A fit of anger raged on Sunday among some national leaders of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) from Osun State against a PDP chairmanship aspirant, Chief Raymond Dokpesi, for purportedly shunning them when he took his campaign to the state on Saturday.
This is coming as PDP leaders across the country converge on Abuja today to consider the reports of the various Reconciliation and Harmonisation committees that met with aggrieved party members last week in parts of the country.
While the committee members succeeded in a number of states in their assignment by reconciling PDP members, where there were parallel structures, they met a brick wall in a couple of states and recommended that the national body determined the fate of such states.
The chairman of the main PDP Reconciliation Committee is the deputy Senate President, Senator Ike Ekwremadu.
Both Governors Olusegun Mimiko and Ayodele Fayose of Ondo and Ekiti states respectively, as well as Senator Buruji Kashamu facilitated the reconciliation and harmonisation exercise in the South-West, especially in Lagos, Oyo and Osun states.
In Osun, where there are two factions, many of the party leaders are furious that Dokpesi shunned them even when they had converged at the PDP state office in Osogbo to receive him.
They claimed that he communicated with the state chairman of the party, Honourable Soji Adagunodo, repeatedly, saying that he would be “in your state PDP secretariat tomorrow (July 30) as part of campaign tour” to mobilise support for his aspiration.
Some of the leaders that gathered at the venue with the hope of listening to him on his ambition and plan of action to revive the PDP included a former deputy governor of the state and minister, Erelu Olusola Obada; Senator Olu Alabi; Ambassador Gunju Adesakin; Chief Bayo Ajeigbe; Dele Fasheru; Alhaja Oyawoye; state PDP chairman, Honourable Adagunodo, while the Board of Trustee (BoT) members from the state sent their representatives.
But, Dokpesi only took his campaign to the office of another faction of the party in the state, and left without a message to the leaders waiting for him at the state PDP office in Osogbo.
Speaking on the development, Senator Alabi described the action of Dokpesi as embarrassing, because of the calibre and commitment of the PDP leaders and their supporters to the current efforts at repositioning the party.
He said it was sad that “anyone should fail to appreciate the fact that the leaders sacrificed their time and energy to be at the venue.
“The PDP in Osun State is leadership-driven,” noting that “whoever wishes to lead the party must never take its leaders and, indeed, the entire members of the party for granted,” Alabi stated.