BY TIMOTHY AGBOR, OSOGBO
The Chairman-elect of the mainstream All Progressives Congress in Osun State, Gboyega Famodun, on Saturday flayed a former governor of the state and incumbent Minister of Interior, Rauf Aregbesola, for publicly confirming his membership of a faction of the party opposed to the incumbent governor, Gboyega Oyetola.
Aregbesola, had during the inauguration of a Digital Nigeria Centre (DNC) at the Muslim Grammar School, Ilesa on Friday, admitted that the party has broken into two factions adding that he belongs to The Osun Progressives, a caucus that birthed a faction chaired by Rasaq Salinsile.
Famodun, in a statement he personally signed, expressed displeasure over the remarks of the minister, saying that his conduct in that regard was “far below the expectation of the right-thinking members of the society.”
He said, “It was unfortunate that Aregbesola who was the immediate-past governor of the state could champion subversive activities against the political party that has transformed his life from that of obscurity to limelight through prestigious offices as a Commissioner in Lagos State, two-terms governor of Osun State and a serving minister of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
“The intra-APC opposition group, called TOP, which meets every Thursday in the Campaign Office of the Interior Minister in Osogbo has become a venue where barrage of insults are heaped on the person of Governor Gboyega Oyetola, the state leadership of the APC and the state government by the leadership of the said TOP.
“This disgruntled set of the APC members are peopled by members of the cabinet of Aregbesola during his two terms of the governor of the state who are now protesting their not being appointed by Governor Oyetola for the third term,” Famodun said.
The APC chairman-elect, who is loyal to Oyetola, told Aregbesola “to perish the thought and notion of being the Alpha and Omega of Osun State progressive politics,” reminding him that he is only grandstanding in the glory of the past.
He said, “Osun APC is too strong for Aregbesola to break. His recent statement in Ilesa reduces his status as a former governor and as a serving minister of a party he claimed to belong.
“Aregbesola is an arrogant, selfish, self-centered, reckless, wicked and inconsiderate politician who wants the whole world to be his possession. It is not an overstatement to categorise Aregbesola as someone who prefers to rule in hell than to serve in paradise.
“Aregbesola should be told that there is no amount of intrigues by him that is capable of bungling the second term ambition of Governor Oyetola as it has divine guidance and pathfinder which makes him (the governor) unstoppable by any mortal.”
