By OMONIYI SALAUDEEN
Of all the six states in the South West region, only Lagos State has remained an impregnable fortress for the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). In this interview, the new Chairman, Mr. Olatunji Shelle, accused the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) of planting moles in the party. He also revealed how ACN siphoned money from the state to prosecute elections in other states. Excerpts… Given the victory of the ACN in the recent Edo State governorship election, do you think the PDP can still regain its strength in the South West? The loss of states under the PDP control in the South West apart from Lagos and Ondo has a history behind it.
There are tremendous resources at the disposal of Lagos State government. The government of Lagos State controls enormous resources from federation account allocation and Internally Generated Revenue (IGR). This has been used to a great extent to carry out expansionist tendencies in the rest of the South West. So, they have only succeeded in annexing Edo State into the whole arrangement. You will recall that the present governor of Osun State was once a Commissioner of Works in Lagos State. This means that while he was Commissioner for Works in Lagos State, he was just repatriating money to Osun State. Similarly, money was taken from this state to prosecute election in Ogun and Ekiti states.
The only state that seems to have distanced itself from the trend is Ondo State where Mimiko of the Labour Party is in charge. In addition, with the enormous resources available to the state government, they were able to infiltrate the press. Some of the media houses even belong to their leadership. Apart from this, they also have an enormous influence on the judiciary. In Lagos State, we agree we lost marginally during the first attempt. But subsequently, a lot of things happened. I don’t want to go much into the details because they are issues that touch lives, soul and spirits.
At the appropriate time, God will judge. Also, they infiltrated PDP in Lagos State, planting moles to destabilize the party in the state. Already, we have identified some of them. Some of them have also left on their own because the heat was already on them. Is that also why your party suffered a crushing defeat in the last local government election? The Local Government election in the state was supposed to be a gradual reincarnation of PDP in the state. And, of course, we won in some local government areas where we had strength. But unfortunately, the results were not declared at the various collation centres.
They were taken to the LASIEC office where the Chairman shamefully declared results without figures. We went to the tribunal and some of the cases are clear-cut. But up till now, we have not gotten justice. However, I believe justice from God weighs better than justice from man. And we shall get that justice very soon. How do you then hope to bounce back in the South West region? We would leave the strategy to our chest. We are working hard and we are repositioning. Now, we have competent hands who are better managers of our party in Lagos State. Ogun State is not settled yet; it is not a good story to tell. Before the next general election, we would have stabilised.
The national leadership would have given the roadmap and definitely, we would bounce back. Why is your party so susceptible to the antics of the opposition? Most of the people causing crises in PDP are defectors from AD and AC which eventually became ACN. Of course, some of them are good people, but some of them were deliberately sent to come and play a role that is not beneficial to the progress of the PDP in Lagos State. But we have identified them. It is now becoming very hot for the few ones that are still left to stand our new approach of running the party. Very soon, we shall show them the way out because they are doing more damage than what anybody can comprehend.
The issue of siphoning Lagos money could have been used as a means of public engagement during the electioneering. But the two prominent leaders of your party were busy working at cross purposes. Who are the people working at cross purposes? The issue of carrying Lagos money to other states is open. What could have made Lagos State to go and buy land in Osun State for purpose of Agriculture? Are you not aware that Aregbesola was the Commissioner of Works in Lagos State before he became the governor? Are you not aware that Opeyemi Bamidele was a Commissioner in Lagos and he is now a member of the House of Representatives representing Ekiti State?
Are you not aware that their spokesperson in ACN today, Lai Muhammed, was a Chief of Staff in Lagos State? After two or three years in office with Governor Tinubu, he went to Kwara State to go and contest election and lost. Where did he get the money? It’s Lagos money. It is not in the interest of the state for people to come here, loot and then go to another state to settle down. That dual citizenship should not be allowed in law. They should be arrested and tried for looting the state. And God will not forgive them. Has the face-off between two prominent members of your party been finally settled? That is why I said there are moles in our party. I don’t want to go into the history of what happened to the leader you had in mind. I don’t want to mention names because I will expose a lot of things. How the man went to jail is questionable. He was tried in a Lagos court. But now, the Speaker of the Lagos State House of Assembly, Hon Adeyemi Ikuforiji, is saying that a federal court cannot try him. You can see the irony of life.
