There is a great pressure from all good men ( who wants me to run for election )— Hiram Ulysses Grant, the 18th President of the United States in 1822
The greatest thing that could happen to a man and his society is to be encouraged, pressurised and “ forced” to contest for leadership and yield to such “ popular demands”, albeit “reluctantly and not run for election as a do or die affair. This is what happened in historic American presidential elections to the first American President, George Washington ( 1732-1799). He was reluctant. It also happened to the second American President, John Adams ( 1735-1826). He was reluctant. It also happened to the 18th US President, Hiram Ulysses Grant ( 1822-1885). He was reluctant. So was Iranian President, Mohammed Khatami. So was American Congress’ Majority Leader, Kelvin McCarthy. So was Chief Bola Ige in 1979. He was reluctant So was Chief Olusegun Obasanjo in 1999. So was Chief Lam Adesina in 1999. So was Oba Rasheed Ladoja in 2003. All of them were initially reluctant but bowed to popular pressures to contest for elections A man can’t be more lucky if people are in love with him. A man must be extraordinary if he is not a moneybag and yet he enjoys a clarion call from the silent majority who believe in his political foresight, social justice and proactiveness in decision making.
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Such a man has no choice but to offer himself to serve his State and people. At Oyo Npeo, we believe true leadership is all about pure responsibility and the ability to achieve goals despite challenges. This is a clarion call to join forces with the forces of light in the state in harmony to make a consensus agreement towards achieving a brighter and greater Oyo State. This is a great day in the history of our state. We are on the verge of an ideological rebirth declaring the possibility of mass-based governance institutionalised on achieving our goals for a progressive state. Social progress and welfarism is our ideology and we intend to deliver hope in the right atmosphere of an all-inclusive governance through a timely insight of consciousness to political activism by the masses who are the silent majority. We believe the time to start mobilizing towards the tomorrow we desire is now. We must by our unrelenting engagements make it easy for our target Messiah to see our sincerity and patriotic motivation to accept the task to lead our state into the next dispensation and era of full hope realization , as we strive to carry along the masses from Ibadan to Ibarapa, to Kisi to Ogbomoso and Oyo as the owners of power.
Having carried out a quick survey on what type of character we need at this juncture in history, we have no doubt in our mind that we have found that right man and which shall be unveiled in the process of time even as he yeilds to popular demand. We bring to the good people a breath of fresh air. We bring to the good people of Oyo State, a new era of good governance. We bring to the good people of Oyo State, a connecting and encompassing ideology that believes in the thought, feelings of the people as the driver of the managerial initiative. This is only possible when we close an abnegative-bridge between Ibadan and non Ibadans across the 33 LGs and 5 zones in the state to bring up a man who is all embracing, desectionalized, de-primordial, dereligionised , a man who cut across all divisions, schisms and disparities. In this man we intend to connect together in putting our hopes to work. In this man, and together we shall realise our collective goals of a greater Oyo State.
- Adejumo, a political scientist, writes in from the University of Ibadan
and then