You’re not qualified to be advocate of free, fair elections – Osun APC to Adeleke

The Osun State chapter of the All Progressives Congress, APC, has shaded the state governor, Ademola Adeleke, on his Democracy Day speech.

The part also told him that he is not qualified to be an advocate of free and fair elections and the observance of the rule of law, alleging that he is a product of the rigged 2022 governorship election in the state.

Newspot recalled that Governor Adeleke had in a statement in commemoration of the annulled June 12, 1993 presidential election had stated that free and fair elections would be the best way to honour the memory of the acclaimed winner of the election, the late Bashorun MKO Abiola and other democratic heroes.

Also in the statement, Governor Adeleke had submitted, among other things, that election rigging is an act of war and that free and fair elections are the lifeline of any virile democracy.

He also appealed to the people to submit themselves to the upholding of the tenets of democracy by respecting the will of the people.

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The Osun APC chairman, Tajudeen Lawal, in a statement issued by the party’s Director of Media and Information, Kola Olabisi, on Thursday that the teachings of Governor Adeleke on genuine democratic institution is at variance with how he and other PDP candidates secured the highest political executive seat of the state during the last elections.

Lawal also alleged that Governor Adeleke won the election through the use of maximum violence by militarising the nooks and crannies of the state.

In Lawal’s words: “It is paradoxical that Governor Adeleke, who needlessly invoked Executive Orders to sack some of the legally enthroned Obas as a way of political victimization and vindictiveness, could be talking of the need for the observance of the rule of law.

“It is equally funny that Governor Adeleke, who was canvassing the need to stop being autocratic in democratic government, would find it worthwhile to sack the Chief Judge of the state, Justice (Mrs) Adepele Ojo, whose saving grace was the court of law.

“If Governor Adeleke is not autocratic in democratic garb, would his conscience have allowed him to sack the inherited 20,000 O’YES cadets, thousands of teachers and health workers alike at the inception of his administration?

“If Governor Adeleke is a doer and believer in what is just and fair, would he have prioritized the construction of five flyovers in a poor state like Osun, where hunger is walking on four legs in all the streets in the state?

“No responsible state executive would pay lip service to agriculture when the governed are wallowing in hunger and the basic necessities of life.”

Lawal also accused Adeleke of willingly denying the public servants who worked for his predecessor their November 2022 salaries as a means of punishment for belonging to the opposition party.