Segun Ayinde, Abeokuta
Newly elected Chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party in Ogun State, Hon. Abayomi Tella, on Saturday, called on aggrieved members and defectors to return to the party and build a new PDP in order to take over the reins of governance from the ruling All Progressive Congress in the state come 2027.
Tella equally urged the aggrieved members to stop patronizing courtrooms and enslaving themselves in the hands of APC, insisting that his new Executive would finalize plans on how to take over leadership from the ruling party in the forthcoming Nov.16 Local Government elections and the next general elections in the state.
He stated this shortly after emerging the new PDP State Chairman at the party’s 2024 State Congress held in Abeokuta, where over 2,500 delegates from the 20 Local Government Areas of the state voted under the supervision of 7-man delegate led by Mr Kabiru Jauro from the party’s Headquarters in Abuja and officials of the Independent National Electoral Commission.
The new party chairman, while appealing to aggrieved members and defectors to come back home, said that PDP under his watch would be rejuvenated, rebuilt, and repositioned to take over the seat of power in 2027, asking the defectors to emancipate themselves from the slavery of ruling APC.
He maintained that his executive-led leadership would restore the glory of the PDP as ruling party back in the state, expressing regrets that although the party had gone through various forms of internal crisis, judicial intervention, it was now fully ready to mend all fences and move forward to reclaim lost glory.
Tella asked members who defected to APC and other political parties in the state to recall the victories of PDP in 2003 and 2007, and come back to the party to eject the APC, which to him denied the people of the state benefits of democracy and plunged them into abject poverty, from the seat of power in 2027
He said, “It is disheartening to describe the Party as a tree that bears no fruit anymore. Many of the People who had benefited from the Party’s previous electoral victories are currently slaving in the APC, we are using this opportunity to request them to return to the base and join us in having a PDP that will be difficult to beat in 2027 and beyond.
“I must say that our true identity is not that of opposition but getting back to our heritage of a ruling party, is imminent and must happen at the next polls. We must inevitably ascribe the success of today’s congress to various eminent people who made themselves available to be instrumental to this God’s project.
“Ogun State PDP will be proudly rejuvenated, rebuilt, rejigged and repositioned for success in the coming polls by the grace of God. There is no doubt that the Party has gone through series of underserved trauma, various forms of unnecessary internal friction, judicial intervention in our domestic affairs and reckless media onslaught by supposed members of the Party.
“We will run a transparent and all-inclusive administration, raise the level of consultation and engagement with internal and external stakeholders of the Party, relate with other allied interest bodies within the Ogun State Political ecosystem and provide admirable leadership as leader of the opposition parties for the purpose of demanding good governance and accountability from the indolent APC government in Ogun State.”
Earlier, Jauro stated that the conduct of the party’s state congress went on peacefully amid tight security denied being aware of another parallel state congress of the party in the state.
“Anybody saying he’s holding a Congress, actually it is a kangaroo Congress and nobody will take it seriously. We are doing a legal one here. I don’t know anything about any parallel congress. If there is anything, maybe on their own, they don’t have the letter, if they have, they should show it to you, they don’t have the list of the delegates, we have all the ballot papers, everything,” he noted
