BOLATITO Ladoja, the daughter of former Oyo State governor, Rashidi Ladoja, who got engaged to alternative-soul singer, Bez, in May 2013, has picked 4 January to solemnise the union. Bolatito, a banker with FCMB, is a graduate of International Relations from Warwick University, UK with Masters in Management from Imperial College, London. The talented singer and guitarist, Emmanuel Bezhiwa Idakula, popularly known as Bez, started dating when he was an undergraduate at Covenant University. The Accord Party chieftain, we learnt, is leaving no stone unturned to make the day grand. On May 1st 2013, Bez announced his engagement to the ex-governor’s daughter through his publicist.
Tag: Rashidi Ladoja
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PDP has lost focus, says ex-Governor Ladoja
•Why my pact with Alao-Akala isn’t working’
Former Oyo State Governor Rashidi Ladoja yesterday said the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has lost focus.
Speaking with reporters in Ibadan, the state capital, on a variety of issues in the country, Ladoja said the PDP has abandoned its founding objectives and is now “peopled with mostly politicians, who are opposed to the principles of democracy”.
On the crisis in the party and past crises, including the one that led to his impeachment in 2006, the Accord leader said they were the reasons he could not consider returning to the PDP for now.
Ladoja cited the recent Anambra State election as a window through which one could assess the party. He said owing to many problems, the PDP could not conduct a primary poll to produce a candidate until a week before the election.
In Ladoja’s view, PDP National Chairman Alhaji Bamanga Tukur means well for the party, but the undemocratic elements in the PDP majority are frustrating his efforts to put the party back on the right track.
He said: “Tukur came in to correct these ills, but I think he is seeing more than he expected. It is difficult. May be God will be kind to us one day, such that we can have democrats in the majority in the party, because whatever they do largely affects the country.”
He likened his impeachment in 2006 to the current travails of Rivers State Governor Rotimi Amaechi, stressing that governance must have stopped in the state since the beginning of the crisis as Amaechi would be battling to save his political career.
The former governor said the recent partnership between him and his successor, Otunba Adebayo Alao-Akala, is not working because the latter is not willing to join the Accord.
He said the joint committee set up by the two groups could not work because Alao-Akala did not show any sign that he would soon abandon the PDP.
Ladoja said: “Alao-Akala approached me if we could work together. We did not even talk or think about what happened in the past. Yesterday is gone. We can only learn lessons from it to plan for tomorrow. All I want is to work for the benefit of Oyo State. We set up a committee, but personal interests changed many things. Bayo is not ready to get out of PDP. Our party does not have any privileges to offer. I think he does not want to leave PDP because of the privileges he enjoys there. As far as I am concerned, our doors are open
“We want to work with Alao-Akala, but we cannot fold our arms and keep watching. PDP has factions and we cannot concentrate on only one while other factions are moving, and the Alao-Akala group is not showing enough commitment. We know what we want. Our door is open at all times for whoever wants to work with us or join us.”
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Group slams Ladoja
An Ibadan interest group, the Oyo Patriotic Front (OPF), yesterday condemned former Governor Rashidi Ladoja’s presence at the first memorial anniversary prayers for former Governor Lamidi Adesina.
In a statement by its Chairman, Chief Jare Adepoju, OPF said the late Adesina must have turned in his grave when his “political foes, Ladoja and former Governor Adebayo Alao-Akala”, stepped into his Felele home.
It said: “The presence of those two men, who constituted serious menace to Lam while he was alive, was the greatest insult on the memory of that great man. We cannot forget in a hurry how Ladoja harangued Lam continuously till his death.
“Ladoja was behind the unkind blow below the belt that was hurled at Lam, when people said he was an Ebira man. Indeed, a few months before his death, Ladoja still hurled unprintable insults at the Great Lam. To allow this same man to grandstand on Adesina’s grave is a great disservice to the deceased’s memory.”
OPF urged the Adesina family to maintain its patriarch’s principles and not allow “agents of destruction to reap where they did not sow”.
It said: “Ladoja was a sworn enemy of the Great Lam. He never hid his hatred for Lam’s populist politics. The same goes for Alao-Akala. Baba detested their conservative politics and believed they would run Oyo State aground if we did not rescue the state from them. What they came to do at Felele on Monday was to literally dance on Lam’s grave.
“Scoring cheap political point at the demise of his traducers is typical of Ladoja’s brand of politics. He did same at the demise of Baba Lamidi Adedibu. The world knows Ladoja hated the late Baba Adedibu. He worked relentlessly for his political death and did all within his power as governor to destroy the Ibadan political warlord. But at Baba Adedibu’s memorial anniversary, Ladoja suddenly showed up at his Molete home, literally gloating by his graveside.”
OPF said with the performance of the progressive government anointed by the deceased, the family should beware of “the hawks” the late Adesina fought in his lifetime
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Confab: Ladoja kicks against National Assembly’s input
•’I won’t return to PDP’
Former Oyo State Governor Rashidi Ladoja has said it will be wrong to submit recommendations at the proposed National Dialogue to the National Assembly for ratification.
He warned members of the National Assembly against tampering with the recommendations of Nigerians.
Ladoja said it was pertinent for Nigerians to discuss their future, adding that their decisions should be subjected to the National Assembly.
He spoke with reporters yesterday after registering at Ward 10, Ibadan North Local Government Area, in compliance with the Accord’s confirmation of old members and registration of new ones.
The Accord leader said: “People have been calling for it, but I do not think this is the type of conference people are yearning for. They are not calling for a dialogue that would be submitted to the National Assembly for ratification, but we are yet to see details of what the Federal Government wants to do. All I know is that Nigerians need to sit down to discuss our country’s future, but how to go about it has not been decided.”
He said the confirmation/registration was to give new members a sense of belonging and allow them vie for any position in the Accord.
On whether he would return to the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Ladoja said he had no plan to do so, adding that the Accord had not had any discussion with the PDP in the past one year.
Instead, he said PDP members were welcome in the Accord.
“That has been foreclosed for a long time. Why do you want to re-open it? We have not talked to PDP in one year. I can assure you that there has been no underground meeting. We are all friends and we can be talking. I am hopeful people in PDP will join Accord.
“The party is supreme. You can see that the registration did not take place in my house. I came out to register. Our politicians must know that in politics, party membership is voluntary.”
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Ladoja’s suspension rattles supporters
Former governor of Oyo State, Senator Rashidi Ladoja, has a new political battle to contend with. Recently, he was suspended by the national headquarters of his party, Accord Party, over an alleged indiscipline, which reportedly borders on insubordination.
Ladoja was suspended for allegedly referring to himself as the National Leader, a position the party officials claim is non-existent in the political party. The suspension, according to sources, has put the former governor’s supporters in a quandary.
Ripples gathers that Ladoja is presently preoccupied with this ‘unexpected’ challenge.