Fayemi vs Bamidele: The race begins

Fayemi vs Bamidele: The race begins

Posted by Sylvester on Sunday, December 29, 2013 0

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After months of silence and speculations, the berthing of the political train of House of Representatives member, Hon Opeyemi Bamidele, in the Labour Party (LP) has suddenly restored life and vibrancy to the party.

LP had gone into near oblivion shortly after the 2011 general elections.

The party, which suddenly pushed into the limelight in Ekiti State in 2011 following the entry of former governor, Ayodele Fayose, to contest the Ekiti Central Senatorial District seat, soon became a shadow of its former self when Fayose abandoned it midstream for his erstwhile party, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), shortly after losing the contest.

However, indications that the party was still alive in the state emerged once again some months ago when rumour was rife that it was the platform that Bamidele, popularly called MOB, would use to realise his governorship ambition.

The rumour was against the backdrop that with the lawmaker’s insistence that he would contest the governorship against the incumbent, Dr Kayode Fayemi, who had been endorsed by the All Progressives Congress (APC) for another term in office, Bamidele would have to use another platform.

Since December 1 when Bamidele openly declared for LP at Emure Ekiti, it has been divergent views on the political future and fortunes of the lawmaker and former commissioner in Lagos State.

While some are of the opinion that joining “a party that is not popular in the state can be a costly mistake for MOB,” others are of the opinion that “it is a risk worth taking if he would not be allowed to test his popularity in the APC, on which platform he was elected to the National Assembly in 2011.”

But to the debate, Bamidele’s response is clear and unambiguous: “The LP has further enhanced my popularity among Ekiti people. It is a coalition that will bring about revolution against anti-democratic forces and pioneers of bad governance in Ekiti State in 2014”.

Bamidele, who said that the tentacles of LP had spread across the length and breadth of the state, advised those referring to the party as underdog to have a rethink, saying: “LP is a broad based coalition of determined people who are ready to bring the needed change to Ekiti.

This is not a matter of political parties, but efforts to rescue Ekiti from doldrums.”

Today, political watchers agree that attention is fast shifting from the PDP to LP as the most reckoned opposition party with the inability of the PDP to resolve its internal differences a few months to the election and the cold feet being developed daily by many of its members.

These, analysts say, is in addition to the influx of politicians across different political party lines in the state into the LP fold to enlarge its membership coast and boost its strength.

The new entrants include its state Chairman, Hon Akin Omole, an erstwhile PDP chieftain who narrowly lost the PDP state chairmanship in 2012; the Accord Party State Chairman, Alhaji Saka Adeleye; PDP chieftain and former House of Assembly Service Commission Chairman, Akogun Bunmi Ogunleye.

Among those from the APC and former aides of Governor Fayemi are Mr Akin Olayisade (former Special Adviser on Public Works); Hon Abiola Olowookere (former Senior Special Assistant, Legal Matters); and Mr Adebamigbe Akilaya (former SSA, Elders Matters).

Omole did not mince words on the party’s drive when he said LP membership was made up of “men dissatisfied with the way and manner Ekiti State is being run by the APC administration.

We have come to deliver Ekiti people from bondage. We have come to give workers and Ekiti people generally a new lease of life”.

The LP National Chairman, Barrister Dan Nwanyanwu, echoed the influx of members to the party recently when Bamidele was formally admitted to the fold. This was at a grand event attended by LP leaders, including former Steel and Power Minister, Dr Olu Agunloye; and Ondo State Governor, Dr Olusegun Mimiko; at the LP State Secretariat in Ado Ekiti.

Nwanyanwu had assured the new entrants that nobody would be discriminated against in the party, saying, “There is nothing like new or old members. All we have in LP is one united family”.

The party chairman, who described the partys as the right vehicle of change and development in Ekiti and beyond, said there was no division in Ekiti LP as being portrayed by some people, assured: “We will not stay in Abuja as they do in other parties and impose anybody as governor. We are going to conduct the primaries in line with the electoral guidelines and the 1999 Constitution”.

