The Kehinde Sogunle Gubernatorial Campaign (KSGC) has raised the alarm on the activities of fifth columnists within the Labour Party working against the interest of the Party in Ogun state. The alarm was raised in a press release signed by Comrade Kehinde Sogunle, the gubernatorial candidate of the Labour Party in Ogun State.
Kehinde Sogunle stated that recent developments in the party in Ogun state have revealed that some members of the Ogun state executives of the party were being used by external forces to de-market the Labour Party in Ogun state and sabotage the expected electoral victory at the polls of His Excellency Peter Obi and all the candidates of the party in Ogun state.
These strange and creeping developments started with the open disrespect shown to Dr Doyin Okupe, the Director General of the Obi-Baba Ahmed Presidential Campaign, by Michael Oluwasegun Feyisola the State Secretary of the Labour Party, in his ill-informed and speculative press statements delivered on August 10, 2022.
After the emergence of Comrade Anthony Kehinde Sogunle as the gubernatorial candidate of the Labour Party at the Primaries held on the 9th June 2022 at the Ogun state NLC Secretariat, the fifth columnists within the party in Ogun state on the prompting of Comrade Abayomi Arabambi, the National Publicity Secretary of the Labour Party, ensured that five months after the primaries and submission of nomination forms, the names of the Gubernatorial Candidate, and his Deputy, all the Candidates of the State House of Assembly and some of the National Assembly Candidates from Ogun State were not listed in the first publications of INEC on July 23rd 2022 and the second publication of October 4th, 2022. It was claimed that the portal for uploading was closed before their details could be uploaded and that a court order has to be obtained to remedy the situation.
We waited patiently and studiously for them to discharge their responsibility through the party and their purported legal channels until we realized that there has not been sufficient transparency and diligence in the pursuit of the cases in court in respect of our candidature not being listed by INEC.
After painstaking investigation, we discovered that the failure to submit our nomination forms to INEC was deliberate sabotage on the part of Comrade Abayomi Arabambi the National Publicity Secretary and his collaborators in the Ogun state Labour Party led by Michael Ashade the State Chairman and Michael Oluwasegun Feyisola the State Secretary.
To date, no satisfactory explanation has been provided to us for their failure to upload our forms to INEC before the closure of the portal, after we have filled and submitted our forms since June 15, 2022, well ahead of the closure of the portal on July 23rd 2022.
Their game plan is to ensure that the Labour party does not have candidates for all the elective offices in Ogun state to weaken the performance of His Excellency Peter Obi at the polls in Ogun state.
Rather than addressing the very critical issue of the non-listing of the Labour Party gubernatorial candidate being facilitated by the Authority given by the National Chairman for another legal representation on the case, Comrade Michael Oluwasegun Feyisola the State Secretary of the party reacted by addressing a Press Conference in which he denigrated the person of Barr Julius Abure the National Chairman of the Labour Party and Dr Doyin Okupe the Chairman of the Peter Obi Presidential Campaign Committee, whilst also spreading other misinformation and incitements to the party stalwarts.
The Kehinde Sogunle Gubernatorial Campaign totally and unequivocally disassociates itself from the vexatious and self-serving Press Conference. We comprehensively condemn in unmistaken terms the vituperations of the press conference and the press release, written in an uncouth language and rendered in an indecorous manner by Michael Oluwasegun Feyisola the Current State Secretary of the Party with the active goading and collaboration of Abayomi Arabambi the National Publicity Secretary and support of some members the State Party Executives on Thursday, November 24, 2022.
Anecdotal information has confirmed severally that the incumbents of the State intend to run unopposed in the coming elections against the goodwill of proper democratic processes. We have recently observed how the ruling party goes to the courts to challenge the candidacies of several parties and in some cases used their moles in different parties to form a clog in the wheel of the electoral procedures and processes.
We are not perturbed by these anti-democratic practices currently pervading our State. We are however hopeful that the last resort in the hands of the judiciary will continue to give the common people hope and restore their constitutional rights of voting and be voted for.
We remain undeterred by the antics of the fifth columnists within the party and their external sponsors. We are focused on running an issue-based campaign and rescuing Ogun state from the clutches of mediocrity while also ensuring a resounding victory for his Excellency Peter Obi in Ogun state.
Ogun State deserves the best and has all the potential to be a great State.
