The last national and state elections in which Olusegun Osoba’s camp lost to Governor Ibikunle Amosun may have set the stage for retirement of former governor from Ogun State politics, Assistant Editor (South West), MUYIWA OLALEYE, writes.
There may be sense in the argument by many that the victory of Governor Ibikunle Amosun in the last governorship and House of Assembly elections in Ogun State may have laid to rest the tussle between him and his predecessor, Olusegun Osoba, over the control of the state’s politics.
Amosun secured his re-election on the platform of the All Progressives Congress (APC), while Osoba is the national leader of the Social Democratic Party (SDP). The latter was a prominent member of APC before breaking out with his loyalists to form SDP few months before the election.
With the outcome of the polls that obviously did not favour Osoba, there have been insinuations that the former governor may have been sent into early political retirement. This is especially as his party was unable to win the governorship election or any of the three senatorial seats, which his men controlled while they were in APC.
He also lost out in the state’s legislaure where his loyalists had been in the majority on account of the 2011 elections.
There is also the belief that the supremacy battle between the former governor and Amosun, which led to the former dumping APC and eventually hurting his political profile in the state, may also have affected his relationship with APC national leader, Bola Tinubu, who many believe supported Amosun during the fight.
The face-off, TheNiche gathered, has also severed him from other political leaders in the state, including traditional leaders and former President Olusegun Obasanjo, who believed that the former governor was not comfortable with the giant strides of Amosun’s administration, going by the way he mobilised some legislators in the state against the governor.
This particular action by Osoba, as well as his withdrawal of political support for Amosun’s government, was seen by indigenes of the state as amounting to bad faith.
The first problem Osoba had with Amosun was over the treatment of former governor’s loyalists by Amosun’s political group in the scheme of things in the state.
Incidentally, Amosun’s ascendancy to power in the state was believed to have had the backing of Osoba who was brought into the picture by Tinubu when the governor dumped the defunct All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP) to pitch tent with the then Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) on the platform he used to win his first term.
Even at that, Amosun, who had a strong political structure that controlled the defunct ANPP, moved into the Osoba-led ACN with a formidable structure to forge alliance with the former governor to displace Gbenga Daniel, the then governor.
The weight of the alliance was brought to bear in 2011, when Daniel, who tried to instal a successor that would be loyal to him after his exit from power, could not have his way.
Daniel’s impasse with Obasanjo also worked against his agenda.
Cracks, however, began to develop between Osoba and Amosun in the build-up to the local government election, when the two disagreed over the choice of candidates for both the council chairmanship and the councillorship seats.
Loyalists of Osoba who were the foundation members of the defunct ACN and who believed they were unfairly treated in the appointment of commissioners, special advisers and other officials of the government wanted to dominate the councils, while some of Amosun’s loyalists who believed that they have been with the governor since the days of ANPP angled for tickets of the party at the local government election.
With this, the battle between the two became an issue in the state, but at the end the positions were shared between them. Nine local government slots were given to Osoba, while Amosun got 11 slots. Even with the sharing formula, Osoba was not satisfied, especially as he wanted to have control over who gets what in the party. However, with the involvement of party leaders within and outside the state, the two leaders were able to sheathe their swords so as not to break up the party.
As the dispute continued, the party’s senators and House of Representatives members, who were purely Osoba’s loyalists, were also mobilised against Amosun. In their various constituencies, they rose in condemnation of Amosun’s government and his projects in a bid to rally the citizens of the state against him.
The senator representing Ogun East, Gbenga Kaka, who was Osoba’s deputy between 1999 and 2003, led his colleagues from the National Assembly to launch attack at Amosun – a move that eventually saw them dumping the party for SDP. They contested on the platform of the party, but lost woefully to the candidates of the APC at the 2015 general election.
In the House of Assembly, which was initially controlled by Osoba’s men, Amosun was able to win some of his loyalists to his side to neutralise his influence. One of the staunch Osoba loyalists who came into the Assembly through the support and goodwill of Osoba from Ado-Odo/Ota local government, Nurudeen Aina, shifted his loyalty to Amosun as the battle raged.
Remarkably, Amosun has indicated his readiness to work with the opposition parties in fixing the state. That, many see as a possible window for Osoba to re-integrate himself into the state’s politics.