In his address, Mimiko, represented on the occasion by his Chief of Staff, Dr Kola Ademujimi, lamented that Ekiti was backward in view of the inexperience of its governors, saying Bamidele had got the necessary experience with which he could take the state to the promised land.

While appealing to Ekiti people to vote for LP to stop having inexperienced people as governor, Mimiko said: “Experience, they say, is the best teacher.

Everything is working in Ondo State because of the experience I had over the years. I served as commissioner in the Old Ondo State. I served as Federal Minister before I was elected the governor.

“Opeyemi Bamidele served as commissioner for eight years in Lagos State. He is, at present, in the National Assembly and has acquired the experiences that would liberate Ekiti from the pangs of backwardness,” the LP governor said.

Bamidele, who expressed hope that he would emerge the party’s flagbearer in the 2014 election, said he had strong political structures and goodwill in the state to dislodge the APC government in the election to pave way for “a people-oriented LP government in the state.

“This is a mission we must actualise. It is a race I must pursue to put an end to the era of inconsistent policies and programmes in Ekiti. Ekiti needs serious interventions at this critical time and God had given us the scientific understanding of what the people’s needs are and how to solve them,” he said.

He, however, advised his political detractors to refrain from harassing him, saying no amount of threats, intimidations and attacks would make him abandon his resolve to rescue the state from the doldrums through the 2014 governorship election.

“Let all political parties and politicians embrace issue-based campaign and desist from habits capable of bringing the state to disrepute in the build-up to, during and after the 2014 election,” he said.

A PDP chieftain, who preferred anonymity, said although he remained faithful to his party at present, he could not predict the next move, especially in view of the positive disposition of many leaders of his party for the ambition of MOB “in view of the lawmaker’s personality”.

While it is believed in many quarters that the MOB threat is real, the ruling APC would always dismiss it with a wave of the hand. APC State Interim Chairman, Chief Jide Awe, who described the lawmaker’s LP move as “perilous and journey to perfidy” said: “This will not have any effect on our performance in 2014. We are solid and have acceptability among the people of Ekiti State.

“We had long suspected that Bamidele had been engaging in anti-party activity. He has been funding the coalition of opposition parties and giving us problems.

But with his exit, we now know the real members we have because some of them were acting like moles before,” Awe said. APC State Director of Publicity, Mr Segun Dipe, who said members “know that the party (LP) is dead on arrival,” said in a statement that Bamidele “is not fit to govern an upwardly mobile state like Ekiti and as such could not have realised his ambition within the APC.

He is therefore free to join any party where he can continue to nurture his mobster ambition as a vain labourer”. Bamidele, however, said “only the electorate can adjudge whether a candidate is fit or not. But it is curious for APC to brand me as unfit when they once elected me to represent the people at the National Assembly.

This perverted reasoning not only smacks of inconsistency and ignorance, but confirmed that they are jittery about my popularity and acceptability among Ekiti populace”. The governorship hopeful, who expressed assurance that APC would become history in Ekiti after the 2014 governorship election since the LP has what it takes to rout the party and consign it to the dustbin of history, located his action within positive historical perspective.

His words: “When the former governor of Abia State, Chief Orji Uzor Kalu, decamped from the PDP to Progressive Peoples Alliance, some prophets of doom said that the party would not win a councillorship election because of the fear of the former President Olusegun Obasanjo.

But to their consternation, Kalu went ahead and installed Chief Theodore Orji as his successor. “When the ever performing Governor of Ondo State, Dr Mimiko, defected to LP from the PDP, the same thing was said about him.

But he went ahead and trounced the incumbent, the late Dr Olusegun Agagu, in a keenly contested election. “The most recent was the incumbent APC Governor in Imo State, Owelle Rochas Okorocha.

He defected when he felt disenchanted with the PDP to the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA) and went ahead to defeat an incumbent, Mr Ikedi Ohakim.

“So, I am not really bothered by their vituperations and resort to abuse. But I want to say that my decision to contest for the governorship was borne out of the passion to liberate Ekiti people from the pangs of maladministration.”