Ekiti PDP Days of Spears and Arrows, by Samuel Omotoso

Emmanuel AmudaMarch 21, 2020

0 8 minutes read

The former Ekiti House of Assembly member, Dr Samuel Omotoso has revealed the genesis of the crisis pummeling the Ekiti State chapter of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP.

Dr Omotoso, a close ally of the former Ekiti State governor, Ayodele Fayose, is a medical doctor and one of the lawmakers suspended indefinitely from the 5th assembly for sundry offences, shortly after Governor Kayode Fayemi took over last year.

In the 5th assembly, Omotoso represented Oye constituency 1 at the Ekiti State House of Assembly.

Dr Omotoso, former chairman, Ekiti Assembly Committee on Information, said the crisis of the PDP started when his was suspended him for allegedly engineering, parallel PDP executive in the Oye local government area of the state.

The lawmaker highlighted some point’s causes the crisis:

PUTTING THE RECORDS STRAIGHT.

1. Gov Fayose had been a 2 term governor and left office since Oct 2018.

2. Dr Fayose was preoccupied with a court case on the alleged and unsubstantiated Dasuki cash gift for an election that led to a winning a la victory that All of us who held offices under Fayose were beneficiaries as well as several other party members and party structure.

3. This pre occupation and court distraction of Dr Fayose coupled with his personal decision not to be interested again in any state political office having served as a Governor for 2 terms wouldn’t have allowed him to have any interest in who becomes what in any PDP Congress in Ekiti State, moreso whosoever is the state chairman of the party cannot function without the leaders inclusive of him as No 1 in the political scheme of Ekiti State.

4. Rather than allow him face his challenges and implement his personal decision, his transducers vilified him un-end daily, beating war drums behind his window every second. Every minute, every hour, everyday and ad-infinitum.

5. The first salvo of spears came from Distinguish Senator Olujimi, who was struggling for a leadership that had already been tactically and indirectly conceded and left for her in the scheme of things pervading the party in Ekiti state as at that time, this she did through a disjointed stakeholders meeting few months after Dr Fayose left office, where she claimed to have been pronounced as the south west and Ekiti State numero uno leader of PDP.

6. We should remember that this pronouncement wasn’t done in good faith considering the timing, the slight and the effect of such unforced political arrows on Dr Fayose who was currently in a political detention at that point in time for been the head of a government that we all benefited from, and majorly by our senators..

7. We should know that the election of Mrs Olujimi was still several months away, as at the point of this avoidable political spears and arrows thrown to and at the weakest point of her political benefactor, which is Dr Fayose. Avoidable in the sense that as at this point in time, there was no issue nor any quarrel between Dr Ayo Fayose and Senator Olujimi after duly reconciling after the initial bravado that came with the Prof Eleka candidacy in the last Election.

8. Senator Olujimi upped the game when the State Party secretariat was stormed by party members with this same state Excos thoroughly harassed and the secretariat was taken over by those acting under the instruction and sponsorship of Chief mrs Olujimi. It took the combined efforts of my humble self in Lagos, Lere Olayinka in Lagos, Ologbodiyan NPS in Abuja, Oguntuase in Ekiti, State CP of police in Ekiti and Dr Ayo Fayose in Lagos to foil and resolve the impasse and logjam arising from the forceful takeover of the party Secretariat. The issue was later settled at a meeting at the Pastoral center, Ikere Road few days after.

9. Fayose saw all these as an unnecessary war against him directed at his political extermination for no justifiable reasons and a wake up call to defend himself politically from these aggressive spears and arrows being thrown at him for no reasons and to make matters worse, thrown by those that he had assisted to political success, one way or the other in their political lives.

10. The battle went further with the formation of the repositioning group by Senator Olujimi, ably set up to undermine this same State Exco led by Oguntuase and with an agenda to “” remove Fayose’s hand in everything that has to do with PDP in Ekiti””

11. Dr Fayose saw this as an escalation of the war of attrition against him and this led him to decide and re-strategise to fight back at these unforced political enemies.

12. This untoward development made Fayose to come down to Ekiti to campaign against Senator Olujimi leading to her loss in the election and her eventual win at the tribunal, with serious emotional and financial cost to her, a score that is fair as at that time at 1:1. Dr Fayose did not just wake up one day to campaign against Senator Olujimi but was forced to by the unending negative activities directed at him from the senator and at this point of 1:1, Dr Fayose declared ceasefire and went back into his shell.

13. In a wise setting this score of 1:1 should have ended the unforced political intimidation and harassment of Dr Fayose by Senator Olujimi which led to an unnecessary quarrel through an amicable settlement or simply through a ‘walk away option”

14. Rather, the win at the tribunal beclouded the supporters of Senator Olujimi who pushed her further to go for the kill against Dr Fayose believing that being a serving Senator is a sine qua non to political invincibility.

