Crisis rocking the Osun State chapter of the All Progressives Congress has continued to getter deeper as the factional group, The Osun Progressives and IleriOluwa group are currently alleging each other of assassination plot.
TOP is loyal to former Governor Rauf Aregbesola, while IleriOluwa is the group of Governor Gboyega Oyetola.
While Chairman of the TOP, Adelowo Adebiyi raised alarm on Monday evening, Ismail Omipidan, the Chief Press Secretary to Oyetola, asked Adebiyi and others to have their head examined.
Adebiyi said his group has uncovered plot by the IleriOluwa group to assassinate some of its leaders, stating that they have informed the security operatives of the move.
“Information at our disposal now makes it clear that the level of desperation of Governor Oyetola led IleriOluwa group has reached the throats of its leaders and therefore concluded that elimination of TOP leaders will put a stop to our opposition to them.
“It is noteworthy to mention that some of the TOP leaders have been receiving strange calls which started at the weekend. The callers were threatening TOP leaders with assassination as the solution to TOP activities in the state.
“We learnt on inquiry that the Governor’s group IleriOluwa is jittery of what is likely going to be the outcome of the case instituted by members of the APC who belong to TOP caucus and would not mind if some leaders are killed in order to put a stop to TOP activities.
“We further gathered that the IleriOluwa group got incensed by the entry of Hon Lasun Yusuf’s into the governorship race and concluded that it was TOP activities that gave him the liver to be challenging the second term ambition of Governor Oyetola.”
In his reaction to the matter, Omipidan said the Adebiyi was the one that led hoodlums to attack APC members at the party secretariat in Osogbo on August 14, 2021. He asked the factional group not to drag former Deputy Speaker of the House of Representatives, Lasun Yusuff into their issues.
Omipidan further argued that only an unstable mind and character would accuse a person of the Governor’s standing, who in the last three years has not done anything to portray him as a man given to violence or the government he leads, of assassination plot.
He added, “The case was incidented at the Police Station by the then Caretaker chairman of the party, Prince Gboyega Famodun, arrests were made and they were duly arraigned before a Magistrate. It took the intervention of Mr. Governor to get him and his co-travelers off the hook.
“How can such a man who is known to have been associated with violence in the past turn around to accuse my Principal who was even described by a prominent TOP member, Temitope Mustapha, on air today (Wednesday) during a radio Live Programme as a decent and complete gentleman of violence?
“We are aware that Elder Adebiyi through some of his foot soldiers have been holding clandestine meetings on how to unleash mayhem on Osun. But like all previous plots, this too will fail.
“Elder Adebiyi is already perceiving another failure on his wild goose chase. This is a man who forged the signatures of other members of the party and lied that they signed the petition to protest the conduct of the Ward Congress. When the lie was bursted , he apologised and pleaded that he be given another chance.
“ He knows those who are in the habit of using extra judicial means by deploying non-state actors to deal mercilessly with perceived opponents. This does not fit the person and character of Oyetola. And our elder knows this much.”
When contacted, Professor Aderemi Ajala, the media aide to Lasun Yusuff said his Principal’s ambition has nothing to do with activities of TOP.
Ajala described TOP members as people who have benefitted from the party and ar hellbent on destroying party. He said nothing in their activities will inspire his Principal.
He said, “what can inspire someone in what TOP members are doing? Rt Hon Lasun Yusuff has at different points dissociated himself from the activities of the group and its financier, Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola. In fact, Aregbesola and all TOP members should be apologizing to Lasun Yusuff for what they did to him. So what will now inspire him in what they are doing? Is it the lies they are dishing out? Did they inspire him when he first contested in 2018?”
“Whatever they are doing, they are just seeking relevance. Nothing in TOP can inspire a reasonable politician.”
Ajala said his Principal is a party man and will forever be after the development of the party.
