In this interview with DARE ADEKANMBI, Osun PDP chairman, Sunday Bisi, says all issues regarding the party have been resolved and the stakeholders are united ahead of the next election in the state.
We are getting a report that Osun PDP is still polarised, despite efforts to unite all stakeholders in the party. Why is there still this division?
How do you mean?
There are leaders in the party who just siddon-look and there is a case in court in which the plaintiffs are praying for the dissolution of the current State Working Committee led by you…
If you are following the latest development in Osun PDP, you would know that of recent, all the leaders in the party gathered in the house of our leader and former governor, Prince Olagunsoye Oyinlola, and all the differences were resolved. At that meeting, three resolutions were arrived at. The first is that all the leaders and everybody in Osun PDP should acknowledge and give due recognition to the State Working Committee led by me as chairman. It was also resolved that all cases in court should be withdrawn and that Honourable Soji Adagunodo should be nominated to fill the vacant position of the National Vice Chairman (South-West) vacated by Ambassador Taofeek Arapaja. All the leaders of the party in the state from Prince Oyinlola, his deputy, Erelu Olusola Obada and our only Senator, Francis Fadahunsi and others signed. Honourable Adagunodo was also at the meeting. So, that meeting put an end to whatever you might have heard about Osun PDP. We don’t have any issue now and we are united.
Some people complained that your emergence was influenced by the Adeleke family…
What I just told you has nullified whatever anybody may say. I told you the caliber of people that were at the meeting. We all agreed and came up with those resolutions.
So, you see the outcome of the meeting as something that is very good for the party?
It is very good for the party in the state. All of us are now one and we are united. APC is in for a big defeat. They can’t rig us out again.
How prepared is your party for the election coming up in about eight months from now?
I think the first step is to unite the party and this we have done. We have achieved that unity of purpose. This means we are ready for that election. No more, no less.
If you talk to those in APC, they tell you they are going to retain the state because their governor has done wonder and you can see him departing from the perceived missteps of his predecessor…
I don’t see it that way. That is just a figment of imagination. How would Governor Oyetola exonerate himself from the ruins of the past and the present? He was the Chief of Staff to Aregbesola for eight years. He was in charge the so-called mega schools that have become dilapidated now. What did he do that time? After wasting about N20billion of state money, he is now telling us that the schools are bad and unsafe for our children. These schools have not even lasted four or five years. Apart from this, what has the governor himself done? He has done nothing to deserve a re-election.
He has been paying salaries and carrying on some of the projects of his predecessor…
Did you hear what Governor Zulum of Borno State said about salary payment a few days ago? Thank God he is an APC governor. When you hire labourers to work for you and at the end of the labourer’s services you pay him. Would you describe that as an achievement? The bible extols us to pay wages of workers. The governor, together with his party, has not done anything since his inauguration three years ago. He was in government when Aregbesola owed workers 15-month salary in the state and up till now, these arrears have not been paid. Up till now, the pensioners are still wallowing in abject poverty. Those who retired in 2012 have not received their gratuities up till now. Those who made contributory pension from 2015 up till date have not been given their money. These people are dying in hundreds. I am one of those pensioners and I know what we are going through. Every month, they deduct the workers’ contribution to the pension scheme and refuse to remit same to the appropriate quarters. After retiring, those people realise they have been short-changed by the APC government, whereas, those who are political appointees are being paid as and when due.
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