BY MAYOWA SAMUEL
The Lagos State governorship candidate of the People’s Democratic Party, Abdul-Azeez Adediran, aka Jandor, has explained why he rejected the suggestion to form an alliance with his counterpart of the Labour Party, Gbadebo Rhodes-Vivour.
Speaking during a live television programme on Monday,, the PDP flagbearer said forming an alliance with his LP counterpart is “like sitting on a keg of gunpowder.”
Adediran said he refused to form an alliance with Rhodes-Vivour because he has a court case on his candidacy and also has an issue with Section 77 of the Electoral Act.
Adediran said the legal issue could come up in post-election litigation despite a move for an alliance to defeat the incumbent governor, Babajide Sanwo-Olu.
He said: “When talks of an alliance began flying around. We tabled the matter, even though Gbadebo and I haven’t sat together to discuss it.
“We came ourselves to look at the issue and say, ‘within us, what do we want to do? Do we want to put an end to a dynasty that has held us by the jugular for over two decades? Where do we go from here?
“We now discovered that the Labour Party candidate still has a case on his candidacy which is currently at the Supreme Court, we looked at it again that the Labour Party candidate also has an issue with Section 77 of the Electoral Act, which says if you’re leaving a particular party to another one, you must have been there, at least, for one month, that is, the party register would have been with INEC 30 days before that party primary.
“For us, we don’t have a problem, we would have said [to Rhodes-Vivour], ‘Go [on], let’s just take this [APC] government.
“But knowing full well who we’re dealing with; we know the kind of character we’re dealing with, we know what can happen – there’s no point sitting on a keg of gunpowder.
“So, for us, we want an alliance; we don’t have any issue with it. But we must put our best foot forward. We must make sure that we go into this election without any snag whatsoever.”
