In this interview with LEKE BAIYEWU, the Ogun State Chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party, Mr. Adebayo Dayo, explains why the All Progressives Congress and the five PDP governors that defected to the party will fail in 2015
Were you shocked by the defection of five of the seven rebelling PDP governors to the opposition All Progressives Congress?
It is a free world; everybody is free to do whatever they like. I think what is happening with those aggrieved governors is that they are just selfish. They think only of themselves. They do not think of the party that made them somebody in eight years. Ten years ago, they were not known in Nigeria but today, everybody knows that they are governors. It will only be good, if they will reciprocate what the PDP has done for them by staying in the party. But now that they have decided to go, it is a free world. And it does not mean that it is going to have any effect in their states. After all, (former Ogun State Governor) Gbenga Daniel left the PDP for the Peoples Party of Nigeria and the PPN had nothing to show for his defection. Of course, it affected our result drastically (at the 2011 polls), but he also couldn’t make any headway.
APC is a regional party; it is just trying now to become a national party. In the 2015 general elections, we will know whether it is a national party or a regional party. I can assure you that it will remain a regional party because we (the PDP) have strength in the North, East and everywhere. Looking at the symbol of the APC, it is still the symbol of the parties that had been in the South. That is the thinking of the northern electorate – I am not talking of the educated ones. The voters in the North believe that APC is still a regional party; it is a southern people’s party. Unlike the PDP they all know, go to Kaduna and when you see the secretariat of the PDP in Katsina State you will be surprised that how could they love a party to the extent of having an umbrella on the roof of the building, which is so beautiful. It is in the blood of the northerners that this (PDP) is a national party. No matter what they do; no matter what people say, their defection will not affect our party in any way.
If you admitted that the defection of some members from the PDP to the PPN affected your party at the polls, don’t you think a similar thing might happen to the PDP in 2015?
It affected our results, no doubt, but you know the percentage President Goodluck Jonathan got in Ogun State. He still got the required percentage in other states. I can tell you, we are going to win in all those states (where the governors defected). In every state, no matter how good you are, you will have some people in the opposition, even in your own political party. When you are no more there, automatically, your opposition in the area or state will be happy; they will take over your control and they will try to make sure that it is very effective.
Look at Kwara State, for instance, some are planning to go the APC, whereas the party has its structure in place. If they dare say the structure should be collapsed and given to the state governor, everybody in the APC in the state will come to the PDP because they are not compatible. When you lose somebody, you will gain a lot. There are some people that cannot work with them because they have been in the opposition. Politics is all about grouping. If you belong to a group and you see that you are comfortable in your group, and all of a sudden an outsider comes in and said all the entitlements accruable to you will be given to them. People in such category will not be happy. They will decide to join a national party. And that is what is going to happen all the way. We will lose some but gain a lot.
Are you threatened, as a party, by the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Aminu Tambuwal’s alleged romance with the APC
Nothing is going to come out of it, I can tell you that. There are some states that are known to be PDP states. No matter how much the leadership of the states try; no matter how friendly they become, they know that they do not belong to the APC.
Ogun PDP filed the suit that led to the sacking of Oyinlola as National Secretary of the party and other national executives from the South-West. You have also approached the Supreme Court to prevent Oyinlola’s reinstatement as ordered by the Court of Appeal. Why are you after him?
We wanted a state congress and while congresses were being held in other states, the leadership of the party did not want the congress to hold in Ogun. What the leadership of the party was trying to do then was to sit in a room and do some imposition; and impose candidates on us. We went ahead with the congress and said anybody that wanted to be the chairman should come to the congress and be voted for. Soremi went to court to insist that the congress be held and the court gave him a nod. We concluded the congresses and compiled all our lists and sent them to the headquarters but they refused to recognise us. Consequently, we had no option than to go to court.
After approaching a court, we went to Oyinlola at his office; I went in the capacity of a state chairman of the party. We also went to his house several times to explain to him that as a leader of the party in the South-West, if anything was going wrong, he must work on it without taking sides. And that he must also make sure that everything went according to the party’s constitution. He said, ‘We have some leaders and whatever they say must be the final.’ Of course, we know that those that had been in the military for a long time are used to commanding people. But, this is democracy; it is not about commands.
Is your attempt to stop him a payback?
Sir Winston Churchill was one of the loveliest gentlemen in England. He was the Prime Minister during the war against Adolph Hitler’s Germany. He won the war and immediately after that, he contested an election. He was rejected by the people, even though they loved him so much. He was still rejected because the dictatorial attitude was still in him. Britons did not want dictators in the office. When you are used to a system in which you command all the time, there is nothing you can do without giving commands. That commanding attitude will always be in you. And that is exactly what is happening in Nigeria today. That is what is wrong with Oyinlola. We went to him on several occasions but he did not listen to our plea. When we had the congresses in the state, they went to court; when they were to have the South-West Congress, we went to court as well. We told them that unless Ogun State was allowed to participate in the congress, it would not be fair enough on the state executive.
Soremi had asked a court to stop the South-West congress and it was stopped by the court. If the congress was stopped, you can be sure that the election of some people was null and void. Oyinlola was elected at that congress to occupy the office allocated to the South-West. The national convention asked for the South-West nominee but he was wrongly elected; the congress that elected him was null and void. If the event in which he was elected was not recognised by law, there is nothing we can do than to go back to court to prove that the election was illegal. And it was upheld by the court.
How did Oyinlola’s replacement emerge?
When the convention that produced Oyinlola was nullified, we had to hold an extraordinary South-West congress. It was held in Ibadan and all the six states (in the zone) were there and we elected someone to represent the zone in the national executive as the secretary. That was where Prof. Wale Oladipo was appointed. A letter to the effect was written by the zonal executive to the national, telling them that we have elected someone else, as ordered by the court. When the previous South-West congress was nullified, there was nothing that could come out of it. Not that we took Oyinlola to court personally, we took him to court in connection with the said South-West congress. That was why (former Ekiti State Governor) Segun Oni’s election was nullified and other executives (Oyinlola and the National Auditor, Bode Mustapha); they were all sacked.
You criticised Oyinlola’s dictatorial nature because of his military background. What about former President Olusegun Obasanjo, to whom the sacked executives were loyal. Did he impose Oyinlola on the South-West?
He did; he did. The former president is a father of all, no doubt about it. But when your father is doing something that is wrong, you will have to say it. And that is what we did. We told him to let us have a congress, let everybody vote but nobody was allowed to vote in Osogbo (where the nullified congress was held). They just read a list and that was it. There was no election in Osogbo but what we wanted for aspirants to test their popularity. It is what will put them in office, not by just choosing them in a room and imposing them on us. We do not want imposition.
Is this why there’s a gap between your executive and Obasanjo or why have all reconciliatory efforts failed?
We have sent several people to Baba to give us an appointment so that we can go to him because, whether we like it or not, he is still our father. He is the father of all. Eventually, we are still going back to him. He is out of the country most of the time. We are still negotiating and there is a lot going on. Baba is our father and we are still going back to him, whether we like it or not.
Culled from PUNCH
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