when he affirmed that he was asked by leaders of the PDP to contest the governorship  in Osun, but was thereafter betrayed and hounded. The first civilian governor  described the PDP as a platform that breeds and supports thuggery and violence.

    Adeleke, also a former senator, spoke in Osogbo, the Osun state capital, while leading thousands of his supporters and former members of the PDP to the All Progressives Congress (APC). Adeleke noted that with the alleged assault on him by the Minister of Police Affairs, Jelili Adesiyan, and the candidate of the PDP for the forthcoming governorship election in the state, Iyiola Omisore?, he and his followers were no longer safe in the PDP. The former governor claimed he was called upon by the leaders of the PDP to contest the governorship seat in Osun having realised that Mr. Omisore stood no chance against Governor Rauf Aregbe-sola.

    He said he was thereafter betrayed and hounded.

    “I am happy to be in the progressives,” Adeleke said. “I was a governor under the Social Democratic Party (SDP), which was a progressive party, I was fully involved in the struggle for June I2.

    “I was asked to come and vie for governorship that Omisore is not capable, I accepted, but a day to the congress I got to the hotel in Osogbo. The people I sent there were on the floor with guns pointed at their heads and I told the police that they are members of our party? from Ede.

    “I then moved towards the room where I met Sogo Agboola, Jelili Adesiyan, Iyiola Omisore, Gani Olaoluwa and others. As I was about explaining what happened outside to the Minister, he descended on me with blows. So also was Omisore and others.”

    He said he had nothing against the PDP, which once offered him a senatorial slot, but that he believed that if he should remain in the party, he would have to work for Mr. Omisore, saying working for Omisore would amount to working for a criminal.

    “They are a party breeding thugs,” he said. “How can a whole minister of the Federal Republic be boxing, I have nothing against PDP. I can’t support a violent person to go to the Government House.”

    Adeleke commended Aregbesola for what he termed enviable achievements recorded so far, said “I am here today to tell the world that I am making a U-turn from PDP to APC to prove that I am capable of advancing my political career and joining forces  with people of like minds, who believe in peace, progress and prosperity for our people and generations yet unborn.”

    The Vice Chairman of the PDP in Osun, who spoke on behalf of other decampees, Bashir Salam, said he and his colleagues were leaving the PDP because security is lacking in the party. “We are leaving the PDP because their is no security of lifes and property. In a party where the first civilian governor was assaulted without anything coming out of it, what do you expect to befall people like us”? “We have to look for change which we got in APC. Since the day I saw blood coming out from the mouth of one of our leaders we became unsafe and we have to leave,” Salam said.

    Aregbesola described the defection of Adeleke to the APC as someone who had chosen to come back to his rightful home, stressing that “I have told Adeleke long before now that his father, who was the Balogun of Ede did not join the conservatives while alive and that his people in Ede do not belong to the PDP”. “He has come back home”, he stated.

    In Yorubaland, we do not belong to the PDP. Their reign had failed to better the lots of the masses. I don’t want to talk much about the failures of the party. This is because some of them are still talking to us and they are coming”. “They (PDP) did not allow former Governor Oyinlola to perform when he was in government for almost eight years. No man of virtues would identify himself with the PDP, considering the misery, bad governance and failure they have caused Nigerians. We celebrated our democracy some days ago, what have we got to show for it”, Aregbesola queried.

    Aregbesola attributed all his Administration’s feats in the state to God without which his personal strives would have amounted to nothing. He admonished the people of the state against fighting the PDP, saying violence had become their stock in trade. The governor said, “What will Adeleke want to gain from saying they want to kill him. He has been in the party for long. If we are not home with that, have we forgotten about the  people killed in Ife?

    As the electioneering gain tractions, there is absolute certainty that the people of Osun have already made up their minds on the direction they aspire the governance of the state to follow. In less than three months from now, that aspiration will give way to reality when they cast  their voters for continuous development, instead of returning the state to long forgotten era of political thuggery and bloodletting. That is what a vote for the PDP can offer the people.

