Leaders and stakeholders of the Oyo State Chapter of the All Progressives Congress (APC), has appealed to the National Secretariat of the party to reconsider its stance on the State Congress fixed for Saturday, alleging manipulation of the list of delegates to the Congress.
Sanctioned accordingly.
The leaders also called for an investigation into the manipulation allegations and doctoring of the party delegates list by some staffers of the National Secretariat, explaining that those behind the act, and their collaborators must be sanctioned accordingly.
The stakeholders, who gathered at the Premier Hotel, Ibadan, to address a press conference, on Saturday, expressed confidence in the National Secretariat of the party to accede to the request of the group, while describing the delegate’s list sent to the state for the congress as “contraband.”
Speaking on behalf of the leaders who cut across the 33 local government areas of the state, Senator Ayo Adeseun, said the party in the state had been reaching out to the National Secretariat for the list of the ward and local government congresses held earlier, preparatory to the state congress, but that the list had been kept in secrecy.
Adeseun said: “We were all prepared for the state congress until yesterday (Friday) morning when the panel from Abuja came. We have been clamouring for the list of delegates. While several of us went to Abuja last week on this same issue to say, we can’t have a congress when we don’t have delegate list. They promised they would do something about it and the list now came yesterday (Friday) and when we opened it, we saw it was just ‘contraband’.
He explained that scrutiny of the delegates list presented to the Chairman of the party, Chief Akin Oke, by the Chairman of the Congress Committee, Gambo Lawal, indicated that what was returned as delegates list which was different from the list sent by the party as results of the ward and local government congresses held earlier.
Adeseun disclosed that the party had adopted a consensus arrangement for its congresses in order to carry every member along in the process of building a new, stronger and virile party.
He explained that a good, authentic, verified delegates’ list, compiled in a transparent manner was needed to go to the polls in any congress.
He, however, on behalf of other leaders, appealed to the national headquarters of the party to give the Oyo State APC more time to verify the results of the ward and local government congresses so as to know that delegates were the genuine delegates elected by party members across the state.
Adeseun stated: “We are very sure and confident that top leadership of the party are probably not aware of what some people did around their offices. When we put this out and let the world see, we are confident that they will correct the anomalies.”
On the question of whether there is a congress or not, Adeseun said: “The State Chairman of the party put out a release yesterday that since he was the custodian of the original list and what went to Abuja, he compared what came back with what was sent, he saw all the differences and insisted that he could not take the list to the congress and that anything about congress should be suspended.”
Some of the leaders at the News Conference include, the Minister of Youths and Sports Development, Mr Sunday Dare; Chairman of the Nigerian Communications Commission, Professor Adeolu Akande; Senator Ayoade Adeseun; Senator Olufemi Lanlehin; Chief Niyi Akintola, who was represented; the 2019 Governorship flag bearer for the state, Mr Adebayo Adelabu; Ex-SSG Sharafadeen Alli; Dr Azeez Adeduntan and Joseph Tegbe.
Some of the federal lawmakers in attendance include, Prince Akeem Adeyemi, Mrs Tolulope Shadipe, former Oyo Assembly Speaker, Mr Olagunju Ojo and Prince Ayodeji Abass-Aleshinloye.
Other prominent leaders present include, Chief Fatai Ibikunle, Niyi Adeagbo, Mrs Folake Oshinowo, Gbenga Olayemi, Kola Olabiyi, Wasiu Owolabi, Ambali Abiodun and Olalekan Kazeem.
Lateefah Ibrahim
