Bayo Adekanle, a chieftain of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and former House of representatives candidate, in this interview with Yinka Oladoyinbo, speaks on the coming governorship election in the state and the chances of the party.THE governorship election in Ondo State is around the corner, how prepared is your party, the PDP'Obviously, we are well prepared for this election. On October 20, PDP will reclaim the state by the grace of God. The party now has better and formidable structures; we have people of no mean repute that have come to team up with the loyal and dependable party men that are in the party, people like former governorship aspirants from the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN).We have people like Saka Lawal, Olaiya Oni, Omoniyi Omdara. I was also with them before returning to the PDP and with the structures we have on the ground now, with strong party men in the three senatorial districts, there is no doubt that we are going to be victorious at the end of the day.The PDP was in power for six years and you have people that still complain about its performance while in power, how do you want to convince the electorate to vote for PDP'If there is anybody that says the PDP did not perform in its six years in office compared to what we are seeing now, that person does not have a deep knowledge of what the state is all about. Move round the 18 local government areas of the state, you will seethe impact of the party. In Ilaje Irele where I come from, in Akoko, even in the central senatorial district, you will see the impact of the party. So, whoever says the PDP did not deliver in its six years in office is only being economical with the truth.We are banking, in this election, on our past performance in many sectors: road networking, scholarship for students, construction of schools, agricultural development, women empowerment, development of the oil producing area of the state and so. That is the basis for which people are moving from other parties to the PDP.The candidate of your party, Chief Olusola Oke, is from the same southern senatorial district as the former Governor Olusegun Agagu. Don't you think this can affect the performance of the party in the election'There are so many reasons why the leadership of the party decided to pick somebody from the southern senatorial district.One, every party has its strategy of winning election. The main reason for the establishment of political parties is to gain power. Oke has been in power since 1992; he was in the House of Representatives; he has been NDDC commissioner, OSOPADEC commissioner, National Legal Adviser of the party and so on. So, among all the aspirants that were contesting on the platform of PDP, he was the best. He was the only aspirant that has catchment area. The whole of the old Okitipupa Division comprising Ese-Odo, Ilaje, Irele and Okitipupa will vote for him en masse, so the leadership was looking at the angle of winning the election. Before the emergence of Oke, the people of the district were backing a candidate from the northern senatorial distrcit but when it did not work out, the party zeroed in on Oke and picked somebody from the north to be his deputy. But what Ondo State needs now is delivery of projects. Whoever is saying somebody is from somewhere should take inot consideration the ability to deliver. Agagu is from Okitipupa Local Government Area, Oke is from Ilaje. They are two different local government.Despite your optimism, do you think the party can go far in this election considering its internal wranglings'The party is not in crisis. Whoever is saying the party is in crisis is not studying the whole events. The mobilisation by members has swallowed whatever crisis anybody may be talking about or imagined because people want to be liberated in Ondo State.We are under political slavery, we want to be liberated, so if anybody is promoting crisis, I believe the opposition parties are behind it. The crisis that anybody can be envisaging has no impact in this election. Thirteen aspirants contested with Oke for the ticket and they all embraced him and gave him the go ahead; none of them has said he is not satisfied. Oke has been a national legal adviser of this party and he knows much about the PDP. Agagu, who happens to be the leader of the party, knows much about the party members, so whoever is bringing in crisis is a paid agent and it won't work because the people of the state want themselves liberated.Why do you think there is the need for a change in the face of the various endorsements of the incumbent governor'Whatever endorsement enjoyed by the governor does not represent the stand of the entire people of the state. For the past three and half years, the Labour Party (LP) government has not improved on the lives of the people of the state. The administration met N38 billion in the state account, yet many of the projects met on ground were abandoned.Students' scholarship were not paid. I was a student union leader in this state and at the national level. It will be extremely bad for a government to say that scholarship can only be given to students after passing an aptitude test, after having second class upper division. That is a government that does not have the interest of the people at heart.
Click here to read full news..
