I sincerely appreciate the honour bestowed on me by the Leadership of the All Progressives Congress [APC] for granting me the opportunity to Chair the just concluded APC Ward Congress Committee in Osun state.
However, I was stuck with a huge surprise when I read a post authored by a certain group called TOP, claiming that the Governor of Osun state compromised myself and my committee members. I have little time for such shenanigans, but to put the record straight let me send my reaction to this:
1. I was at the airport on Friday 30th July when a certain honorable forwarded a message to me that myself and my colleagues have been kidnapped by the officials of the government of Osun state for days. This is blatant falsehood! We received documents for the congress on Thursday 29th at the National secretariat of APC at about 5pm, so we couldn’t have been in Osun days before Friday 30th, 2021.
2. I got to Osogbo at about 4pm on Friday and lodged in a hotel owned by a friend and as a matter of fact, I called the owner of the hotel to inform him that I will be staying there. I paid for two nights and the so called TOP can go and verify because the proprietor is a known member of the APC
3. We called a stakeholders’ meeting same day we arrived. In attendance were the following personalities among several others:
1.- Gov Gboyega Oyetola
2.- The state chairman of APC
3.- One of the two APC senators and Senate Spokesperson (Senator Ajibola Basiru)
4.- Speaker of Osun State House of Assembly
5.- All the 3 former Deputy Governors of the State who are members of APC (Sen Iyiola Omisore, Mrs Titi Laoye-Ponle, Ch Sooko Adewoyin), serving and former members of the National and State Assembly and many other leaders of the party, including Chairmen and Stakeholders from the nine Federal constituencies in the State.
4. Our Committee immediately deployed the 3-man Ward Congress Committee in strict adherence to the rules and guidelines. In compliance with the Guidelines, the 3-man committee were deployed to wards other than theirs and performed their functions as stipulated in the guidelines and reported back to us at the Osun State APC Secretariat where we also addressed the press.
5. On the day of congress (Saturday) we moved round the state as possible as we can.
6. For those group of people claiming the congress was faulty, they are advised to utilise the grievance remedial mechanisms under the guidelines and the party constitution rather than attack our hard earned reputation.
7. Lastly, my committee did not distribute nomination forms, and we can only work on those submitted by the aspirants in line with the guidelines.
Signed:
Otunba (Hon) Gbenga Elegbeleye,
Chairman APC Ward Congress Committee, Osun state.
Wednesday, August 4, 2021.
