A former Minister of State for Education, Senator Iyabo Anisulowo, has accused the duo of Vice-President Yemi Osinbajo and the National Chairman of the All Progressives Congress, Adams Oshiomhole, of being the masterminds of the ongoing crisis rocking the APC governorship primary in Ogun State.
She made the allegation on Wednesday during a media chat in Ilaro, Yewa South Local Government Area of Ogun State, barely 24 hours after the Secretary to the Ogun State Government, Taiwo Adeoluwa, came hard on Oshiomhole over an alleged plan to foist his preferred candidate on the state.
The ex-minister, who was working to ensure that the next governor of the state comes from Ogun West, said it saddened her that no one from the zone had governed the state since it was created 42 years ago.
She said she and other Ogun West elders began the struggle for the “emancipation” of the zone over 30 years ago and described 2019 as the best opportunity for the zone to produce a governor of the state.
Anisulowo disclosed that the Yewa Elders Council unanimously chose the consensus governorship candidate, Adekunle Akinlade, after a thorough screening.
“I am really hurt. I’m disturbed and feel like crying with this development. After shifting the direct governorship primary two times, members of the APC in the state trooped out, on Tuesday, to participate in the exercise in the presence of officials of the Independent National Electoral Commission.
“But I was shocked to discover that some APC members, backed by the Vice-President and Oshiomhole, conducted another direct primary. He (Osinbajo) did his politics in Lagos. He came to be Vice-President from Lagos but we cannot deny that he is an indigene of Ogun State. But for us, I have been in politics for 35 years. We don’t know him in the politics of Ogun State.
“The only thing we knew about him is that he was a commissioner in Lagos State and his brother was a commissioner here in Ogun State and many times we met, they were very respectful. So, how do we feel that he would be the one that is trying to rock the boat here?
“But Oshiomhole, everybody knows him. And if he is faulting the system here, what about the system that made him the national chairman of our party? How clean was the process? And now he wants to turn everything upside down for us here.
“So, we are begging all law-abiding people, all the citizens of Nigeria to please caution our national chairman and other people that are fuelling trouble to put Ogun State on fire.”