By Banji Ayoola
The Director of Media and Publicity of the Ambassador Olusola Iji Campaign Organisation, Prince Sola Aregbesola, in the following interview with The Radiance, explains why he believes strongly that his boss would defeat the incumbent Ondo State Governor Oluwarotimi Akeredolu, SAN, in the forthcoming primary of the ruling All Progressives Congress, APC, which would pick the candidate to fly the party’s ticket in the scheduled governorship election of the state. He spoke with Banji Ayoola. The interview is hot; it compels reading of all political watchers of the sunshine state. Excerpts:
You said recently that Ambassador Olusola Iji would defeat Governor Oluwarotimi Akeredolu in the coming primary of the ruling All Progressives Congress, APC, to pick the party’s candidate for the forthcoming governorship election in Ondo State. What gives you that confidence?
Thank you very much. We are going to begin the story from the beginning. Akeredolu was not known in Ondo State politics until sometime in 2012, when he came and Lagos packaged him to come because of the role that he played in the Agagu/Mimiko electoral challenges of 2007. So he came.
Because of the kind of politics we play here, a very horrible one, very bad one, and because we do not have the money, Ondo state people are not used to sponsoring any candidate to vie for political office. Those who sponsor know what it means. That’s why they are shining today in politics. So Tinubu called all of them who were contesting.
Iji came out from the South Senatorial District with branded vehicles, billboards and posters. He had his men on the ground because he had been chairman of AD (Alliance for Democracy) for four years from 2003 to 2007; chairman of AC (Action Congress) up to 2012; and interim chairman of ACN (Action Congress of Nigeria) for three months. For eight years and three months, this man was party chairman in Ondo State. You know what it means. He had his grassroots people, ward, local government executives, on and on from AC to AD and then ACN.
Then he also played a key role in bringing what today is APC (All Progressives Congress). He was part of the five man presidential committee set up to midwife the conglomerate of CPC (Congress for Progressive Change), AD, the breakaway faction of PDP (Peoples Democratic Party) to form what today is the APC. So he is sufficiently deeply rooted in Ondo State grassroots politics. That much we do know now.
In 2012 when he showed interest, Bola Ahmed Tinubu called him and said look, please we want this governorship to go to the North Senatorial District because Baba Ajasin had been governor before the creation of Ekiti State. There had been Olumilua, Baba Adefarati from the North. After Adefarati, Agagu from the South had a shot. After Agagu, it came back to the Centre. After the Centre, that is Mimiko, it has gone back to the North. Normally it is the South Senatorial District that should produce the governor.
This gentleman, the present governor, Akeredolu was given the ticket in 2012 because Lagos prevailed on other aspirants to step down and allow the thing to go to the North. And he was the only person coming from the North. Yes, Tunji Abayomi, SAN, showed interest. But it is one thing to show interest, it is another thing to back that interest up financially. We knew that whatever happened, Aketi was going to emerge, and he did emerge. And Aketi contested against Mimiko in 2012 and lost. The party waited. The next attempt was 2016, and he got the ticket of the party again, and he won.
Ondo State politics is so straightforward. Until Mimiko came, Ondo people don’t give second term consideration to any governor. No. The one who had it was Baba Ajasin, and you know it wasn’t easy. You remember what happened in 1983; and the records of Baba Ajasin. He created structural development of this state, still first class. He had it. Of course he was to enjoy it, but the military came in. Twenty months after, Olumilua was a goner and every other person. Ondo state people don’t give second term to anybody. But Mimiko had it one way or the other. Of course we know the experiences of Ondo State people in Mimiko’s second term.
Now that Aketi won in 2012, asking for another ticket in 2020 would mean getting the ticket for three good terms of four years each. That’s very unfair to the South Senatorial District; which means that the political arrangement of eight years whatever is going to affect the whole senatorial districts; because if on the unlikely event that he gets another four years, that means he has held the ticket for 12 years. The South would have to wait until four years time. South would also want to spend four years.