What goes around comes around. Thank God that the man is a very strong character. He went to jail and bounced back and he will continue to be a courageous person. Time will tell when people will openly confess their sins. Some of the people fighting him are stooges and errand boys of the opposition party. They are moles in the PDP. Even when people decamped to join the PDP, they said it was a rented crowd. Whenever we are going for election, they will be the ones who would say we cannot win. We were to have an election in his home base in Ikorodu; he said we could not win. But we won the election. I have said I am not going to mention names but I will be tempted to make inferences which would help people to make a guess of those we are talking about.
Are you saying PDP can dislodge ACN in Lagos State? We shall capitalize on all the ills of the ACN ranging from illegal sand filling, illegal displacement of people to illegal use of resources and abuse of power. We shall capitalize on promises unfulfilled. Where are the promises to build Fourth Mainland Bridge, coastal roads, and water transportation? Where is the promise to build Badagray express road? Where are the water transportation facilities? They built jetty at a very exorbitant cost and there are no boats to service these jetties. The Yatch they bought is lying fallow at Marina. Is that the kind of boat for transportation? Is that the kind of things we need at this point in time to develop Lagos? In terms of beautification, a lot of things have been done.
But is that all? Are they maintaining the roads in the inter-land like Somolu, Bariga, Alimosho, Mushin and others? Lekki is sinking and somebody is sand filling the Atlantic Ocean. It is unheard of. Lagos will eventually sink because Lagos by topography and by geography is below sea level. Now, they are compounding the problem. The effect is now being felt along Alpha beach, Oke Mapo up till Ibeju Lekki. Many houses have been washed away, many businesses have been destroyed, roads have been completely washed off. Go to Alpha beach, the roads are all gone. They even want to take sand filling as far as Oniru. When you enter Oniru now, you will see them putting stone and cornering the Atlantic. It’s madness. Unless these excesses are checked, Lagos will be no more in the next 10 or 20 years. Certain part of Lagos would have come under water.
The question is: where are they spending the ecological funds? They provide roads on concession but they fail to provide drainages. Where they were forced to provide drainages, the drainages are not connected. Water is standing in all the drainages they provided in Lekki. And they feel they are providing services to the people. Lagos has been turned to a huge business where a few people come together to corner all the resources. So, the rest can go to hell. It is rather unfortunate. You mean it is an error of judgment for the people who are saying Lagos is working? It is because they have not gone round to see exactly what is happening. Lagos is cleaner on the surface when you move through the major roads. But go to all the villages in Lekki, you will be shocked with the state of the roads. Even go to Ikoyi which is supposed to be the best GRA in Lagos, you will not find any good roads there. Go to Alimosho, go to Agbado Oke-Odo, go to Eleko, go to Jakande, what you will find are the same stories.
Once they see a waterfront, they displace whosoever is there, sand fill it and share it. This will not help Lagos at the end of the day. A few people will benefit, the poor will continue to be poorer. The language now is ‘go back to your state’. Nigeria belongs to all of us. If you are here to find a means of livelihood, you should be able to do so as long as you are a Nigerian. But for people to be threatening is unbecoming of an administrator. A good administrator will not do that. He would find a way around to make everybody happy. Lagosians are not happy. They are being oppressed, dispossessed and intimidated. But when election is coming, they know how to threaten them.
If you don’t vote, you will lose your market stalls. For fears of the unknown, many people will succumb; they will get their votes and later descend on them. They didn’t collect toll on the Lekki expressway until after the election. Even Okada riders now pay toll. What is the value of Okada they are riding? Many things are wrong. Taxation is heavy. And where does the money go to? I leave the rest to posterity. You talked about judicial rascality. Can you say with confidence that the PDP will win the coming election in Ondo State? Ondo State has a different picture entirely. The leadership of Ondo State happens to be part and parcel of PDP. Mimiko was a bonafide member of PDP. It was the disagreement between him and the incumbent governor then that made him to change party.
We have left Ondo State the way it is for peace to reign. We know our son will eventually come back. One of us in Labour Party today will eventually return. There are insinuations here and there that the power at the centre is backing him (Mimiko). But the man still remains in the LP. Is this just a smoke screen? It is better to be in a good party and show good example than being in a bad party. If we are supporting him at all or we have sympathy for him, it is because he is part of us. Supporting him at the expense of your party? It is a mere show of inter personal relationship. He too shows concern for our party. There is a meeting point between Mimiko and PDP. I don’t want to say more than that. Perhaps, what you mean is that LP is an appendage of PDP. After the election, we will review the relationship. All I can assure you is that Ondo State is not going to ACN in this election, period. ACN cannot win in Ondo State no matter how they try. They even imposed a candidate which is already working against them.
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