Protest: Osun APC members lament loss to PDP in guber election, demand dissolution of party executive

…Oyetola discarded our advice, warnings — Salinsile

…Move by Aregbesola’s supporters shameful, callous — Famodun

Abimbola Abatta and Ismail Azeez

Members of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in  Osun State, sequel to the defeat in the July 16 governorship election, have staged a protest, calling for the dissolution of the party executive from the ward to the state level.

The protesters, who were comprised of youth, took to the streets from Odi-Olowo area through Ogo Oluwa to Osun House of Assembly in Osogbo, the state capital on Tuesday.

They accused Famodun of destroying the party due to his inability to lead the party to victory in the last July 16 governorship election in the state.

Nigerian NewsDirect reports that the aggrieved members held placards with inscriptions such as, “for the Osun APC, Famodun must go,” “Osun APC must be restructured Now.”

In addition to the dissolution of the party executive, other demands include, “Setting up of an independent caretaker committee to oversee the restructuring of the party and turn it into an election winning machine again; composition of an all-inclusive party executive structures from wards to state level within 90 days; and redistribution of the state and federal legislative tickets in an all inclusive manner to reflect true membership structure and tendencies.”

According to the Spokesperson, a member from Ward 10 Unit 8, Boluwaduro LG, Abosede Busayo Oluwaseun, fulfilling the demands will prevent the risk of suffering worse consequences in the coming elections.

Maintaining that the party Chairman, Prince Gboyega Famodun and the current officially recognised executive committee in the state have acted with malice aforethought, gross incompetence, impunity and ill will in the last four years, she disclosed that “this cost us the governorship we fought so hard with blood and tears to win from PDP.”

In the spokesperson’s words, “The July 16th governorship election in Osun has come and gone, but the aftermath will remain with us for a long time to come with prospect of its deleterious consequences for our party in the state and coming elections.

“Our party lost a governorship election we should have won. It’s like we snatched defeat from the jaws of victory, bringing to a halt the progressive train that began a glorious movement 12 years ago in Osun. We practically surrendered the governorship of the state to a decimated, fractious and disoriented opposition party, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).”

Oluwaseun further revealed that “the journey to this humiliating defeat began in 2018 with the unjust imposition of the candidate, Alhaji Gboyega Oyetola, from the wrong electoral zone, Osun Central when the people of Osun were expecting our party to field a candidate from Osun West.

“We had to leverage on the goodwill of the outgoing APC government, the charm and charisma of the then Governor Rauf Aregbesola and the relative strength of our party and members in the state, to be able to just manage to win the election.

“Once the new government that had just a thin veneer of legitimacy was inaugurated, it began a bizarre and ruinous process of delinking itself from the popular and well accepted immediate past administration and the dutiful party leaders and members that made its election possible. This is in gross and ominous violation of our fathers proverb that says a river that delinks from its source will soon dry up.

“The government divided the party into Ileri Oluwa and others. Government and party positions became the exclusive right of Ileri Oluwa partisans while other members were excluded. This was even taken further with the arrest and prosecution of party members who do not belong to the Ileri Oluwa caucus.

“To make matters worse, the government and its cabinet members began an open attack on the person of Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola. The most visible achievement of the government without any doubt was the undoing of the cardinal programmes of his administration in education, political restructuring and others. While some programmes were reversed, others were simply stopped. The excuse then was that the people wanted it that way.

“We should ask now why the same people who demanded for the reversal of the eight years legacies could not vote for the governor’s re-election? We should also ask why the consultations that engineered the reversal could not deliver the votes in the end? But we know that they are all infernal shenanigans.

“The government was acting a diabolical script of exclusion and smear against Aregbesola and anyone that identifies with him in the party. It so happens that after delinking itself from the Aregbesola’s administration and reversing his legacy programmes, Governor Oyetola had nothing with which to campaign and win the hearts of the people again. He fell precipitously at the polls.”

Speaking further, Oluwaseun maintained that “all these happened under the Prince Gboyega Famodun officially recognised leadership of the party in the state. The party not only supported these but was in cahoots with the government. Prince Famodun presided over the destruction of the party.

