The political future of the billionaire publisher of National Mirror and Newswatch newspapers, Jimoh Ibrahim, took a further plunge on Tuesday as his loyalists in Ondo have pitched their tenth with the new leadership of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, under the grip of Ondo State governor, Olusegun Mimiko.
Our correspondent gathered that all other members of the old PDP in Ondo State have accepted the leadership of
Mimiko, the fact that became more glaring with their
honouring of the governor’s invitation at the
state house on Tuesday.
With this development, political pundits reasoned that Ibrahim, the a Group Managing Director, Global Energy group, who is nursing the ambition of succeeding Mimiko as the next governor of Ondo, may have been left alone in the struggle to wrestle the soul of the party from mimiko.
An impeccable source reveal that the billionaire businessman was totally devastated by the action of the party loyalists, owing largely to millions of naira he has spent to nurture the party till this particular time.
However, noted for his self-effacing attitude, the source further hinted that Ibrahim has being telling all those that cares to know that he still remains the bedrock of the party in the state, assuring the few loyalists that are still hanging around him that the caretaker committee set up by the national secretariat of the party will be reversed.
Ibrahim’s political future in Ondo PDP became troubled immediately Gov. Mimiko dumped his former party, Labour Party for the PDP, the situation which inside sources said badly jolted the Igbotako-born self-acclaimed corporate surgeon.
Recalled that Ibrahim and Mimiko had not enjoyed the best of relationship in the past. Even when the governor visited Ibrahim in his Lagos residence just before the last election that returned him to power, Ibrahim had treated him with disdain.
Now that the party structure in Ondo has been handed over to Mimiko, whom inside source claimed to be Ibrahim’s major political adversary in his quest to rule the state, that ambition may have hit the rock.
However, desperate to be a governor, those close to the haughty businessman say he may be considering defecting to the opposition All a Progressives Congress, APC.
One of Ibrahim’s allies told New Mail Nigeria on Wednesday morning that, former President Olusegun Obasanjo had advised Ibrahim to go with APC earlier in the year like in view of the body languages of the leadership of the party.
Those in the know of the political permutations however claim that Ibrahim may not really find accommodation in the APC, not that he wouldn’t want to, but that the party leadership may deny him a space.
Those who share this line of thought told our correspondent that the former Governor of Lagos and chieftain of the APC, Bola Ahmed Tinubu had in 2011 offered Ibrahim the opportunity, in a desperate political chess same to dislodge Mimiko to which Ibrahim allegedly declined.
The source said that Tinubu had sent Dr. Amos Akingba, one of Ibrahim’s close associate to discuss the issue with him.
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