  • Anti-APC plot: PDP in rowdy session as Fayose takes on Bode George

    Anti-APC plot: PDP in rowdy session as Fayose takes on Bode George

    A Meeting by some leaders of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) on how to dislodge the All Progressives Congress (APC) from the Southwest turned rowdy yesterday when Ekiti State Governor-elect of Ekiti State, Mr. Ayodele Fayose, joined issues with former Deputy National Chairman Chief Olabode George.

    With his election, Fayose insisted that he, not George, should be the natural leader of PDP in the Southwest.

    According to sources, the meeting was convened by George to strategise APC from the Southwest between now and 2015.

    The session, which started at about 10pm on Monday, went on till 1am yesterday, with PDP leaders reeling out ideas on how to “conquer Osun, Oyo, Ogun and Lagos states”.

    Some of the leaders recommended the adoption of what they described as Fayose’s “strategy” (stomach infrastructure) in Ekiti to enable the PDP overrun APC in the Southwest.

    The party leaders also opted to focus on trade unions, student leaders, and teachers, because “these groups can influence people to turn against APC”, with adequate propaganda.

    But the situation degenerated over the claim to the leadership of the party when Fayose challenged George.

    A highly-placed source said: “To the consternation of a few and cheering applause from many witnesses, amidst shouts of Oshokomole, an alias name for the Ekiti latest gladiator, Fayose said he should be the rallying point of PDP in the Southwest till other governors join him.

    The source quoted Fayose as saying: “Being the only governor of the party in the Southwest, the leadership of the PDP in the Zone automatically belongs to me.

    “I have won elections twice and I make bold for anyone to contest that.”

    A party elder reportedly cautioned Fayose to eschew arrogance and respect George, who was not only the convener of the meeting but a much older person than Fayose.

    “Ayo, you can’t come to an elder’s house to insult him.” the elder cautioned Fayose.

    On the motive of the meeting, the source said: “The PDP leaders at the session designed a plot tagged: ‘Operation Total Conquest of South-West’. They said with the defeat of APC, the “Ekiti startegy” could work in any state in the Southwest.

    “They drew up a number of options which would be tabled before the PDP leadership and the Presidency.

    “They also decided to support Prof. Wale Oladipo as the National Secretary of PDP instead of the return of Prince Olagunsoye Oyinlola.”

    At the session were a former Minister of Works Adeseye Ogunlewe, Osun PDP governorship candidate Senator Iyiola Omisore, party chief  Kashamu Buruji and many others.

     

     

  • Southwest PDP leaders back Oladipo as National Secretary

    Southwest PDP leaders back Oladipo as National Secretary

    •Oyinlola meets Jonathan, says ‘I’m authentic scribe’

    The Southwest zonal leaders of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) have thrown their weight behind the party’s incumbent National Secretary, Prof. Wale Oladipo.

    It was gathered that the decision was taken at a meeting convened by the party’s former Deputy National Chairman (Southwest), Chief Olabode George, in Abuja last Monday night.

    The position is being contested by Prince Olagunsoye Oyinlola, who occupied it before he was removed from office in January 2013, on the orders of a high court.

    Oyinlola had challenged his removal in the Court of Appeal and the appellate court on November 11, 2013 ordered his reinstatement.

    The order was rebuffed by the national leadership of the PDP.

    But Oyinlola has vowed to pursue the case to the Supreme Court.

    Going the decision of the Southwest PDP leaders, it was gathered that Oladipo’s position is expected to be ratified in the party’s proposed national convention, which date is yet be fixed.

    At the meeting, George was reported to have pleaded for the understanding of other zonal leaders to forge a common ground by giving Oladipo their unflinching support.

    According to sources close to the meeting, other stakeholders at the meeting agreed with George, with a view to fight the August 9 governorship election in Osun State on a united front.

    The choice of Oladipo as Oyinlola’s replacement had ruffled some feathers among some key stakeholders in the party, particularly Chief Ebenezer Babatope and Prof. Tunde Adeniran, who contested the position with Oyinlola at the party’s March 24, 2012 national convention.

    Babatope and Adeniran, who were also at the meeting, reportedly renounced their interest in the position, to give Oladipo the needed support.