Before it comes back to the Centre here, you are talking of after 12 years, and that is very unfair, considering the fact that no Akure person has held the position of governor. It is not the fault of the system. It’s the fault of our people because they do not play the kind of politics that would have allowed an Akure person. Akure people wasted their first and second eleven in 1983. The rest is history.
They said leave it for him. Iji turned over his structure to the party. As party chairman, he gave the people robust leadership, an all inclusive leadership like we said. It was easy for him, and then he was now made the DG of that campaign. He played a very magnificent role in getting this man in. but he did not win. The man lost. It was pretty difficult to beat Iroko who was eyeing his second term. The man who financed his election in Lagos was very mad at that. Not to mention figure but talking of billions of naira. If he had spent that money on the election here, Mimiko won’t have had won a second term. That is what happened, and the financier was angry. Tinubu was angry and it’s normal. So they fell out, which was the same thing that also played out in 2016 because I am an insider. I was deeply involved.
He got it in 2012, he got it in 2016. Asking for it again in 2020 is abnormal for those who are saying Operation four plus four. Between 2012 and 2016 is four years; 2016 to 2020 is another four years. So he has had eight years. Fairness demands that the thing should go to the South. Just leave the disposition of the man. Don’t even talk about how he has treated the party structure. Everybody is in pains, in abject poverty, living in tatters.
We went round 17 of the 18 local governments in Ondo State before COVID-19 lockdown came. We went round with the Ambassador. We first of all went to the party leaders, party excos in the local governments. These involved ward chairmen too, average of 25, 27 party officials. We went round. Their condition is pitiable. It is sad. They were neglected. No consideration for anything. A lot of them would be invited to come to a meeting in Akure, and nobody would give them a kobo as transport money back home. Meetings are never held; and party meetings are the things that keep the party going, maybe twice monthly, one monthly, quarterly, or twice yearly basis.
The man just came, got what he wanted because he got Abuja backing. What happened in the primaries was a horrible thing. We are where we are because the Oyeguns of this world are never true to themselves as former leader, former governor, as National Chairman of APC; so much so that there was a brazen rigging of the governorship primary.
The three man appeals committee set up by the national working committee of APC to look at the complaints raised by the people who were rigged out, recommended a cancellation of the primary result and holding the primary elections afresh. The recommendation was referred to the National Working Committee in Abuja. They got to Abuja. They deliberated on it for a long time before they could arrive at the decision to vote on this. Ordinarily once the appeals committee recommends, except there are proven cases of political shenaniganism in what the appeals committee did, that’s when you subject it to vote.
The evidences were so compelling. They voted. Six of the eleven member National Working Committee who voted said let’s uphold the recommendation of the appeals panel for cancellation. Five said let’s go ahead, let’s jettison the recommendation because of time lag. Oyegun got in there, said okay this is the result. The only other body that could deliberate on that matter would have been the board of trustees, and the board doesn’t have that power any way to do that. All they needed to do was inform INEC. But INEC set deadline to submit candidates’ names.
They deliberately waited, calculated it in such a way that the voting would come up on the last day of submission of candidates’ names to INEC. Oyegun had believed that having done their homework, the thing would fail, they would throw that appeal out and this man would have his way because the hatred they had for Jagaban was so much; and those whom he himself brought into the APC administration of Muhammadu Buhari were working against him. They wanted him destroyed politically. So instead of adhering to what the appeals panel had recommended and upheld by the National Working Committee of APC, Oyegun took the papers from there and went straight to INEC office to submit this man’s name.
That has been the problem of APC since then. Then those who were affected went to court. One thing led to the other. Elections came. He won. Some of the aspirants went to other parties and contested and lost to him. But the matter was still in court. But the gentleman who went to the court who, by all arrangements, should have won was prevailed upon not to show interest in the matter. He travelled out. Nobody saw him; then allowing this man. I was talking about the judiciary system in this country, how rotten it truly is. It is so sad. By the time he came, they said 180 days time lag. So he could not do anything. So Aketi had to spend four years.
