By Kola Olabisi
The wind has blown. We have seen the anus of the fowl. With patience, the eyes will sight the nose without hitches. Such is the current situation of the disenchanted, disgruntled and subversive group of elements within the Osun State chapter of the All Progressives Congress (APC) self-styled, The Osun Progressives (TOP), which has needlessly constituted itself as a major opposition group within the party which it professes to belong to.
It was the arrival of the Senator Abdulahi Adamu-led All Progressives Congress(APC) National Reconciliation Committee to Osun last Saturday which was earlier inaugurated by the Caretaker/Extraordinary Convention Planning Committee(CECPC) of the APC that exposed the real ulterior motives of the rebellious TOP members. The litany of their obnoxious demands was enough to make an angel to intuitively burst into weeping as it was a clear indication that the so-called TOP people did not mean well for Governor Gboyega Oyetola-led administration, the state APC and the state as a whole.
For instance, the TOP pressure group was asking the Reconciliation Committee to recognise its so-called congresses when it was pungently visible to the blind, audible to the deaf and tangible to the idiots that this recalcitrant set of people, never for once, held any Congress. Their demand in this regard cannot add up as something cannot be built on nothing.
Funny enough, the so called TOP handlers even went ahead to assault the sensibility of President Mohammodu Buhari who appointed Governor Oyetola into the membership of the (CECPC) by giving the latter’s resignation from the body as one of the conditionalities for peace parley. The rebellious TOP leadership must have forgotten that it is he who appoints that is vested with the authority to fire. It’s this analogy that buttresses the fact that this aspect of their demands is DOD(Dead On Delivery).
Another allegation of the infamous TOP group of politicians in Osun is that of nepotism against Governor Oyetola. What is being canvassed here for the world to believe is that Governor Oyetola, since the inception of his administration, has been shutting out the APC members who had served one or two terms in the unbroken two terms of eight years of former Governor Rauf Aregbesola’s government. This allegation also falls flat as some prominent members of the Oyetola cabinet were recycled from the cabinet of the immediate-past governor of the state.
In the category of the inherited cabinet members by Oyetola are the Chief of Staff, Dr Charles Akinola, Remi Omowaiye, the Works Commissioner; Bola Oyebamiji, the Finance Commissioner; the Health Commissioner; Commissioner for Budget and Economic Planning and a host of others. Based on the above explanation, a discerning mind can easily find fault with the TOP allegation.
In a nutshell, what the rancorous TOP is hankering after is the soul of the APC in Osun State as they are fond of saying that all they want is the control of the party. In all the states where any political party is in power, the governor of such state is the leader/head of the party. As it is in Osun State today, Governor Oyetola is the leader/head of the APC just the way former Governor Rauf Aregbesola was the leader of the party during his own time. I can’t recollect of any body whether personally or corporately, jostling the control of the party with him then.
The demand of the inconsiderate TOP handlers as regards the control of the party can be likened to someone who is dubiously asking for the control of the neck and at the same time feigning freedom for the head. Such a head which concedes to the control of his neck by an identified enemy would be operating at his whims and caprices. Such a head will only become a pawn in the hands of the neck. May God forbid bad thing.
If not for the imminent fear of public outcry, the heartless TOP handlers which are asking for impossible utopia from Oyetola in order to settle the self-created conflict would have also asked the governor to part way with Kafayat, his wife, as one of the conditionalities to make truce!
There is no way that a scar can be like the original flesh. If a wife has made up her mind to elope with another lover, she will be making unattainable and outrageous demands from the husband she is about to ditch. With the current development in the Osun APC, it’s only a political nincompoop who would think that anyone who calls himself a member of TOP is wholeheartedly with the APC. They are only in the APC in the body while their spirit is in another political party where they have been alleged to be having clandestine meetings in Ibadan and Abuja.
However, let me congratulate Governor Oyetola on the emergence of the TOP members and their leaders as it would have been deadlier and more catastrophic if they have opted to put on the insignia of their avowed political enemies who are working against his re-election under the table.
The emergence of TOP is an express indication/pointer to the fact that Oyetola’s re-election has divine undertone which no human being is capable of bungling. I am convinced that with or without the so-called TOP, God’s predestined arrangement with reference to Oyetola’s re-election is unshakeable.
It was the misinformation deliberately published by one of the media guys of TOP, one Niniowo Kikiowo, about the meeting of the national reconciliation committee on Monday which was spotted by the ever vigilant Chief Press Secretary to Governor Oyetola, Ismail Omipidan, that further exposed the shameless antics of the TOP.
Kikiowo had published a story with a false headline that “Oyetola Group Shuns Reconciliation, Dismisses All TOP Allegations,” when it was not true that the Osun APC under the watch of its Chairman-elect, Prince Gboyega Famodun, shunned the reconciliation meeting. The false headline showed that the TOP which was hitherto working to the answer would have rejoiced to the rooftop if Governor Oyetola had rebuffed the reconciliation committee.
The long and short of the development is an indication that the demands of the nefarious TOP handlers are insensitive, inconsiderate, wicked, unrealistic, ludicrous, unreasonable, awry, awful and hawkish which can neither sit nor fly. The earlier they realize the need to genuinely join force with the Prince Famodun-led APC in Osun State to win the incoming governorship election, the better for them. If not, they will keep to remain outside the government and the party in perpetuity.
Reliance on frivolous and distractive legal foibles and chicaneries to unsettle the governor, his government and his party would, in the end, be counterproductive because if a wicked man relays a story, the judgement won’t be equally delivered by a wicked judge. Experience has also shown that what gives a human being fame is equally what brings him down. Half a word is enough for the wise. Period.