    The two politicians were however said to have voiced their reservations about the way and manner Oladipo was foisted on the zone by the camp of the PDP governorship candidate in the Osun State, Senator Iyiola Omisore, without consulting other interested parties.

    Oladipo was quoted to have expressed his appreciation to the party’s zonal leaders at the meeting, saying that he was humbled by their collective decision to accord him recognition.

    He was said to have promised to be fair to all in the discharged of his duties as the party’s National Secretary.

    Those at the meeting were Ekiti State Governor-elect Mr. Ayo Fayose; former Oyo State Governor Adebayo Alao Akala; Chief Kola Balogun, Elder Wole Oyelese; Mrs. Olusola Obada; Senator Adefemi Kila and Prince Dayo Adeyeye.

    Others include Mrs. Titi Oseni, Chief Ade Fadahunsi, Mr. Dave Salako, Chief Ade Otegbola, Oloye Jumoke Akinjide, Mr. Demeji Bankole, Chief Kashamu Buruji, Mrs. Mulikat Akande and Chief Adeseye Ogunlewe.

    Meanwhile, President Goodluck Jonathan yesterday held a closed-door meeting with Oyinlola and the PDP National Chairman Adamu Mu’azu at the Presidential Villa in Abuja.

    The meeting started around 11a.m.

    Discussions at the meeting might have focused on the Osun governorship election.

    Oyinlola affirmed yesterday that he was PDP’s authentic National Secretary.

    While he was replaced by Oladipo in the Bamanga Tukur-led PDP, Oyinlola occupied the office of the National Secretary of the Kawu Baraje-led faction, called the New PDP.

    Oyinlola, addressing State House correspondents after the meeting with Jonathan and Muazu, described the occupier of the office as a pretender.

    He said: “I was taken to the Villa by the chairman of the party, and we had some discussions as to how to move the fortunes of the party forward. That is all I can say.

    “All I am telling you is that Oyinlola in the face of the law remains the authentic Secretary of the PDP, anybody in that office for now, is a pretender.”

  • Envoy donates N60m rice to party members

    ABOUT 6,300 bags of rice worth N60 million have been distributed to members of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in Sokoto State by Nigeria’s Ambassador to Morocco, Senator Abdallah Wali.

    The bags of rice for PDP members in the state’s 23 local governments were handed over to the executive of each ward.

    Each of the wards got 20 bags.

    At a brief flag-off ceremony, Wali said the party’s state executive members were given 100 bags while 960 bags went to elders.

    The envoy, who is also a governorship aspirant, said the gesture was aimed at assisting the beneficiaries to fast with ease.

    Speaking, the state party chairman, Alhaji Ibrahim Milgoma, warned against diverting the commodity.

    “Anyone who is found wanting in this direction will be duly punished,” Milgoma warned.

  • Ekiti: So much for stomach infrastructure

    Ekiti: So much for stomach infrastructure

    When a colleague said it sometime last year I thought he was joking. It couldn’t be true, I said. That one can just walk into any beer parlour, as we call it here, anywhere in Ekiti State and chant osoko and green bottles would start to flow free of charge, courtesy, Ayodele Fayose, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) candidate in the just concluded gubernatorial election in Ekiti State?

    I immediately dismissed it as one of those talks by ‘enemies of progress’ to bring down the person of former Governor Fayose and probably ridicule the good people of Ekiti State. Haba! In the land of honour, with more professors per household than anywhere in Nigeria; how can such motor park tactic bring support for a candidate, particularly one seeking the office of the governor of the state? I didn’t even give a second thought to it.

    But as elections day drew nearer, more people started to talk about it as well as other efforts including distribution of foodstuff and throwing money at people on campaign grounds, by Fayose to win votes. This must be a joke, I said and I hope Ekiti people would not allow this man hoodwink them a second time.

    As these things were going on signs were emerging that there could be a surprise in Ekiti; some hitherto respected people started speaking from both sides of their mouth and the PDP hierarchy including President Goodluck Jonathan started beating their chest and the police in Ekiti state started misbehaving; I knew something was going to happen.

