Those claiming to be factions should learn to crawl before running —Oladejo, Lagos APC spokesman

Spokesman of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in Lagos State, Honourable Seye Oladejo weighs the impact of dissenting members of the party on the leadership, future elections and on governance in the state. SUBAIR MOHAMMED brings excerpts.

Apart from the mainstream Lagos All Progressives Congress (APC), three other factions of the party in the state held parallel congresses, what does this portend for the party?

Let me start by saying that Lagos APC is one. There are no mainstream or factions in whatever guise in the party in Lagos State. And the reason for this is very simple, all the congresses we had were as directed by the national secretariat of the party under the supervision of various congress committees. We followed the rules and guidelines as published by the national secretariat of the party. The state congress was a huge success. It was held at the venue recognised by the national headquarters of the party and it was supervised by the seven-man member committee led by Chief Adebayo Adelabu deployed to Lagos state by the national. We used the delegates as forwarded by the national. The statutory delegates made up of political office holders who are members of our party from the governor, to members of his cabinet, the deputy governor, senators, and members of the House of Representatives, local government chairmen and councillors and all other statutory delegates and five state delegates from each of the 245 wards in the state that was how the list of 1,615 delegates were generated. Our congress was witnessed by the Independent National Electoral commission (INEC) at the national level and at the state level. So, you need to ask those who claimed they held factional state congress how they generated their list of delegates. What you’ll hear from them is laughable. The APC state congress wasn’t an all-comers’ congress. They need to go and learn the rudiments of politics because they have no idea of what they are talking about. They just gathered somewhere and said they were holding a congress. What impunity is that? They should learn to crawl before running. They need to learn the rope, so as far as we are concerned the state congress was hugely successful and that’s it.

Other factions also claimed their congresses were held according to the guidelines and as such they are recognised by the national secretariat, what do you say to this?

The question to ask them is, where were their delegates drawn from? Who were their statutory delegates? Where did they get their delegates list from? Are you aware that the Appeal Committee that came to Lagos for the ward congress had upheld the list of delegates, five per ward that we used?    Which committee was deployed by the national to conduct and supervise their congresses? They chose and created committee among their members to supervise their congress. Theirs is an exercise in confusion and they will end up being internally displaced in politics because they are not ready to play by the rules. They are just embarking on a fruitless exercise.

What do you think is the cause of the multiple congresses and friction within the Lagos APC; do they have anything to do with the 2023 governorship race?

I would say some of them are beclouded by their ambitions. And it is getting clearer by the day that what they are doing is an exercise in futility. It will end up in failure because it’s a recipe for failure. Although there is an appeal committee in place, I can assure you that with all the facts I have stated earlier, the outcome of that committee is predictable; all the factions are going to fail just like they failed at the local government and ward appeal committees.

Are you saying factions stand no chance in the Lagos APC?

They stand no chance whatsoever under the sun. This is based on the way their delegate lists were raised. Who were their statutory delegates? They list of delegates were generated on their own. Where was it upheld? Where was it sanctioned? What they had was a family interview and of course, they have that right under the constitution.

What then is the way out of this imbroglio, especially as some of them have signified interest in running for the governorship race of the state?

At times you start questioning the intentions of these so-called groups. You see them making press releases that bitterly criticise our government. We are supposed to be the ruling party. When groups in the party claim to be loyal to the party and they continue to criticise its leadership, you cannot but start questioning their intentions. And they have made it clear that whether they pick the APC ticket or not, they are going to run for the governorship seat in 2023 and that should send some signal about their true intentions. In fact, they are doing a better job of being in the opposition than the PDP because they are so critical about the government and the party. But let me tell you, they will become IDPs politically in the end.

They alleged being side-lined and marginalised and that the party is solely run by one man.

Is it the government that is side-lining them? During the last State Congress, they simply committed political suicide and I will explain to you. They bought forms in Abuja which was allowed by the guidelines which they were supposed to submit to the committee deployed by Abuja for their screening and the rest of it but they didn’t do that because they kept boycotting activities at the state secretariat of the party. So, they couldn’t be properly screened. Therefore, they were not on the list of those who presented themselves, as far as the party is concerned, to be elected into the state executive positions. That amounted to a boycott.

One of the reasons stated by the Lagos4Lagos for the boycott was that the Appeal committee had been cornered by the leadership of the party in the state, how true is this?

The onus of proof is on them. Without proving his allegations, he has drawn a conclusion and even indicted Adelabu committee for no just cause. The congress had not taken place before he decided that the committee was compromised. They are only busy chasing shadows. They are in the wrong vocation. They shouldn’t be in politics.

The lead visioner of the Lagos4Lagos Movement, Dr Olajide Adediran has declared his intention to run for the governorship seat of the state in 2023 and with more than two million members behind him. Do you nurse any fear of losing the state to him?

Politicians can claim to be anything. The Lagos4Lagos has a crowd that is largely untested, I have seen that before. When the chips are down and after losing out in the fullness of time, they will look back and see nobody. I just wish them well. When you see people dancing in that kind of acrobatic dance and naked in the market, just know that there are some people beating high beat tune for them nearby. Let me tell you what they don’t know, politics should be learnt. It is okay to dream but for those dreams to become reality, you will have to wake up. But in their case, they are in a perpetual dream. They can’t stop our party. They don’t have the number to stop the APC and by the way, oppositions in Lagos State only exists in paper.

What path do you think the factional APC in the state could take to address their grievances?

It’s simple; they should eat the humble pie. They should come down from their high horses and stop dreaming. They should wake up and smell the coffee. They will lose out in the fullness of time that I can assure you. They have largely people who have not tested the murky water of real politicking and we are ready for them. They can’t stop us but we are ready to make peace with them. We are ready to extend the olive branch but they must be prepared to play by the rules.

We are in a party that has rules and guidelines. We have constitution that must be followed and at every level of life, there are leaders and they must recognise that. And all the clamour for Lagos4lagos, let me just say this, is a recipe for chaos and anarchy. They want to put a knife to that thing that unites all of us. Lagos as a coaster city state is bound to attract people from all ethnic nationalities. The prosperity of Lagos state is infectious. You won’t find many families in Nigeria that do not have a presence in Lagos and that also means that the cosmopolitan nature of Lagos is such that you can’t start playing divisive or sectional politics.

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