The four years that Aketi spent, it is the fourth year now, he has been in the vengeance mood because people questioned the legality of his emergence in the primaries. Normally you bring everybody together. This is our state. Let’s do this, that one. He didn’t do that. He just brought his boys from wherever, and they are running APC the way it pleases them. The normal patronage that is given to party elders and leaders at whatever level, the youths and all others is not there. As I am talking to you in Akure, there are very few people enjoying the government. It’s so sad.
As far as he is concerned no leader exists, no party structure exists because they handpicked members of the state exco. He is more or less the chairman of the party because what does Ade Adetimehin know about politics. Yes, he may be a grassroots politician. But how far can he go. How many people does he know. What help does he have in politics that he should be the state chairman. He could be a young man but one who is open to suggestions and pieces of advice from established, experienced, exposed and tested politicians. We are not having that.
Now that Ambassador Olusola Iji is coming in, that’s why he says he is interested in this thing. The party should be running on the basis of the fact that this party is the coalition of members of CPC, ANPP, SDP, AD, AC even a breakaway faction of PDP that came together to form APC; we should bring everybody together again. Let us bring everybody together under the real umbrella of APC, and not handpick leaders.
All of us, who were involved in the campaigns and were not on his side, are out. We can’t do anything, nothing. And that is why for anybody to get any patronage or contract in Ondo State, you go to this guy who owns the supermarkets because the wife has a domineering influence on the man. It’s the wife who is ruling; and you begin to wonder. So these are some of the reasons we believe that Iji would defeat him.
We went round the local governments. The pictures that were painted to us that we met on the ground, and the revelations that were made to us: the people, everybody said we are waiting. We were even planning, we prefer Direct Primary which would involve card carrying party members, those who have been sidelined. Everybody would queue up, a reflection of Option A4 – queue up and they count. But he wanted indirect primary in that it would be only exco members and political office holders only whose votes would determine who wins the primary.
But from what we have seen on the ground, what we have heard, what we could deduce from the reports that we met on the ground and the conclusions that could be reasonably drawn from what the people have said, the guy is a goner. And he himself knows that because he keeps on saying if the party fails to pick him, the party would lose. How can a state governor say if the party fails to pick him. How can a sitting governor be saying that kind of a thing if he knows that he has well taken care of party members.
At the end of the day it is what the people say that is determinant. And the people who would say it are the people, the elders who were neglected. He used to say kilo kan oun, the elders, who are the elders. Some aspirants got together to form the Unity Group in Ondo State under the leadership of Baba Alli Olanusi, former Deputy Governor. You need to see the kind of language this man uses on those elders. Politics apart; Yoruba culture is such that age is respected, experience is revered, integrity is rewarded anywhere any day. That is the reason why small boys don’t go around talking to experienced, exposed and tested leaders who have paid their price, their dues for the development of this state.
What contribution has the man made? Nothing. He is based in Ibadan. You remember his days as Attorney General under Onyearugbulem. That was the same Owo man who led the assaulting team to Baba Ajasin’s bedroom to go and assault him. He is an Owo man. You would be shocked at what we discovered In Owo, his own local government. He would lose there, except they would just be somewhere and cook the result like they did for him in the primary.
That’s why Iji said he knows he would beat him any day. The people, market women, everybody, people are suffering. You have to be an Aketi person or acolyte to get anything. I said it on radio when I was invited. I said it on Adaba FM that the man has been too distant from the people. You cannot sit down and be ditching out orders; and you do not take into consideration the means of livelihood of the people here.
We have no New York Exchange here. No Security and Exchange Commission or whatever here. People who are here operate daily businesses. They leave in the morning. They survive from whatever little amount they make. You see what people are doing. Nobody is saying it is their fault. But we are saying that if government had compassion for people as part of their social structure of governance, from day one, it would not be this terrible for the people. As I was coming, trying to fish out this address, people were saying please oga give me N200, please give me N100 to be able to buy gari and groundnuts. It is that bad.
So Iji is beating him hands down. Iji is a man they know. Iji has been a labour leader, party chairman for eight years and three months, and he has his structures all over the state. You are a senior journalist like me too. You know how you get anywhere. You cannot be stranded. All you need do is call somebody. In politics, those who are grounded in politics can never be stranded anywhere. Iji is not stranded. He cannot be stranded. So they prefer Iji, a man who they know. And when he was here, he gave the pragmatic approach to leadership, all inclusive leadership.