    My mind quickly went back to 2003 when Fayose first came in as elected governor of Ekiti state defeating the incumbent Niyi Adebayo of the then Alliance for Democracy (AD) party. In the run up to that election, Fayose among other tactics went about with water tankers supplying water to the people; and he won their hearts; they voted for him. Two years or so down the road before he was booted out, some say illegally, it did not occur to him, I think, to provide every household in Ekiti with potable water, if he did that with what will he campaign the next time?

    I told myself, lightening will not strike twice in the same place, Ekiti people would not allow it. But I was wrong; lightening did strike twice and with venom too. Fayose’s campaign with no tangible achievement of his first tenure to point at and no promise of a better future to hold on to, swept away, like a tsunami, the incumbent, winning in all the 16 local government areas, defying all logic.

    Some have put his victory down to the incumbent governor, Kayode Fayemi losing touch with the common man, not being one of them, staying aloof and speaking ‘too much grammar’; his records of outstanding achievements in all sphere of governance notwithstanding. Fayose was the man of the people whose name could bring out several litres of beer at the local pub; who would go to‘paraga’ joint to ‘jolificate’ with his people; who would throw wads of naira notes at people or stop by to buy banana or groundnut from the roadside hawker. He could do these things and more and the people ‘loved’ him for it (he was literally putting money in their pockets, food on their table, beer in their tommy, even if they had to struggle to pick the money on campaign grounds) and they rewarded him on June 21, with the key to the government house in Ado Ekiti for another stint at governance.

    For and in all of these I have no grudge against Ekiti people even if I am disappointed. They have made their choice; a people deserve the leadership they get. Life itself is dynamic. The majority have the right to be wrong; even at that, it is too early to say the majority in Ekiti was wrong in that election. So, those who were disappointed like me should sheath their sword and allow Fayose to govern, after all he says he is a changed man now, wiser and has learnt from his mistakes. The next four years should prove that. Only time would tell if a leopard can change its spots.

    Though some people have raised eye brows over whether it was possible for the people of Ekiti who benefited so much from Governor Fayemi to so reject him massively at the polls and questioned how that huge figures were recorded, my worry is not so much about that but the bad example the Ekiti election is setting in the way the electorate judge and reward performance with their votes.

    My fear is that any desperate first term governor or president with an eye on a second term could abandon physical infrastructural development of his community and the human capital development of his people for populist programmes that would put money in the pockets of the electorate in the immediate at the expense of their future. And if the Ekiti example is anything to go by any such tactics would succeed especially in a poverty ridden society as ours.

    Our politicians we know are desperate, only few of them have genuine programmes that could take the country to the next level and are prepared to stick with such programmes no matter the odds. For what he did in Ekiti, which even the people have acknowledged, Governor Fayemi must be praised for not dancing to the tune of those advocates of stomach infrastructure even if his people have punished him with an electoral defeat. Even if he didn’t mean to take it this far, discerning Nigerians, including a lot of Ekiti people know the course he had taken was the right one and time would vindicate him.

    One good thing we have been witnessing in the South West where the All Progressives Congress (APC) has been in near total control of the states is the unprecedented level of infrastructural development that had been going on in the past three years. The people appreciate this, and the APC should not out of panic and in response to the Ekiti setback abandon this for cheap political gains. Nothing good comes easy. After all, the late Chief Obafemi Awolowo, the founder of the modern Yoruba society didn’t find it easy implementing the free education programme in the then Western Region for which everybody has continued to praise him. He saw the future of Yoruba in education for his people and he stuck with that programme, even though at a point he suffered electoral losses, he never wavered.

    The rest of Nigeria should not go the way of Ekiti in next year’s elections if truly the people there voted for stomach infrastructure; the PDP, particularly President Jonathan should not trick Nigerians into going that way just because it wants to win election in 2015. It is a route that leads only to destruction.

    We cannot talk of curbing corruption if we expect our politicians to bring the money out for us to share; we cannot expect our roads to be good, our hospitals to be better and schools to be world class if all we are interested in is stomach infrastructure. Let us decide on what we want and live with the consequences Ekiti people have made their choice, let nobody cry for them.