RE: PDP GOVERNORSHIP TICKET: WHY IT SHOULD BE IBADAN. Politics is a game of numbers but one must be certain of his political estimation so as to avoid political woes. The responses of late Pa Dejo Raimi to Obilo’s were a common impression of an average Ibadan man when forecasting likely results of elections. According to the late icon, Ibadan is the only city that determines who wins governorship seat. He (Dejo) substantiated his claim by saying that 68% of total eligible voters in Oyo state were from Ibadan. Rt. Hon. Kehinde Ayoola in his recent release accentuated this fallacy but he only differed on figures by reducing it to 58%. As late Dejo Raimi of blessed memory did not expatiate on the source(s) of his statistics, Hon. Kehinde Ayoola JP claimed to have used voters’ registers of 2011 to justify his declamation. I see the statements of the comedy duo as a manipulative propaganda dedicated to achieving a political ambition. Unfortunately, their propaganda had actually suffered a deceptive flavour required of a polished trickery being too banal to convince Oyo state people of geo-political zones other than Ibadan zone. As no politically sensitive person doubts the influence which a big city like Ibadan may have on political drifts; likewise should we not overestimate the actual strength ascribable to it! Ibadan is populated by both aborigines of Ibadan and settlers. For instance, people living at Oke-ado area and greater part of ‘challenge’ area are Ijebu descents: Olodo, breweries area and part of Alakia are dominated by Osun state indigenes: Eleyele, Apata and Odo-ona are dominated by Ibarapa people: and Ojoo to Moniya is dominated by Oke-ogun people and Hausas. Similarly, Ibadan villages like Batake, Idi Iya, Osee etc are populated and dominated by egbas, Ibarapas and foreigners e.g Togolese. For the foregoing reasons, I suppose voters’ population in Ibadan could not exist without overlapping foreign sources. It should be recalled that Ibadan city has many higher institutions of which their students are usually hired to fill up voters’ registers. Most of these students are indigenes of neighboring towns located within the geographical bracket of Oyo state and other states. Unfortunately, most of these students are not always in Ibadan during elections. I was aware of fill-in-the- register mobilization embarked upon by political office seekers in 2010 during the voters’ registration exercise which even attracted money for the volunteers. A politician believes that rigging process begins with manipulation of voters’ registers. It on this note I’m calling on all Oyo state indigenes of outside Ibadan extraction to be relentless in their political move. Agodi secretariat belongs to all Oyo state indigenes and not Ibadan indigenes alone. Therefore, it will be anti-democratic to exclusively reserve it for Ibadan people; it will be tantamount to fear if other geo-political zones fail to contest the seat and it will be a betrayer to the generation yet unborn if their political space is already bartered for cowardice. AUTHOR: Ogunlana Gabriel Gabmentor
Posted on: Sat, 02 Aug 2014 16:29:05 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015