The
Ondo State governor-elect, Chief Rotimi Akeredolu, on Wednesday, said he did
not acknowledge a national leader of the All Progressives Congress, Asiwaju
Bola Tinubu, in his victory speech on Sunday because it was not expedient to do
so.
He
said having acknowledged President Muhammadu Buhari, who is the recognised national
leader of the party, and the National Chairman, Chief John Odigie-Oyegun, it
was safe to infer that he had acknowledged all the party’s leaders.
Akeredolu
said this while answering State House correspondents’ questions shortly after
he and his deputy, Mr. Agboola Ajayi, met Buhari at the Presidential Villa,
Abuja.
They
were led to the meeting, which was their first after their victory, by the
Chairman of the All Progressives Congress Campaign Council in Ondo State,
Governor Simon Lalong.
The
governor-elect, who said the relationship between him and Tinubu was cordial,
explained that mentioning the name of the former Lagos State governor
specifically would have amounted to him mentioning the names of about 37 other
leaders of the party.
He
said, “On the names that were mentioned in my speech when expressing gratitude
and that I didn’t specifically thank Bola Ahmed Tinubu. I thanked the President
and the leader of our party profusely for the leadership which he showed
leading to this election.
“I
also thanked our indefatigable chairman for standing by the truth and for his
position on this matter that led to this election. I have no reason to do
otherwise.
“Party
structure, to the best of my knowledge, is very clear. You have the leadership
of the party and that is represented by Chief John Odigie-Oyegun.
“After
an election, a chief executive emerges, he becomes a leader of the party, you
don’t have to personalise and be looking for leaders all over the place.
“If
we have to do that, then I will have to mention 36 or 37 leaders. So, I believe
the leadership as represented by the President covers all leaders and that
tells me it would include Chief Bola Ahmed Tinubu, it would include even Baba
Akande, (Ogbonnaya) Onu, and so many leaders.
“But
President Buhari is the leader of the party. So, that is my position there.”
Akeredolu,
however, added that Tinubu remained one of the leaders of the party, noting
that he (Tinubu) had since sent congratulatory message to him after he won the
election.
“For
me, as a person, I believe he is one of the leaders of the party and I don’t
see any strained relationship between us. And you would observe that he has
sent in his congratulatory message after the election, so what else do you
expect?
“I
mean all of us see this as a victory for the APC, not for Akeredolu, not for us
an individual but for the party as a whole. I believe he is a member of the
party. Mr. Femi Adesina had issued a release but you journalists just want to
put words into our mouths,” he said.
Akeredolu
also said despite his decision not to probe the administration of the outgoing
governor, Olusegun Mimiko, he would not close his eyes if he stumbled upon
established cases of wrongdoing in the course of carrying out his
responsibilities as governor.
He
explained that what he said on the matter was that he would not deliberately go
out to probe Mimiko’s administration.
He
said, “At the centre, the government of President Buhari said we must look back
in order to move forward, he has been there for over a year now, has he
instituted a probe?
“Looking
back is not a probe and I maintain that I will not probe any administration.
This is responsible leadership and I am elected to lead the people.
“The
task ahead of us is enormous than for us to start instituting probes. My own is
not to institute any probe against the last administration and that is what
President Buhari has done.
“But
if we find out that wrongs were committed, we have enough laws of the land to
take care of people who have committed wrongs.
“As
we start our work, as we go ahead, if there is any semblance of ‘Dasukigate’ in
the state, the law will take its course. That is different from probing. We
will follow what Mr. President is doing at the centre.”
The
governor-elect also promised to implement his manifesto in line with the
reality on the ground.
That,
he said, did not mean that he would not deliver on all the five cardinal
programmes he promised the people.
On
Senator Yele Omogunwa who left the PDP for the APC, Akeredolu said the lawmaker
had joined his campaign trail and that he only formalised his defection on the
Senate floor on Wednesday.
He
said it would have been wrong for the lawmaker to remain in a factionalised
party like the PDP.
Lalong
had earlier said that he was in the Presidential Villa to present the
governor-elect and his deputy to the President.
He
said he would also be visiting the national headquarters of the APC to do the
same thing to party leaders.
The
governor-elect again said the APC was not responsible for the confusion over
the candidacy of the PDP ahead of the election.
He
said, “It was not the APC that went to court neither was it the APC that gave
the judgment, all we saw was friction or conflict between the PDP and the PDP.
“If
that judgment was going to help the APC, so be it. But we were not parties to
the case for somebody to even assume that the APC was responsible for denying
somebody.
“The
APC is not the court; the court is a separate arm. I am saying that as far as we
are concerned, the APC was not responsible for denying anybody the right to
contest that election.”
Tags
Politics