Trouble For Fayose As APC Plans To Capture Ekiti State 

CYRIACUS IZUEKWE

All appeared set for the ruling political party in Nigeria, All Progressives Congress, APC, to win the Ekiti State Governorship seat in the election slated to come up on 14th July, 2018, after their painful lost to PDP four years ago in the election that brought in Gov Peter Ayodele Fayose.

The party seemed to be putting its acts together and really strategising after the conclusion of its tasking primary election which finally produced Dr. John Fayemi as the party’s candidate for the election.

P.M.EXPRESS scooped that both the Presidency and the South West leaders caucus of the Party led by Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, Chief Bisi Akande, state governors and other top leaders were all interested in winning the election in order to return Ekiti State to the progressives family.

President Muhammadu Buhari has also shown interest in the Ekiti gubernatorial election because it will boast his reelection bid in 2019, as winning the state will enhance his chances of winning the presidential election by getting block votes from the South West zone comprising of six states.

The South West leaders were said to be very much in agreement among themselves in winning the election, because they felt that the PDP robbed them of the state going by the revelation which later came to open up on what actually happened during the last election that ushered in Fayose. Apart from that, the leaders were said to strongly believe that the victory will also enhance the South West block for bargaining for positions within the APC as the ruling party.

A popular chieftain of APC in the South West told P.M.EXPRESS that the leaders have common interest to win the state back and that had made them to decide to be neutral in the primary election and agreed to work with any candidate that emerged after the primary election.

The source said that after Fayemi won the primary last week, he did not waste time in reaching out to all the candidates that contested with him and they have all agreed to work with him to win the election. The success of the meeting and agreement was said to have been seriously encouraged by the leaders of the party in the South West.

P.M.EXPRESS gathered that at the National party level led by the chairman, Chief John Oyegun and the Presidency led by the leader of the party, President Buhari, it was the same commitment to win the state.

The decision of the party became more open when the South West caucus visited and was hosted for a dinner by  President Buhari on Wednesday at the Aso Rock villa in the Federal Capital, Abuja. The dinner was well attended by the almost all contestants in the primary election, South West leaders and top national leaders of the party.

It was in that meeting that Buhari stated his mind clearly and urged the South West leaders to work together to win the election and assured them that he was ready to support them. President Buhari said that he fairly knew Ekiti people for their strong values, forthrightness and integrity and noted that those values had slipped away in the administration of Fayose and they must work together to restore those values back to Ekiti people.

P.M.EXPRESS gathered that after the APC primary election, Governor Fayose had boasted that he will still beat Kayode Fayemi like he did before. However, the manner the APC as a party were strategising and working as a team have really unsettled Gov. Fayose and his party in the state.

A source said that the declaration by the Presidency that the party should work as a team to win the election and the open support by Buhari had send signals to PDP that APC might use the federal  might to win the election.

Fayose had already alerted the public that APC and INEC were planning to rig the Ekiti Governorship election. It was gathered that during Jonathan’s administration, such scenario played out when the opposition were said to have been muscled out and the election was alleged to have been manipulated in favour of PDP.

It was gathered that the PDP chieftains in the state were rattled because they had hoped that there will be crisis in APC and that the candidates who participated in the APC primary election will work against the winner in favour of PDP.
However, it did not happen as the APC caucus quickly intervened and directed the aggrieved candidates to accept the result of the primary election. It was not yet certain how the APC will win the election when the popularity of Fayose in the state was considered.

But some of the indigenes posited that though Fayose was popular in the state, that he was not the PDP candidate for the election. It was not yet confirmed if the APC was planning to use the federal power to capture the state.