Former Deputy National Publicity Secretary of the All Progressives Congress, APC, Comrade Timi Frank, on Monday, appealed to President Bola Tinubu to call the Minister of Marine and Blue Economy, ex-Governor Gboyega Oyetola, and his APC thugs to order in Osun State.
Frank, in a statement in Abuja, said the call has become necessary to restore peace in Osun State following clashes between APC and PDP faithful in the state over control of local government areas in which many lives have reportedly been lost.
Violence erupted on Monday in Osun State as the battle for the control of the local government secretariats between the PDP and the APC turned bloody.
A Court of Appeal judgment was interpreted differently by the APC and the PDP.
Governor Adeleke and Oyetola, who is the Minister of Marine and Blue Economy, have strongly disagreed over the alleged reinstatement verdict of the Court of Appeal.
Governor Adeleke insisted that the sacked council chairmen cannot return to office, citing security reasons.
However, Oyetola said the Appeal Court judgment would be implemented through the instruments of law.
He added that the council executives should resume yesterday.
Frank said: “Intelligence at our disposal has revealed that the present strategy and plan by Oyetola is to make the state ungovernable for Governor Ademola Adeleke, so they can hide under the guise of crisis in the state to declare a state of emergency in Osun State.”
He lamented that following the crises orchestrated by Oyetola and his APC thugs, the National Secretary of the APC, Dr. Ajibola Basiru, who is from Osun State, had on live television on Monday evening urged the Federal Government to declare a state of emergency in the state to curtail further violence.
He quoted Basiru as saying: “I will suggest that perhaps it will be necessary for the Federal Government to declare a state of emergency. It has gotten to that stage where hapless people coming from farms are attacked by uncontrollable PDP thugs.”
Frank said: “Their major target is to declare a state of emergency because they know that if the elections are allowed to hold today, Governor Adeleke will still win.
“So they want to abort his second term through crisis and violence to pave the way for the declaration of a state of emergency.
“The President is hereby called upon to break his silence in spite of the fact that Osun is his state of origin and hometown, but the state is being ruled by the PDP, and Governor Adeleke is the people’s choice.
“Therefore, we are using this medium to let him know that if the present crisis is allowed to degenerate beyond what has already happened, both Oyetola and himself, as the Commander-In-Chief of the Armed Forces of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, would be held responsible.
“Presently, Oyetola is using federal might to engineer evil and anarchy in Osun State, and this nonsense must stop with all urgency.”
Frank, who is the United Liberation Movement for West Papua (ULMWP) Ambassador to East Africa and the Middle East, called on all well-meaning Nigerians to speak up to save the nation’s democracy, “because what is happening in Osun State is sheer impunity, dictatorship, and arrogance on the part of the APC that is trying to capture every part of the country at all cost—not through the ballot but through impunity and criminality.”
“We call on the people of Osun to stand strongly with Governor Adeleke in the face of this aggression being fueled by Oyetola and the APC.
“They must not be intimidated but resist the rascality of federal might that the ex-Governor and his party are using the way they have always done.
“Come to think of it, Oyetola was governor for four years without any developmental projects to show for it, but Adeleke has been there in the last two years and has done so much which has profoundly impacted the lives of the people.
“Despite the intimidation, we encourage the people of Osun State to stand firm in support of Adeleke, to prevent any form of distraction in rendering good governance in the state as part of his electioneering promises.
“They must equally rise up against every plot to declare a state of emergency in the state courtesy of Oyetola and the APC, through which they intend to destabilize Adeleke’s administration and take over the state by all means, because they know that Oyetola or any other APC candidate cannot win an election in the state to unseat Adeleke.
“So, that’s why Oyetola and the APC are very desperate to take the state by force because they believe that is the President’s hometown.”
