Oyo 2019: Akintola Deserves Our Total Support, Says Alaafin

Alaafin of Oyo, Oba Lamidi Olayiwola Adeyemi, has appealed to the leadership of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) at both state and national levels to ensure that the governorship ambition of Chief Adeniyi Akintola (SAN) received their blessings.

Oba Adeyemi made the remark at the weekend when the legal luminary paid him a courtesy visit at the former palace in the ancient city of Oyo town.

The monarch who described Akintola as a formidable pillar in legal practice, recalled that the aspirant had applied sheer legal prowess to save situations for the progressives on many occasions, especially in the south western part of the country.

Oba Adeyemi noted that the likes of Akintola, whom he described as knowledgeable and God-fearing individuals should always vie for and seize the reins of leadership across tiers in the country.

He said: “If Niyi (Akintola) does not come out, someone else will. When those who are wise and intelligent refuse to contest elections, fools will take over. When the party chooses you, we know the next move.”

Intimating Akintola of the enormity of the burden of leadership if he eventually won the election, Oba Adeyemi said “You (Akintola) have come to work. Some of those who have been made governors, ministers, and commissioners are running into hiding today because they soon forgot what they were voted in for and deviated from the path. You have come to work. No rest till the last day.”

He commended the incumbent governor, Abiola Ajimobi for what he called his “socio-infrastructural renewal across the state,” noting that those who ensured a second term mandate for Governor Ajimobi have no cause to regret their action.

Earlier, in his remarks, the aspirant pleaded for the support of the monarch whom he referred to as a father. He said his interest in the governorship race was informed by the need to sustain the enviable legacies of the incumbent governor, Abiola Ajimobi.

“Efforts should be made by the progressives not to allow Oyo state to derail from the enviable path as currently being charted by the visionary leadership of governor Ajimobi.

The aspirant declared that “plots by uninformed politicians to create artificial and non-existing divisions within the Oyo speaking people should be consistently exposed and condemned,” as he submitted that the Oyo ancestry extended from Otta, the boundary of Ogun state to Offa, in Kwara state.