2011 Nigeria Election: Ogun PDP vows to resist Olurin/Obasanjo-Bello ticket

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Party in Ogun West Senatorial District have vowed to resist the imposition of Maj.-Gen. Tunji Olurin (retd.) and Senator Iyabo Obasanjo-Bello's ticket for the state's governorship poll in 2011.

The governorship was said to have been zoned to the district largely populated by the Yewa/Awori people by the PDP leadership in the state and the PDP Project 2011 Apex Body under the chairmanship of Senator Ayo Otegbola, had picked a former Group Managing Director of Gateway Holdings Ltd., Alhaji Gboyega Isiaka, as the consensus candidate for the poll.

Reacting to the recent meeting allegedly held between Obasanjo and the members of the G-15 lawmakers and some PDP stalwarts in the state, the people at a meeting in Ilaro on Thursday vowed to resist what they described as a plan to impose particular candidates on the state.

One of the elders of the PDP in the state, Alhaji Jelili Akingbade, vowed that the state would resist what he described as the "Yar'Adua treatment."

He said, "We need a governor that is healthy. We need a governor that will finish his term and go for a second term.

"We don't want a governor that is over 70 years and that his deputy will assist to complete his term."

Another elder of the party in the state, Senator Iyabo Anisulowo, who also spoke in the same vein, insisted on the consensus candidate and vowed that the people would resist any imposition.

She admitted her closeness to Olurin, but insisted that it was a season for democracy and not a military era and that the wishes of the people must be allowed to prevail.

Chief Iyabode Apampa said that the Muslim community in the state, including the Awujale of Ijebuland, Oba Sikiru Adetona, had advised the people to present a Muslim candidate as no Muslim had ever ruled the state.

She condemned what she described as the imposition of the "Christian-Christian candidate" (Olurin and Iyabo) against the practice of Christian-Muslim ticket that the state had been noted for in its last 34 years.

Source: The Punch

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