These are his selling points. He is not arrogant. He is humane, a man who would listen. He is an accomplished lawyer. He would listen to you. He would tell you, this is the way I see this thing. But if you are able to convince him, he would say yes, you have a superior argument. The line you’ve just explained is the line we are toeing. That’s the man. That’s leadership, because he has been there; he knows what it takes. A man who had nothing to do with the people would not know; he won’t know people are suffering; he wouldn’t know what it means to bring people together; he won’t know how to talk to traditional rulers; he wouldn’t know how to talk to the elderly; he wouldn’t want to hold meetings; what’s his business with meetings; why are they meeting?
The other day, it was so sad. They said Governor Kayode Fayemi of Ekiti was reporting something. He said he went for a seminar or conference in Ghana. They were together in Ghana; and those of them who assembled got to the reception, the whole place was so dull. No sufficient arrangement was made. And he said I would entertain you; he picked the microphone and started singing Orlando Owoh, Sunny Ade songs, singing Fela Anikulapo Kuti’s Zombie. Governor of my state? During the three years anniversary, he got on stage and was singing Fela Anikulapo Kuti’s songs; the man who everybody came to celebrate got on stage and was doing that. We in Ondo State do deserve better.
Yes, he is constructing roads. What roads; we think they are good. What does that bring to the economic livelihood, life sustenance of the people? Nothing. You bulldoze their property and give them pittance. Who are the contractors handling the jobs? We know. Then the Ore whatever, we know it is on the federal highway; he would still collect the money back. He is talking of over N7billion. When he collects that we won’t hear anything. My brother, we are going to beat him hands down even in Owo Local Government.
What are the programmes of your brand for the state?
There is going to be a complete economic rejuvenation of Ondo State. Ondo State had a good name when Baba Ajasin was here. There was Oluwa glass in Okitipupa. You talk of the oil palm estate in that area, fantastic thing; Ifon ceramics, all these signposts of Ajasin’s leadership. We are going to revive all these ones, bring them back to life. As we sit here, the South Senatorial District where our brand comes from has not tasted electricity in the last five years. And we have a government that is not even bothered about what is happening there. We are going to right the wrongs; bring that area back to life again.
Between Ilaje and Lagos via Epe, if you go on the sea, it would take you less than 30 minutes from Ilaje to Lagos. We are going to develop the coastal area, the seaport and bring life back to that area, take so much weight off Lagos. It is the longest coastline in the whole of West Africa. The resources are there. It’s only the management; the way they garner these things. Now we are going to be back to square A with complete loss of revenue from oil. Abuja has told everybody of the need to brace up because free money would not come from Abuja now. Abuja itself is not getting free money from oil. So diversification is going to be there.
The bitumen project has been in the cooler over these years. Arrangements have been made not by my brand but by this man with Fayemi when he was Solid Minerals minister to revive the Olokola project. Ondo State would shine again. Our sun would shine again.
The education sector is in tatters. You are now asking state owned university students to pay three times what they used to pay. Remember that students of Adekunle Ajasin University went on the rampage. If there is any major industry Ondo State people enjoy, it’s free education. It used to be free. It’s no longer that free now. We are going to look back at that. We are going to diversify the education sector in such a way that it’s not going to be just basic. It’s going to be more technical based so that by the time they come out, students would be useful with their own hands. It would no longer be a question of looking for government jobs that are not there. There would be a reduction in the atrocious fees state owned university students are compelled to pay.
In the agriculture sector, we are going to bring back the cottage farms, industries where people would be encouraged; farmers who would be on the farm grounds, not farmers who would be sleeping in the hotel in Akure and say they are farmers. They would be encouraged to produce what is necessary, what the people can do so that we can turn back the rotten edible food challenges that Ondo State has.
The elderly would be taken care of. Then our youths; the truth of the matter is that any of the boys you see now prefer short cuts to making money because there is no honesty in governance itself. They see what is happening. Yahoo yahoo government would be out. Real governance would come when Iji gets to power.
