Fewer than 20 days to the 2023 general elections, the All Progressives Congress (APC) in Oyo State is still embroiled in factional tumoil that might armstring its performance at the polls, despite the popularity of the party’s presidential candidate, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, who is enjoying massive support of the people and stakeholders.
It’s not a hyperbole that Oyo people are raring to vote him to be the next president of the country. They are encouraged by the former First Lady, Mrs. Florence Ajimobi’s new twist to the campaign for Tinubu in the state.
The soaring popularity of Tinubu among APC members and those who could be described as critical stakeholders in the state, political observers asserted, could, without fear of contradiction, be attributed to what was recently regarded a new lease of life and a fresh breath given by the campaign efforts by the Oyo State immediate past First Lady, Florence Ajimobi to Tinubu for President sloganeering that has caught the attention of voters, sweeping them off their feet to vote for Tinubu.
The former First Lady, evidence on ground has shown, has whole heartedly plunged herself into the pool of spreading the gospel of Tinubu for President with an unusual political dexerity and determination with a strong resolve to make a success of it.
Those who appointed Florence Ajimobi the Oyo State Co-ordinator of Tinubu-Shettima Presidential Campaign Committee would not have got a better candidate for the arduous work. City People learnt that Mrs. Ajimobi did not allow the intra-party crisis buffecting the APC in the state to bog her down as she rolled up her sleeves to make an advantage out of what appeared an insummontable ubstacle on the path of the party’s success at the polls. She regarded party’s unity as crucial and the first step on the path to victory in the immenent elections.
To ensure success of her new mission, Mrs. Ajimobi donated a building that had earlier served as the APC state secretariat as the co-ordinating centre, where meetings are held and decisions taken on the way forward to achieve her set objectives. That is not only canvassing support for Tinubu, but also changing the scale of mobilisation for more votes that would take Tinubu to Aso-Rock as president. Recall that the late Senator Isiaka Ajimobi was the acting National Chairman of the APC when death come calling on him. He was a close friend of Tinubu and his political confidant too. Inside source at the APC said that perhaps that was one of the reasons Florence Ajimobi was saddled with the responsibility of mobilising women and other voters in Oyo to support Tinubu’s ambition.
With her performance so far, she could be described as the right choice. Reconciliation of the APC members who were at one another’s throats after the death of Senator Ajimobi and the emergence of Isaac Omodewu as the new party Chairman in Oyo State was not ignored by Mrs. Ajimobi. The bitterness provoked by Omodewu made the party to bleed: Some aggrieved members who felt cheated by the big hand of Governor Bala Buru, the immediate past acting National Chairman of the APC, left the party in a disarray of disunity. Most of the protesting members went to Accord Party to realise their political ambition, while others teamed up with the party in power in Oyo, the People’s Democratic Party (PDP).
Mrs. Ajimobi as the Oyo State coordinator of Tinubu-Shettima Presidential Committee went all out to salvage what could be described as the wreckage of the APC in Oyo as many members had defected, while many who did not leave were still nursing a burning hatred for the new leaders of the party antagonistic disarray. This, the former First Lady knew would constitute a big obstacle to the realisation of her purpose. She set up a reconciliation committee to which the fighting members of the unity group, Ajimobi Legacy Forum and the Folarin Teslim faction were invited. The committee thoroughly examined the cause of the crisis and to its members’ credit, an acceptable solution was fashioned. This was embraced by all the participatory factions.
To the surprise of observers, however, dissatisfaction was the banner displayed by Teslim’s faction after the reconciliatory exercise. The governorship candidate of the APC, Senator Teslim Folarin, in action after the reconciliation efforts of Mrs. Ajimobi, appeared to have agreed to participate in the reconciliation exercise as a means of buying time to perfect his agenda, which might reignite hostility among the factions. This, the governorship candidate believed would give him time to restrategise and perfect efforts to armtwist members of other factions who participated in the reconciliation meeting. He was even accused of perfecting a gambit to manipulating members of other factions to succumb to his antics to the advantage of his faction members.
Mrs. Ajimobi did not allow the uncooperative stance of Senator Folarin to discourage her she knew that to succeed in her daunting challenge of wooing voters in Oyo State to cast their votes for Tinubu, she needs all hands on deck. She went all out to cast her net for more voters. Florence Ajimobi held a meeting with the leadership of the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) in Oyo State. Her efforts, it was learnt, were bounteously rewarded. She succeeded in convincing the Christian body that Tinubu’s Muslim-Muslim ticket was never to undermine the voting-power of the Christians. It was not to hold Christians in contempt either.
Besides, the former First Lady was reported to have held meetings with various market men and women without leaving out Muslim groups and societies, recording many faithful who have agreed to cast their votes for Tinubu-Shettima come February 25.
It was after the wooing of the critical Christian-Muslim stakeholders that APC members, who are loyal to Senator Folarin attacked Mrs. Ajimobi. They accused her of anti-party activities, while campaigning for Muslim-Christian stakeholders. They said that Mrs. Ajimobi shared out Accord Party (AP) flyers at the meetings she held with the Christians, Muslims, market men and women groups.
The allegation was a fresh provocation to party members who did not leave the APC for other parties as they licked their wounds in silence after losing intra-party contest for the elective offices to the beneficiaries of Governor Buni’s manipulation. Folarin was a beneficiary too. They wondered at the unprovoked allegation of disloyalty against Mrs. Ajimobi, which had no iota of truth. They said this was the time for the APC leadership to foster unity and cooperation among its members and face the general elections with a united front. That, they said was the only way to ensuring victory for all the party’s candidates at the polls.
It was, therefore, not a surprise that observers said that the false allegations against Mrs. Ajimobi despite her efforts to sell Tinubu-Shettima and all other party’s candidates to the electorate in Oyo State is a disservice which maybe counter-productive to the fortune of the party at the polls.
– Tajudeen Adigun
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