“The tradition in APC has been that elections are won on the strength of the party, from the ward upwards. But Ileri Oluwa became the party as anyone not in this caucus is considered an outsider and officially alienated by the government and the leadership of the party. For this reason, Prince Famodun no longer holds party meeting and hardly come to the party secretariat again. Party business is either conducted in his house or mostly at the Oke Fia Government House.”

She added that, “The people of Osun are resolute in telling us that it is not our party they are angry with but our candidate and the leadership of our party; that is why they did not vote for us, even with the money our candidate spent on the election like a drunken sailor.

“This is going to get worse with the coming general election in February next year as we hold the presidential and other elections into state and national legislative offices, unless we address the drift now!”

Oyetola discarded our advice, warnings — Salinsile

In an interview with Nigerian NewsDirect, the factional Chairman, Hon. (Alhaji) Rasak Salinsile, disclosed that the State Governor, Adegboyega Oyetola, turned deaf ears to advice and warnings.

Salinsile called on the national leaders of the party to dissolve the state executive from the ward level to state executives for losing the governorship election to PDP in the just concluded poll.

Salinsile urged the party leaders to form a caretaker committee that will take good care of the party to organise a new Congress and send the party back to its base.

He demanded that the caretaker committee members should come from other geo political zones to ensure free, fair and credible congress.

According to him, “In developed democracies, when an ugly incident happens where a big party like ours a party in a recent where we never lose an election and was badly humiliated in an election like this nature. We have been warning him (Governor) more than two years ago.

“Severally, I have spoken to the press that even to the weakest opposition APC will not stand it. I have many opportunities to speak to the whole world that what was going on in party has never landed party in a good position.

“After being warned severally, they turned deaf ears to our advice.

“The last minute he took his ground even the National Chairman of the party came here for reconciliation, the governor never allowed it to work. At the last minute, we still went to Abuja calling for reconciliation. I led a 7-man committee to Baba Akande in Ila calling for peace in our party.”

Move by Aregbesola’s supporters shameful, callous — Famodun

Meanwhile, the State chapter of the APC has condemned the protest embarked upon by the supporters of the Interior Minister, Mr Rauf Aregbesola, against the state leadership of the party and the administration of Governor Gboyega Oyetola.

The State chairman of the party, in a statement issued by his Media Adviser, Kola Olabisi, in Osogbo said the protest was shameful, callous, primitive, selfish, wicked, misplaced and inconsiderate for the Aregbesola supporters who glaringly worked against the success of Governor Oyetola at the polls to now be canvassing restructuring of the party through a sponsored protest.

In Famodun’s words, “When I heard that the supporters of the immediate past governor of our state, Mr Rauf Aregbesola, were protesting, I thought my memory was playing me false as they cannot insulate themselves from whatever might be the current plight of the APC in Osun State.

“Assuming but not conceding that there are challenges within the party, protesters should be told that they lack moral right to either suggest or effect any likely solution as it is on record that they massively and collectively worked against Oyetola, the APC governorship candidate in the just-concluded election in line with the series of their threat.

“One would have thought that the appropriate place for them to canvass for the restructuring of any party is Senator Ademola Adeleke’s Ede country home whom they voted for with flaunted pride.

“If I may ask, at what point did it occur to you that the political party that you had abandoned for about three years which you have been working against needs restructuring?

“Did the Adeleke Dynasty not fund your series of campaigns of calumny against Oyetola and the leadership of the party at the Aregbesola Campaign Office where you converge every Thursday with the task of scrambling to outdo one another in lampooning Oyetola’s administration and the leadership of the party?

“If you all have conscience, I will enjoin you to do individualistic soul-searching and ask yourselves if you are worthy to be called the members of our party again by your actions and inactions which partly contributed to our temporary loss of the Osun State governorship election.

“Was it after you were rebuffed by the Pathfinder group faction leadership of the PDP which pungently refused you patronages after the governorship election as it was witnessed by the composition of its Transition Committee membership that you thought of coming back into the party with a sing-song of restructuring?

“It is however, pertinent to state here that there is a free entry and free exit in any political party which memberships are bonded by common interests and ideals.

“Since politics is a game of number and the more the merrier; continuous membership of our party is not foreclosed to any genuine member whose interest would not be counter-productive to the interest of our party as you cannot be an outsider and be canvassing for the restructure of the party,” Famodun explained.