Ahead of the January 18 Local Government election in Ondo State, some members of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in Odigbo Local Government Area have protested the swapping of the candidate of the party in the Ajue ward of the council area.
Consequently, the leaders and youths of the party petitioned Governor Lucky Aiyedatiwa, alleging that some persons had surreptitiously swapped the name of their chosen councillorship candidate with another person who polled one vote in the primary election process that produced their preferred candidate.
The APC youth staged a peaceful protest and demanded justice in the choice of candidate for the council area to prevent a breakdown of law and order.
In a petition addressed to the state Governor Aiyedatiwa and received, the petitioners stated that the 16 leaders of the party, four leaders from each of the four zones -Ajue zone, Oro zone, Igburowo zone, and Lapahun zone- had chosen one of the aspirants, Ayodeji Emmanuel Adesuyan as the candidate of the party for the January 18, 2025 local council election.
They said Adesuyan polled 14 votes, the second aspirant, Mr Siji, polled 1 vote, while the 16th leader, Mrs Margaret Akinsuroju, was not present at the meeting but sent High Chief Lisa of Ajue Town to inform the meeting that she could not attend because she travelled to Lagos.
It read “Three leaders from each of the four zones, revealed that the leaders of the party had on December 2, 2024, submitted the name of the candidate, with the attached attendance sheet with each leader who participated in the election appending their signatures, to the party’s Local Government chairman in Ore for onward transmission to the state Chairman of the party, Engr. Ade Adetimehin.
‘Despite the outcome of the process which produced Adesuyan as a consensus candidate of the party and the fact that the ticket has been zoned to Oro, the leaders of the party alleged that the nomination form of the party for the councillorship position has Siji who polled one vote.”
The APC leaders appealed to Governor Aiyedatiwa to intervene in the matter.
The petition read, “It is not cleaner to us leaders and the entire members of APC in Ajue Ward, someone who got one vote was given the nomination form of the party against the other aspirants who got 14 votes was rejected.
“The leadership and the entire members of our party are hereby appealing to our governor to please direct that the appropriate stakeholder look into our matter and correct the wrong in the interest of justice and equity.”
In a separate statement, the youths protested what they described as the imposition of a candidate. The youth alleged that “APC Youth in Oro, Ajue ward say no to the imposition of unpopular councillorship candidate.
The youth said, “How on earth can a candidate, Mr Folasele Siji, who scored only 1 vote, be imposed on Ajue ward against the popular candidate, Hon Adesuyan Ayodeji Emmanuel, who polled 14 votes at the Ward leaders meeting?
“This is grossly unacceptable, because this same scenario played out in 2007, (17) years ago when the leadership of Ajue ward PDP gave Oro zone the party ticket for councillorship position, Ajue ward was denied the position by the same factor, as they are currently using their closeness to Engr Ade Adetimehin to make a mess of a collective mandate given to Hon Ayodeji Adesuyan by the majority of Ajue ward leaders. Let it be known that this act of brazen illegality will not stand by God’s grace.”
