BY OLADIMEJI ABITOGUN
Anybody familiar with the politics of Ondo State will not be taken aback at the hullabaloo spurned by the activities of Lagos-based mogul, Jimoh Ibrahim.
Really, never has a political party been rattled by an outsider pretending to be a member of the PDP, in this fashion. But a detour to historical analysis will help put things in perspective. Between February and March this year when Ali Modu Sheriff took over as the national chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party, there was an aggressive drive by his leadership to re-register members across the country. The party’s offices all over the country opened all day’s long, re-registering members with a view to re-validating the membership strength of the party.
Jimoh Ibrahim, who then had started nursing the ambition of becoming the governor of Ondo State reportedly asked his loyalists at Igbotako, his hometown to await him as he intended to make a fanfare out of the re-registration exercise.
But alas, those awaiting Jimoh’s arrival only waited in vain as he failed to turn up. The implication was that Jimoh failed to re-register as a member of the PDP. That also, lent credence to the fact that this maverick businessman has been working with the opposition against his party, the PDP.
The common argument that Jimoh Ibrahim is not a member of the PDP, to wit, cannot be controverted because he himself declared that he had defected to the Accord Party. In an interview Jimoh granted an Akure-based magazine, TRACE, dated June 19, this year, Jimoh explained why he left PDP and also declared how he intended to build his new-found party, Accord.
But while he was in his Accord party, the leadership contest between Sheriff and the PDP new chairman Ahmed Markarfi broke out. Sheriff’s interim leadership was dissolved and a caretaker committee headed by Makarfi took over. This afterwards led to a legal contest as Sheriff claimed that he remained the party chairman.
Latching in on this face-off, Jimoh quickly abandoned his Accord party and gathered some disgruntled elements within the PDP together, who filed a suit against the PDP leadership that they are from the Sheriff group and as such should be declared as the authentic PDP in the South-West.
The battle was thus taken to the home front in which the party chairman in the state and his executive members are now being told by Jimoh and his cronies that they are no longer the authentic leaders.
Tut, is it not curious enough to know that Biyi Poroye, the self-acclaimed PDP chairman nominated Banji Okunomo as the Publicity Secretary of the PDP in the state? Yet, he is claiming that the same executive arm that he joined in forming is no longer authentic. How Poroye then became the PDP party chairman in Ondo State can only be deciphered by him and his cronies.
Again, in the suit filed before Justice Abang of the Federal High Court Abuja, Poroye and co only claimed legitimacy to the nomination of candidates for offices in the 2019 general elections. No mention was made of the August 2016 primary election that produced Eyitayo Jegede (SAN) as the governorship candidate of the PDP in Ondo State. It is therefore strange to common sense that a court would give the Jimoh band what they did not pray for. They did not pray for the substitution of Jegede’s name with Jimoh’s and one wonders why the truth should be stood on the head.
But what is clear from the foregoing, is that the whole theatre of the absurd had been deliberately planned from Day 1. So the recent pervasion of justice in favour of Jimoh Ibrahim is a calibration from an orchestrated attempt to dislodge the PDP, especially from the South-West, knowing that it is the party to beat in the 2019 presidential election.
Those planning all these problems actually saw a good Man Friday in Jimoh Ibrahim, as the latter would always make himself available to do the bidding of the highest bidder.
A scenario in 2003 suffices. When now President Muhammadu Buhari came to Ondo State in 2003, Jimoh Ibrahim was offended that Buhari chose to put up with General Olu Bajowa (rtd) as against himself, Jimoh. Bellicose in wrath, Jimoh went to leak it to then President Olusegun Obasanjo that Bajowa harboured Buhari in his house, knowing the frosty relationship between the two personalities at the period. Luckily for Bajowa, someone from Aso Rock hinted him that Obasanjo was not happy with him and that his life was in danger. Shell-shocked, Bajowa quickly fled the country and did not return until two years after.
Buhari too heard of the Judas role played by Jimoh and so was not happy with him. That’s why Jimoh has been doing all he can ever since, to please Buhari in whichever way. And already, he has forces to work with.
Some forces like the Kaduna State governor, Nasiru el-Rufai, Works Minister, Babatunde Fashola, and his Mineral Resources counterpart, Kayode Fayemi, are all planning ahead of 2019. They are gung-ho in devising various methods to get rid of the PDP, especially from Ondo State, knowing that Ondo, from history, is Nigeria’s political launch pad for sundry articulations. Already, the All Progressives Congress government has failed woefully, having reneged on virtually all its pre-election promises.
Now, they are seeking redemption through the backdoor, and to get redeemed, they have to destroy the PDP.
But as the Lord liveth, they will all fail.
*Chief Abitogun, publisher of sharpedgenews.com, is the Odopetu of Aiyede-Ogbese, Ondo State