Yayi Vs Amosun

The political clime seems dicey ahead of 2019 governorship poll in Ogun State. In this piece, Femi Ogbonnikan examines the subtle bickering between the lawmaker representing Lagos West Senatorial District at the Upper Chamber of the National Assembly, Solomon Olamilekan Adeola (Yayi) who is jostling to become the governor of the Gateway state and the incumbent governor, Ibikunle Amosun, especially with the planned demolition of the Ilaro home of the Lagos West lawmaker, a development many believe, is a political vendetta, in order to cripple Adeola’s political machinery

An uneasy calm is currently unsettling the leadership of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Ogun state chapter over who succeeds the incumbent Governor Amosun in 2019. The unsavoury contention which has become a war of attrition is between Senator Adeola  (aka Yayi) and Amosun,  who is still keeping his joker very close to his chest.

Thus, the subtle bickering has split the leadership of the party into two, with Yayi faction enjoying the full support of the National Leader of the APC, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, while Amosun is unfavourably indisposed to the former, but would want to pick his own anointed child to succeed him.

 An informed source told our correspondent that the crisis has pitched Amosun against Tinubu, noting that the duo hardly see eye-to-eye. 

And following the deafening agitation by the people of Ogun West for the number one seat, come 2019, the game which is being played has turned Yewa/Awori land into a theatre of war, between the two gladiators.  

Ranking top with his beourgeoning fame and influence, Yayi, the political son of Tinubu, has remained a threat and his foray into the governorship race has continued to send jitters down the spines of his arch-rivals, especially the present administration in the state. Some party chieftains, like Chief Bode Mustapha and Tunji Egbetokun, who worked closely with Amosun during his first term in office (between 2011 and 2015), has dumped their former boss and pitched tent with Yayi. Consequently, Yayi’s political machinery has come under scathing criticisms and attacks.

Of recent, the personal donation of N5 million to the Ogun State chapter of the Nigerian Union of Teachers (NUT) during the World Teachers’ Day was said to be the genesis of Yayi’s travail, an unsavoury development, which culminated in the sack and suspension of some leaders of the union by the State Government.  It was gathered that the recent condolence visit of Yayi to the Isara home of a former Afenifere chieftain, Sir Olaniwun Ajayi, did not also go down well with the state government.

But the last straw that broke the camel’s back, and which is giving the government in power a sleepless night, it was learnt, occurred on Tuesday, December 6, 2016, a day after Yayi hosted well over 200 erstwhile Ogun State Local Government councilors in his Ilaro mansion. Officials of the Ogun State Ministry of Physical and Urban Planning subsequently gave the owner of the house a three-day demolition notice. 

The planned demolition of the house which is located within Ilaro GRA was said to have flouted the laws regulating building construction in the state. Many see the development as a political vendetta.  But who will succeed Amosun come 2019? The popular consensus will certainly prevail.