Oyo Govt Fingered in Osun PDP Protest

Yinka Kolawole in Osogbo

Members of the Peoples’ Democratic Party (PDP), in Osun State, yesterday staged a protest against the alleged interference of Oyo State Governor, Mr. Seyi Makinde, in the affairs of the Osun State Chapter of PDP.

They also alleged the South-west Zonal Chairman, Mr. Soji Adagunodo of disrupting the state PDP’s activities using his office.

The protesters, who were drawn from all the wards across the state, stormed the party’s secretariat at Biket in Osogbo.

The party members were armed with placards with several inscriptions warning about interference by “external forces.”

Some of the inscriptions read: “Osun is not an appendage of Oyo,” “Seyi Makinde, please keep off,” “PDP Govs, we love and respect you,” “Ademola Adeleke is our man,” among others.

The protesters were chanting different songs all pointing towards the external influence in the party.

Speaking, a Chieftain of PDP and former Osun West Senatorial Candidate, Dr. Lere Oyewumi, said the party is known for its forthrightness.

According to him, the National Working Committee (NWC),that is headed by Senator Ayu, started well by inviting 150 stakeholders to Abuja.

“We have discussed our grievances, which they promised to be free, fair, just and honest to all. Yesterday supposed to be our congress and they had already appointed 93 to conduct the congress across the local governments in Osun State.

“They arrived at Osun State on Wednesday, in the afternoon around 1 p.m., five leaders who ought to lead the congress invited us to an hotel they lodged, they said they can’t continue with the congress because they receive court injunction.

“We linked up with Abuja and found out that it was a lie as the NWC did not order for the cancelation of the congress. Later that day we learnt that Abuja stakeholders had met and postponed the congress officially.

“We want to believe that there are some forces within the PDP who are not interested in us winning this election in Osun State, unfortunately they are leaders of the party including a governor.

“We demand that all the people they sent here to conduct the congress, that none of them should come back here, if we see their face here on Sunday, they will not live to tell the story.”

Oyewumi said the NWC must appoint people who are fair to all stakeholders.

“We learnt that they want to bring the Governor of Adamawa State here, that is even worse because when we went for national convention, Fintiri was the convention chairman and what they did to us should not be allowed here. They delayed us for almost five hours before our national delegate could be allowed to vote.

“We have presented our letter to the chairman of the party to be transmitted to National Secretariat. Oyo and Adamawa State governors should not be allowed to determine the issues in Osun PDP.

“We suspect the hand of Seyi Makinde in what happened on Wednesday. The way he is acting to us seemed that the he is not interested in our progress. He supposed to be helping us as a governor who is close to us, but he is not,” he stated.