Fellow progressives, comrades, loyalists across all 20 local governments of Ogun State, hear me clearly:
This is not a moment for whispers. This is the moment for war cries. The soul of our party is bleeding, and the men responsible are not outsiders. They are within.
What is happening today in Ogun State APC is nothing short of institutional mutilation. The sacred pillars on which this party was built, equity, justice, fairness, democratic participation, and grassroots respect, are being bulldozed in broad daylight. And the bulldozer wears a party card.
Faithful members who bled for this party, who mobilised, who sacrificed, who delivered votes when it mattered most, are today being treated as spectators in their own house. They are ignored. They are sidelined. They are replaced by a manufactured crowd of “consensus” builders who carry neither credibility nor grassroots legitimacy.
Let the truth be stated without apology: imposition is fraud. It does not matter how many endorsement meetings are staged, how many chairs are arranged, or how many hands are raised by invitation. A consensus that does not emerge from the genuine will of party members is a lie dressed in party colours. And lies do not win elections. They destroy parties.
Our party has never been this fractured. Not in recent memory. Members are leaving. Foot soldiers are demoralized. Wards are restless. And yet, some people at the top continue to act as though loyalty can be purchased at N5,000 per head and delivered in Ghana-must-go bags.
It cannot.
When you hollow out a party’s internal democracy, you hollow out its fighting capacity. A party that substitutes popular acceptance with orchestrated rubber-stamping is a party that is engineering its own collapse. And collapse does not announce itself. It arrives quietly, on election day, when the people who were disrespected stay home.
Now, my direct charge to every card-carrying member is to go to those primaries. Do not be intimidated. Do not be bought. Do not be absent.
Vote your conscience. Vote competence. Vote integrity. Vote the candidate who commands genuine popularity across all local governments, who can unite the party after the primaries, who has real electoral strength and a track record that can withstand scrutiny on any campaign platform.
This is not about faction warfare. This is about the survival of progressivism as a credible political force in Ogun State. It is a fight to reclaim what our party once stood for, and must stand for again.
To my people in Ogun East, I speak with the weight of history on my tongue.
I am an Ijebu man. And it is precisely because I am Ijebu man that I will not be silent.
The same dangerous error that crippled the Ijebu State agitation is repeating itself today. Our forebears, despite their vision, allowed personal ambition, stomach politics, and individual self-interest to fracture what should have been collective power. That fracture cost our region enormously. Ijebu and Remo, which should be one formidable bloc, ended up as rivals exploited by those who understood that a divided people is an easily conquered people.
Today, that script is being replayed. Some of our own people, driven by personal gain and stomach infrastructure, are being deployed against our collective interest. They are being used to deliver us into the hands of a man who needs this seat not to serve Ogun East, but to shield himself from the consequences of eight years of governance that left this region visibly behind.
Think clearly. Eight years as governor. What did Ogun East receive? Count the roads. Count the projects. Count the dividends. Then ask yourself why a man who overlooked you in power is now begging for your vote.
The answer is not altruism. The answer is self-preservation.
Hear me well, we children of Ijebu! Be vigilant, let us not allow one man’s greed to destroy our collective opportunity. He who seeks to use our identity as a personal shield does not deserve to represent us. Let our unity be iron-strong. Ijebu and Remo, stand together! Let them not deceive us again.
Across all 20 local governments of this state, from Ifo to Imeko-Afon, from Ijebu-Ode to Yewa South, the same message holds: the primary ballot is your most powerful weapon. It cannot be taken from you if you show up. It cannot be rigged if you are present. It cannot be manipulated if your conscience is made up before you walk through that gate.
Stand together. Not as factions. Not as zones. As one progressive family with one mission: to restore integrity, restore internal democracy, and restore the winning tradition of a party that was built on the people’s trust.
The hour is now. The decision is yours. Make it count.
By General Olumuyiwa Okunowo (Rtd)
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