15. Senator Olujimi group went for the jugular of Dr Fayose soon after the tribunal win, when the position of the repositioning group was echoed by the media release from MOBA LG Party Chairman which contain loads and lots of coronaviric insults and political innuendo against the person of Gov Fayose with a rider that Moba LG has agreed not to allow anything traceable to Fayose in the incoming party congress and therefore other LG should follow suit. This release led to his suspension by the state Exco.

16. It was at this point we came in and the war within our party started on social media.

17. My coming in as at that time was to separate facts from fictions with my standard saying that “THE TRULY AGGRIEVED MUST HAVE A VOICE and the party must address their grievances”

18. Yes, I believed that there are truly AGGRIEVED party members and that our leader Dr Fayose may not have satisfied everybody while on the saddle, at a point i even suggested that Dr fayose may need to apologise to the truly aggrieved in the party for either his error of commission or ommission or both and the apology was given at Afao by him on Dec 9th, 2019 to a multitude of party members.

19. I also stated clearly that None of the house of Assembly that made close to 80M minimum in 4 years, Commissioners that made close to 40M at minimum,, Rep that made close to 800M at minimum and Senator that made close to 2B at minimum within the last 4 years can be TRULY AGGRIEVED.

20. I went further to list examples of the truly aggrieved members of our party and that these set of people in this category must have a VOICE and the party must listen to them and address their grievances and the leader Dr Fayose may even need to apologise to them. Which he did.

21. I put it on record that the likes of Senator Olujimi, Duro Faseyi, Hon Odebunmi, myself, Musa Arogundade, Hon Ogunsuyi, all REP Members, all Assembly Members, all LG Party chairmen and State Excos, council chairmen etc. and all who served under Fayose without resignations cannot and are not in the category of an AGGRIEVED PARTY MEMBER. But maybe they dislike or hate Fayose and should be so treated as such.

22. I counseled that we should stop all the war beats and come together in the interest of the party. But some group though they have the aces and hence said no going back until apocalypse.

23. The repositioning agenda led to the crisis with the OYE LG party chairman when we erroneously thought in Oye that we are protecting the interest of the ignoble State Excos that the repositioning group was duplicating and sharing their powers all over the place.

24. The same disconnected state Excos after being compromised financially turned around to face we that were initially fighting their cause by unilaterally returning Oye LG Party chairman that was indicted at all fronts back into office without any meeting with us the COMPLAINANTS before we ran the suspended Chairman out of town till today.

25. The discovery of the turn coat behaviors of the ignoble state Excos that the Fayose group initially thought they were defending led to the free for all political explosions and implosions that follow suit within our party, and the rest is history.

26. The reentrance of Fayose into the feud is for prosperity and his decision to defend himself and teach all political apprentices that failed to wait for their freedoms a political lesson of their life time. And this he achieved at the last Congress.

27. The truth is that were it to be the Repositioning group that had the upper hand in the last congress, hell would have been let loose.

28. The failed attempt to get the Ward Congress Committee members led by HE Engr Manu to come with Oguntuase to a designated hotel is known to those in category A of information accessibility in each group setting.

29. The housing and compromising of the initial appeal panel in an hotel by Senator Olujimi on Wednesday night and the confirmation by Freedom on this blog that he was in the same hotel room with the appeal panel on Wed night before being cautioned by Hon Dokun and before he deleted the message, all points to the fact that the other group did all that can have done to beat Dr Fayose to the game but alas, skills come with tremendous training, massive war chest and monumental experiences.

30. The above is a non-limited summary of the cascades of events in our party since Dr Ayo Fayose left office and hereby documented for prosperity sake and for those who joined the fray midway without necessarily knowing the root cause and affects of these perilous circumstances be-devilling our Noble Party.

31. As it is the party is fractured down the line, no thanks to the repositioning group that relentlessly fanned the ember of discord and disunity within our party and the only way out is for Mrs Olujimi, our senator who sponsored them all through till today, to continue with her peace moves and hopefully if it is not too late. Since the person who took the tortoise up should also be the one to bring the tortoise down.

32. As full blooded Ekiti indigenous people, we are used to sentiments, fantasies, displacement, reaction formation, denials etc. as a form of ego defence mechanism but none of these will change the fact that Fayose has walked away with the trophy during the last Congress..

33. The whole scenario is unfortunate but seriously avoidable but now that it has already happened, we therefore need to come down from our high horses to discuss OUR FUTURE.

34. For those who are not reasonable or too egoistic to discuss their future, the strangers usually eat their food, may that not be our portion in Jesus name.

35. Political losses are not our portion, but our activities, by both leaders and followers will determine our success and in any political loss, some feel it more than the others.

36. We shall surely rise again.

37. Only in togetherness.

38. Amandla awethu, Victory for us all.

39. Think!

40. Thank you.

Hon Dr Samuel Omotoso