Osun State Chapter of the All Progressives Congress (APC) on Saturday described most of the new set of commissioner-nominees rolled out by Governor Ademola Adeleke as a show of shame.
The party Chairman, Sooko Tajudeen Lawal, spoke in a statement issued by the state party’s Director of Media and Information, Chief Kola Olabisi, in Osogbo.
He stated that “though it is not the business of the APC to teach Adeleke of the PDP extraction how to run his government, the party is concerned that most of the nominees have no sound and verifiable backgrounds.”
The APC described it as the worst assemblage of the government actors that would ever be witnessed in the history of the 32-year-old State of the Virtuous, insisting that it has further exposed another failed promise of the Adeleke-led administration.
“There is nothing to celebrate about the galaxy of Hallelujah men and women who will be annoyingly entrusted with the governance of the state through their various ministries.”
Lawal, however, stated that it would not be proper to be collective in his excoriation and castigation of the Adeleke administration cluster as there are few ones in the horrible, horrendous and obnoxious commissioner-nominees list that have distinguished themselves in their callings either in private endeavours or public offices.
He observed that the literally pieces of bent firewood among the batch could not, in any way, be an asset to the administration of the rudderless Adeleke’s government.
“What are we even saying about the composition of the Adeleke administration commissioner-nominees? Can a government be better than the quality of the head of such government? The answer is a capital NO.
“It is an impossible Utopia as one cannot plant corn and expect to harvest banana no matter the injection of the intervention of a scientific methodology”, the state APC chairman hinted.
Lawal also observed that the highlighted portion of the commissioner-nominees scenario that is hyper offensive to the sensibilities of the discerning minds in the state is the governor’s explanation that a wife of his late brother, one Mrs Adenike Folashade Adeleke, could not be counted as a member of his immediate family in Ede.
He disclosed that all efforts by Governor Adeleke to confuse and convince any right-thinking members of the society with any grammatical and political chicanery to prove that he is not truly guilty of nepotism has fallen flat as in the Nigerian parlance, once a woman is married to any particular family, she has wholly become a part and parcel of such family.
Speaking further, the Osun State APC chairman stated that apart from the slots being heavy in some local governments without considering the propriety of others, the parade of only two females in the list of 25 nominees is an arrant and unmitigated balderdash, hogwash and bunkum which is against the adopted World standard in any saner state and also contrary to the promise the governor made to the women while campaigning.
Lawal noted that, the list of the Adeleke commissioner-nominees further vindicated the Osun State chapter of the APC on the allegation that there were serpents with divided loyalty in the party as two chieftains of the defunct self-styled The Osun Progressives (TOP) under the patronship of former Minister of Interior, Mr Rauf Aregbesola, in the persons of Barr Kolapo Alimi and Mr Biyi Odunlade, made the list.
“This further attests to the fact that there has been a secret alliance between the TOP members and the PDP.”
He however consoled the people of the state over the choice of the new set of the commissioner-nominees rolled out by Governor Ademola Adeleke which was announced by Speaker of the State House of Assembly, the Right Honourable Adewale Egbedun, on Friday.
Meanwhile, the PDP Chairman, Hon Sunday Bisi, in his reaction, described the statement as “half baked response of Osun All Progressive Congress (APC) reconfirmed its incompetence and shallowness as the party is ignorantly condemning a commissioners’ list without perusing the robust profile of the nominees.”
“Covering up its ignorance in questionable big words and phrases, the APC state Chairman and his stone age publicist shamelessly attempted to cast aspersions on credible professionals and administrators nominated to serve the state. “
“How do you judge nominees without at least gaining access to their profiles? How do you condemn a list with almost two third professionals, technocrats and administrators? Nominees are great patriots with enviable antecedents in private and public sectors. We have a list made up of experts in finance, education, economy,social sector, agriculture, sciences, law and engineering among others.”
“The PDP government in putting up the list applied such principles as spread across federal constituencies, interest groups, professional considerations among others. “
“A serious opposition party will engage in thorough research to add value to its image. Unfortunately , the Osun APC is too bewildered by its post-election trauma to dig deeper to see the great team the PDP administration is putting in place.”
“Our answer to APC as a party is that before the unveiling of the nominees, Osun is already enjoying the dividends of democracy. With the new cabinet coming on board, the state is billed for further growth and development under Governor Ademola Adeleke, he submitted.
Reacting to the Aregbesola/The Progressive (TOP) men in the list of Adeleke’s nominees for cabinet positions, the Chairman of the group, Reverend Adelowo Adebiyi said, “our attention has been drawn to a jaundiced report apparently sponsored by some groups of politically naive elements in Osun APC alleging that Governor Ademola Adeleke included Aregbesola/TOP men in the list of his nominees for cabinet positions.”
“The writer of the supposed story,, but that really qualified as a composition gave himself away as a mischief maker or confused person when he falsely state that Kolapo Alimi Esq who had decamped to PDP for close to two years now as a member of TOP.”
“Like the writer stated, a lot of speculations had been made by the electorally injured group, ilerioluwa within our party, the APC with a view to affix the reason for their failure on TOP but which we have evidently rebuffed, we note that this is well another attempt at that failed mission to blackmail us.”
“We note that electoral loss, especially of the magnitude that the arrogant ilerioluwa group suffered could be very painful to the extent of affecting ratioal thinking but remind them that they are architects of their own misfortune with their empty boasts and grandstanding on their near nonexistent prowess and excluding majority of party members from the process.”
“Again , like they kept speculating, Hon. Biyi Odunlade was speculated to have joined PDP in not too distant past and it would be recalled that TOP had been dissolved since last year, hence it may be an academic exercise to categorically state correctly his status politically.
Of course, we can’t deny the fact that the the two gentlemen were our, and indeed our Patron, Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola’s associates but we state in categorical terms that they must have earned their nominations by their merits and not on behalf of TOP.”
“This is yet another opportunity for the political loafers in ilerioluwa group to attempt to blackmail the TOP and we are not in any doubt that they will continue to agonise over their woeful but needless loss of the July 16, 2022 and the 2023 general election.
“We shouted ourselves hoarse about the degenerated state of the party but their lack of political understanding aided by selfishness didn’t allow them to see our call for party restructuring for election winning purposes.”
“We restate our commitment to the APC, the Progressives platform which we worked assiduously for its reinstatement into government in 2010, costing us sweat and blood along with other patriots after the manipulative debacle of 2003.”
“We state again that Governor Adeleke was referring to the breakaway group members that joined PDP and not the entire caucus and that the original TOP with Ogbeni Aregbesola as Patron did not engage the Osun PDP at any time” he stated.
