Lagos APC explains Oluwo’s resignation from Ambode’s cabinet

Agbaje flays LASSAA on destruction of billboards
Lagos State chapter of All Progressives Congress (APC) has said the resignation of erstwhile Commissioner for Energy and Mineral Resources, Mr. Olawale Oluwo, would not impact negatively on the party’s fortunes in next year’s election. The party therefore bided the former commissioner farewell.

In a statement, yesterday, the party’s Publicity Secretary, Mr. Joe Igbokwe declared: “The APC wishes him well, but as well salutes the vigilance of the party’s apparatus and leadership, which have put Oluwo on the watch on account of his antecedents in party politics and succeeded in checkmating his rabid opportunism.”

The party maintained that it is on record that Oluwo first made an attempt to reap from the challenges of its internal democracy “in our progressive movement, when he teamed up with one of the losers in the 2007 primaries of the Action Congress (AC) to stop former governor Babatunde Fashola’s sure victory at the polls. The unfortunate political adventurism failed.”

“However, in the conventional demonstration of mercy and forgiveness, Oluwo’s principal, Senator Tokunbo Afikuyomi was accommodated in the second term cabinet of Fashola as the Commissioner for Tourism.“A similar milk of mercy and kindness led to the consideration of Oluwo as a member of the Lagos State Executive Council under Governor Akinwunmi Ambode in the hope that he has purged himself of opportunism, disloyalty and vaulting desperation for power.

“Oluwo had hardly resumed as the commissioner, when he began his plot to use that office to advance his quest for political fiefdom. The object of his ambition was the positioning of his wife as the chairman of a local government. However, alert party men and women raised the alarm about his anti-party antecedents wondering why someone who recently joined the party would want to use his position as commissioner to impose his wife on the constituency.

“The party rank and file aborted this abuse of power and reckless peddling of influence and everybody thought the lesson had been learnt. He, apparently, had not,” Igbokwe stated.Lagos APC added that as soon as the procedures for the 2019 general election began, Oluwo once again became the only commissioner to recommend his wife to run as a member of House of Assembly for Eti- Osa.

“By now the pattern of his ambition had become clear,” he added. “The intrigue that enabled him to make his wife the first-term commissioner’s wife to become the chairperson of the committee, which organised the annual National Women Conference, became clear. It was meant to achieve undeserved visibility.

“This obnoxious attempt to deceive party members was again foiled and it is the aggravated frustration that has led to this defection. It has been necessary to put this in true context so as to dismiss the false and capricious insinuation that his resignation was in principled objection to the party’s last primaries. Far from it, he was only playing true to type, seeking as he had done in 2007 to reap from the primaries.

“He has further showed that he has been a mole of the PDP and has been working to undermine the APC. His exit is a signal to other like minds, which may wish to follow his trail.

“The party machinery knows everyone and their inclination. We encourage all genuine APC members to remain firm and committed to loftier and greater ideals of taking Lagos to a higher level of excellence. The party remains unshaken.”

Meanwhile, governorship candidate of Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in the state, Mr. Jimi Agbaje, has faulted claims by the Lagos State Signage and Advertisement Agency (LASSAA) that his campaign billboards were destroyed because he failed to secure permit to erect them.

Agbaje maintained that the agency’s claim to have destroyed his boards for not securing the supposed permit contradicts its decision to granting blanket ‘waivers’ for the display of political A-boards and posters.

According to him, “The advertising public knew that for billboards, certain sums were paid for LASSAA permit, which did not apply to lightweight temporary political materials like posters and A-boards.”Agbaje said the agency’s conduct reflected the impunity that Lagos needed to liberate itself from at the coming 2019 elections.