BY : RAJI AYOOLA, Ibadan.
An Oyo State-based Socio-political Organisation, the Oyo Kajola Group (OKG) has advised the Oyo State chapter of the All Progressives Congress (APC) and some purported members of the Association of Local Governments of Nigeria (ALGON) in the state to stop its relentless and meaningless attacks on Governor Seyi Makinde.
OKG, in a statement by its Media Coordinator, Mr. Adebayo Ayandele, which was made public in Ibadan on Tuesday, said that recent outbursts by the APC and ALGON on the management of local government matters by Governor Makinde can only be termed as the compulsive attitude of bad losers whose negative tendencies are completely unproductive.
According to OKG, the criticisms against Makinde by the APC and ALGON are not only baseless but a clear demonstration of undemocratic tendencies by political actors who have unfortunately benefitted from the nation’s democracy.
“We can only urge them to stop being bad losers and stop the incessant display of undemocratic conducts, including their call for unconstitutional intervention in Oyo State,” the OKG said.
The group stated that APC’s statement calling on President Muhammadu Buhari and the National Assembly to adopt undemocratic measures by illegally intervening in the issue of local government in Oyo State was not only a shameful faux pas, but a portrayal of the members of the APC and ALGON in Oyo State as namby-pamby democrats.
The group further described Oyo APC’s call to President Buhari and the leadership of the National Assembly to prevail on Makinde on local government administration in Oyo State as a disgrace, noting that APC members in the State would have to avail themselves the opportunity of the free education policy of the Makinde administration and free distribution of textbooks to return to secondary school classrooms to learn Government and Civics Education, especially topics on federalism, democracy and government system.
According to the group, the claim made by the APC that Makinde’s plans to appoint caretaker committees was an affront to the judiciary and a decision to position his lackeys in office was not only strange but totally baseless, especially coming from a party that administered local governments in Oyo State with caretaker committees for seven of its eight years in office.
The group added that the claim that Makinde tried to ‘bribe’ known APC members appointed into the Oyo State Independent Electoral Commission (OYSIEC) by the immediate past government was a wicked lie from the rotten pit that APC is, noting that Makinde’s offer to pay the OYSIEC members off the appointment was lawful and well-intended.
The Oyo Kajola Group (OKG) advised Makinde to go ahead if he so wishes to appoint caretaker chairmen for the local councils, as according to it, the move will enable the grassroots in Oyo State to feel the impact of government more than before.
It noted that if the Governor decides to do so, he would not be committing any infraction on the laws of the land, pending the election into the councils.
The Oyo Kajola Group also warned the Oyo State APC and its appendage, to perish the thought of its evil intention of planning to snatch the people’s mandate freely given to Governor Makinde through the Court, noting that the APC’s false hope would end up being deflated.
The group said: “On Monday, the Oyo State chapter of the APC, for the umpteenth time and in its characteristic frustrated manner, treated Nigerians to another round of its garrulous but baseless attacks on the Oyo State Governor, Engineer Seyi Makinde. Silence would have been the best answer for the ninnies that Oyo APC leaders and members have become ever since they lost the March 9, 2019 governorship election.
“However, the namby-pamby democrats and bogus progressives known as Oyo APC had gone too far this time, as they called on President Buhari and the National Assembly to “prevail” on Makinde on how to administer a federating unit, Oyo State. This call, to say the least, is disgraceful, uncanny and not well-thought-out and we can only ask whether the writer and sponsors of the APC statement actually went through school or learnt anything about the federal system of Government.
“They cited some cases to buttress their disgraceful claim but they were only clever by half, as they hid a substantial part of the matters from the public with an intent to deceive and mislead the public. The truth is that Governor Makinde would not be disobeying any order by appointing an interim management for the local governments. By doing so, he would only be contributing to making the impact of governance felt more at the grassroots.
“The Oyo State APC, which has become devitalized and enfeebled by its loss in the State, instead of calling on President Buhari and the national leadership of the party to help rebuild its broken house, has been going about attacking Governor Makinde and seeking ungodly shortcuts on how to reclaim the governorship seat it lost in a free, fair and credible election. We can only wish them the best in their voyage of shame as they go ahead groping in self-inflicted darkness until they fall into their own traps.
“We, however, will not sit and watch as the Oyo State APC, which is renowned for its mendacity and barefaced dishonesty, attempt to deceive the public over what is going on in Oyo State regarding the leadership of the local government system.
“The APC, in its statement, tried to extrapolate on the Supreme Court judgment over local councils to justify its attacks on Makinde. The truth is that the cases in point are different. As the Latin maxim goes, Nemo dat quod non habet; you cannot put something on nothing and expect it to stand. The election that brought in the sacked local government chairmen of the APC was illegal ab initio in that it flouted the Constitution. The election was conducted in defiance of court injunctions that restricted the government of Senator Abiola Ajimobi, a clear violation of the Constitution, which President Buhari and the National Assembly are now being asked to protect.
“It will also be recalled that the same illegal council election had marked the beginning of the end for the APC in Oyo State, as it was a festival of imposition of the cronies and flunkeys of former Governor Abiola Ajimobi. This development, indeed, led to a faction of the APC approaching the court to stop the election, using the plan of the immediate past government to conduct polls into local government councils and LCDAs as a ground for litigation.
“It is also interesting that the judgment the APC claims to have against Makinde was hurriedly procured before he took office, having been done in cahoots with the immediate past administration, which had lost grounds through Makinde’s election and was looking for a landmine to plant for the new governor.”