You have spoken so much about Governor Akeredolu; if your brand is eventually elected the governor of the state, how does he plan to correct the seeming wrongs you identified?
They are not seeming wrongs. They are naked wrongs. Whoever is going to be appointed into any position, generation for these things would come from the ward through the local government and all that. Yes, technocrats would be brought in; but technocrats of proven integrity, people who also have links here, who have names, people who have another addresses, who are not just politicians who have no business, who have nothing. People who would be appointed from the local governments would be recommended from the local government leaders so that you have a leach on them. If they misbehave on the jobs, there are people you talk to. And no local government would want to lose the slots that they are going to get in the administration.
Won’t you concentrate appointments on APC members alone?
It is not going to be APC members alone. Kwara State had leadership challenges between Lai Mohammed and Belgore. They were struggling for leadership. Ambassador Iji was the one called to go and head a five man panel that held office temporarily and unite the warring factions. And he succeeded in doing just that. That was the reason why CAN, faction of PDP, CPC, other factions when they came together, were able to beat PDP in the elections. He did that in Kwara and so APC became a reality today. Imo State had same challenges. He was seconded to Imo. He was able to unite the party members together.
What we are having in Ondo State today is complete disintegration of the party APC; the party that is in power is in disarray. Don’t forget that during the presidential election, Governor Akeredolu worked against APC candidate, Muhammadu Buhari. He got people to vote for AA. He voted the party named AA and funded it, and it was working against APC. He didn’t want the president to return. So the president returned. I am in a position to know because I was one of the two party agents for the presidential election. The other person is Rt Hon Victor Olabimtan. We knew what happened; the figures were coming in and we knew what happened.
A sitting governor on the platform of APC here was working against the candidate of his party, and the party structure was also campaigning for another candidate. They all voted for Atiku. That was why PDP won two of the three senatorial seats in Ondo State, five of the nine House of Reps seats and one fringe party won one in Ondo. APC had the three reps for North Senatorial District. Thank the Lord for what Senator Boroffice was able to do at that time. So Ondo State APC has just one elected senator. And the man did everything humanly possible to make sure Boroffice lost. But he did not lose. As at today we have just one senator and two senators of PDP. And PDP are doing their homework quietly.
Like I have always said, PDP may not have lost the 2016 election if their house had been in order. They were fighting against themselves, as APC is doing now. So if the man who is champion of party cohesion, unity, and oneness gets there, you can be sure he won’t look elsewhere. He would not do what just pleases him. There would be consultations. It would be all inclusive governance.
From all indications, governorship election may not hold in October. How is that affecting your activities?
It has affected our activities and it has been a blessing in disguise. Yes, we could not meet, hold rallies, and meet the way we normally should. On social media, we do teleconference; we do video discussions and we link ourselves up. I stay in Akure here and talk with people in Akoko, Ikare, Isua, Igbobini, Ifon, Igbara oke, Ore and so on. So we don’t have to be physically present. COVID rules say you cannot be more than a certain number. We don’t need that. It won’t help us; but occasionally when we have vital issues, we call the people concerned.
Don’t forget that this man, part of his strategies that no other candidates ever did when he officially declared his interest on March the 16th, he had about 42 vehicles all branded. And he insisted that all the coordinators from the local governments should collect their campaign car keys, fitted with overhead amplifiers. Eighteen of them got their campaign vehicles that day. Don’t forget that we could not have just suddenly come up with coordinators overnight. He has people on the ground.
He has linkages all over the place. He has tentacles spread politically. So we are working underneath. Even at the ward levels, they have their own excos too; some key party officials, apart from the three Senatorial District coordinators that were also appointed. They got their vehicles. Some youth leaders got vehicles. Some women leaders got vehicles campaigning for this man. You may not be able to travel from the head quarters of your local government to Akure; but activities are still moving on. There is no other aspirant who has done that. He is out of the country, in his base, locked out; but we are on daily communications.
How has he been standing by, identifying with the people of Ondo State as regards cushioning their pains of this COVID-19 affliction?
