A collage photo of Umar Ganduje and Governor Ademola Adeleke
By Tony Folarin Obajemu
Mallam Olawale Rasheed, spokesperson to Osun State governor, Senator Ademola Adeleke, on Monday, pointed accusing fingers at the national chairman of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Dr Umar Ganduje, saying the APC boss is suffering from verbal diarrhea and swollen ego over his alleged outburst that the state will be hijacked by the APC in the 2026 governorship election.
Olawale, who claimed that the APC national chairman has an agenda to destabilise the South-West zone and create a crisis for Mr President at the home front, in a statement in Osogbo, described Ganduje as “a threat to democracy and an insider enemy of President Tinubu.
According to him, “ Dr Ganduje is clearly unhappy with the peace and united front behind Mr. President from the South West zone and has now launched vicious attacks to ignite regional political battles to weaken the President ahead of 2027.
“The anti-democratic utterances of the APC leader contrast sharply with the democratic credentials of President Bola Ahmed Tinibu, wondering why the APC leader speaks like an amateur dictator without respect for history. “
“As a well-read politician, one would have expected Dr Ganduje to know that electoral contests depend mostly on local indexes and factors and that what is obtained in Edo and Ondo is surely different from political facts on ground in Osun State.
“Local permutations, grievances, and interests dictate how people vote rather than superimposed force, the spokesperson noted, citing the failure of the APC leader to win the Kano State governorship race for his party.”
“In Kano, the local peculiarities enforced the subsisting victory of the Kwankwasiyya group, which beat the Ganduje caucus, which was in office for eight years.
“If Ganduje failed in his own state because internal forces rejected his brand of politics, why is he thinking Osun factors which enthroned Governor Adeleke would not resist any attempt to disrespect the will of Osun people in 2026?”
“Osun State is the cradle of Yoruba people, where political freedom is cherished and where resistance to electoral fraud is a strong tradition.
“By threatening to hijack opposition states, the APC leader is undermining the general consensus among Yoruba people, which accept Mr. President as their own irrespective of political differences.”
“If however the statement of the APC leader is borne out of ignorance, he is invited to study Osun politics to get better informed of the dynamics of this state’s politics and to appreciate that what works in Edo and Ondo cannot play out here for several reasons.
“In Osun State, the ruling party, the PDP is daily receiving thousands of decampees from opposition parties. The PDP in Osun is already a strong mass movement which cannot be overrun by a party chairman who failed to deliver his own state and who does not have the mandate of Mr President to ignite conflict in the South-West zone.”
“The PDP in Osun State is too deeply planted to be threatened or suppressed by any electoral robber, and Governor Adeleke remains an extraordinarily popular leader whose mandate now or in 2026 cannot be hijacked by anti-democratic forces,” he emphasised.
