Governor Abiola Ajimobi and the leadership of the All Progressives Congress, APC are losing sleep over their inability to agree on a possible running mate for the party’s governorship candidate, Oloye Adebayo Adelabu.
The governor, OYO INSIGHT gathered, is under pressure from his loyalists (SENACO) to pick one of them as deputy governorship aspirant for the 2019 election.
The party is expected to choose its deputy governorship candidate, possibly a Christian, from Okeogun. The people of the zone, with their ten local government areas, had agitated for power shift.
Top on the list of those who are on the governor’s neck are his wife, Mrs Florence Ajimobi and the ‘powerful’ Head of Service, Mrs Olawumi Ogunesan, who according to sources, told him to choose somebody who is going to be loyal to the SENACO camp.
As at the time of filing this report, the governor is in a meeting with major stakeholders within the party. To make it democratic, they are currently writing the names of their deputy governorship aspirant, after which the ‘results’ would be announced.
The running mate is expected to be named later today.
Muyiwa Gbadegesin: The Okeho-born neuroscientist was commissioner for health during the first term of the governor. A close associate of the national leader of APC, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, he was briefly a deputy chief of staff to Ajimobi before he went back to Lagos to oversee his business. His father, Prof. Segun Gbadegesin, who is a pro-democracy activist, is one of the opinion shapers from the zone.
Wale Okediran: Born in Iseyin, the former House of Representatives and Ife-trained medical doctor was a personal physician to late former governor Bola Ige. He has contributed immensely to the development of the state, especially with his Ebedi Writers Residency.
Ajiboye Omodewu: He has been commissioner since 2011 and has shown loyalty, in even trying times. The Otu-born politician, who returned from the United States of America, shortly before Ajimobi’s emergence, was one of the aspirants who jostled to succeed Ajimobi before he stepped aside.
Jacob Ogunmola: He was chairman of ATISBO local government during the first term of Ajimobi. He has a Ph.D.