That’s a big question you asked. I know you want to talk about palliatives because that is the language in vogue. I told you he has a style. In each of the local governments that we went to, we made arrangements for the elders who were neglected; even when COVID-19 had not come in at all. We are talking of the meetings we had been having with them since December. We’ve been meeting with people, the leaders, youths, women, those who are doing siddon look, and even the excos of the local governments we went to and so on.
There are three things in life. When I went to the Bible school, they told us that you don’t go to an elder’s house empty handed; you don’t come to an old man’s house empty handed; you don’t come to a pastor empty handed; and you don’t go to a sick person empty handed. Apart from the sick person, the baba or mama would bless you; the pastor would bless you. So you don’t go to them empty handed. We did not go empty handed. And I can tell you that our ward coordinators, 203 wards in Ondo state, all of them are receiving something. It may not be much. But the fact that they are receiving something to help them in the regular meetings they hold, visitations they make, is a lot of money.
And there are five members of each ward excos in 203 places; apart from the 18 local governments that have six members each. There is also the maintenance of their vehicles. It’s been a tremendous thing. So if he is not distributing two kongos or three tins full of rice, that does not mean he has not done anything. He has done much. This past week, these people collected their monthly basis. The people who are concerned have got it.
If he is in the country, if local government election office seekers are doing something, he is such a compassionate person. He is prepared to remove the last singlet on him and put on the neck of somebody who doesn’t have. He is very compassionate a person. Though he is not around, the instruction he gives is that once he makes anything available, this is it. And he would call everybody up because we have their phone numbers, and can link up with them. We have our way of doing our teleconferencing. Come and take your thing. They all collect and do sign. And all of them are encouraged to call him and tell him. That’s the kind of person he is. The things we do are completely devoid of rigmarole. We do everything in the open; and if we have been doing it in the open, that tells you the kind of leadership he is going to give the sunshine state.
Assuming he defeats Governor Akeredolu and other aspirants in the coming primaries, and he eventually emerges the governor of the state, could you paint the picture of Ondo State after his first four years in office?
By the special grace of the Lord, the real sun would shine so brightly in Ondo State that the sobriquet the sunshine state would have greater meaning. Our youths would have been so developed to be on their own. They would have been so helped, assisted to develop and be sustained on the development lane, that Ondo state people would see the difference.
As we are talking about Baba Ajasin’s administration, don’t forget that the oil palm estate in Okitipupa in the South Senatorial District is fantastic. You know what seaport could mean if a full-fledged seaport comes to Okitipupa, the daily economic activities that would be going on there. You remember the kind of negotiations that sent Dangote out of Ondo State; the refinery he wanted to site here; but because of the disposition of a man who wants to take decision, then Lagos asked the man to come. What is happening there now? Over 3,000 jobs created. You know what the spiral effects of such jobs could have meant. Whatever we have lost in the Dangote thing, we can still gain from the development of the bitumen facilities that we have here; developing that place; turning Ondo state to business port of destination. Ondo State would experience a beautiful turn around.
Are there further comments?
My additional comment is to appeal to the traumatised, sidelined, crudely abused and people who have had to live with the day to day insults, to just hold on. This ugly time would pass and good times would come again. Money does fail; integrity helps; nearness to the people helps.
In some of the places we went to, somebody in Ikare said Iji was his boss in those days. He was sick, he couldn’t call him. His wife called him, and before the end of that day, N100,000 got into his account. He was able to buy his drugs, treat himself, buy good food for post treatment management of the home front. And our brand was asking, are you sure of this. He called his wife who said Sir, I am the one who spoke with you. He said he just heard the voice, he didn’t know who he was speaking with; but the fact that she mentioned one person who was sick. We needed to snatch him from the jaws of sickness, bring him back to life again. I didn’t even know that such a story could even come up today; but thank the Lord, I was able to do something. If I had not been able to do something, may be you would not have mentioned it.
He is such a humane person. Ondo State would be different. It won’t just be consumer thing. We are going to wear a new look. It would be government of the people truly; and that government is coming under the leadership of Ambassador Olusola Iji.
Thank you.
