OPC warns Tinubu As dismissed members enlist APC National leader to remove Gani Adams
Aderounmu Ajayi
The Oodua People’s Congress, OPC has advised the National leader of the All Progressives Congress, APC, and former Governor of Lagos State, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu to stay clear of some dismissed members of the organisation. OPC stated this in a statement signed by its Publicity Secretary, Yinka Oguntimehin, and made available to NigerianEcho. OPC noted that it has uncovered plans by some persons, who were expelled from its fold some years back, to enlist Tinubu in their desperate bid to oust Otunba Gani Adams as the President/National Coordinator of OPC.
The dismissed members of the group , which include : Rasak Balogun alias Sadam , Monsuru Akande , Musiliu Amusa alias Big Fish , Adesina Akinpelu , Olayiwola Ogunsolu , Lateef Ogungbayi , Gbenga Egunlusi , Ranti Akande , Lateef Olawale Oshodi , Soji Folorunsho , Segun Olusanya Idowu Akintunde Sunday Bankole Kehinde Ogunyale and Sunday Adebayo had written a letter to the former Lagos State governor , seeking his support and blessing to remove or get rid of Otunba Gani Adams as the President of OPC.
In the said letter which was obtained by NigerianEcho, the leader of OPC, Otunba Gani Adams, was accused by this group of former members of the organisation of “continued misrule”.
Their letter reads in parts:
“… we are glad to present ourselves to you once again. We are members of Oodua People’s Congress (OPC) opposed to the continued misrule of Gani Adams. Among his sins is the manner in which he be mismanaged funds of our organisation as well as the ungodly role he played during the last general elections held in March 2015 which portrayed him in his true colour as a traitor, turncoat, reactionary and extremely unreliable.”
They expressed their inability to remove Adams and requested in their letter to Tinubu that they needed the support of the former Governor to achieve this.
“However, we are bent on removing Gani Adams as the National President of OPC but we are in dire need of your support and that of other well meaning and revolutionary Yoruba leaders to achieve this aim…..”
Oguntimehin in the statement confirmed that the names, hand writing and signatures on the letter which was written to Tinubu tally perfectly with the information available in the archives of OPC. He added that these people had earlier planned to assassinate Otunba Gani Adams but the plot was exposed some months back.
“This latest evil scheme of these disgruntled elements is coming on the heels of their earlier plans to assassinate Otunba Gani Adams which we exposed some months back. They have also mounted a campaign of calumny and malicious falsehood to malign the person of the national coordinator on print and electronic media all to no avail.
“In their letter to the former Lagos State Governor, a copy of which was brought to our notice by a good Samaritan , the dismissed group regarded themselves as “The Ten Million Boys Strike Force “ – an appellation for their crude conduct. They are so desperate to enlist Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu to get the support of the former governor and enlist some Yoruba leaders to create crisis in the OPC.
“The National Coordinating Council of the OPC hereby reiterate its unequivocal support to the leadership of Otunba Gani Adams and it urges members of the general public to disregard members of the group , who are lawless and only interested in creating chaos in the society. The illegal and criminal conduct of these dismissed elements is no longer fashionable and not in tandem with the current aspirations of the repackaged OPC led by Otunba Gani Adams which has given birth to five different organizations, saddled with different noble responsibilities that are useful to the society both nationally and internationally.
“These organizations are Olokun Festival Foundation ,saddled with the promotion of Yoruba culture and tradition with seventeen festivals annuall, Oodua Progressives Union which is a platform for promoting unity and sustaining Yoruba identity all over the world and is presently in fifty eight countries of the world , Gani Adams Foundation which was established in 2003 for philanthropy and has touched many lives in Nigeria beyond the confines of Yoruba people , Oodua Economic Empowerment Initiative which was established to provide economic empowerment for Nigerians generally , Oodua Research Center which was established for a proper documentation of Yoruba heroes, communities and information that would be useful for our generation and successors.
In view of the laudable achievements of Otunba Gani Adams, it is unreasonable for the dismissed members of OPC who were expelled on account of their illegalities to be bent on seeking the support of the former Lagos State governor in order to remove or get rid of him at all costs”, Oguntimehin added.
On the decision of the group to support the re-election bid of the former President, Dr. Goodluck Jonathan, Oguntimehin made it clear that it was a collective decision of the highest organ of the organisation and not that of Adams alone.
“This is not an indictment on the former Governor of Lagos State in any way but to let the whole world know the desperation of the dismissed fifteen members and their mission to return OPC to the era of blood shedding that was laid to rest with the intervention of Late Ooni of Ife; Oba Okunade Sijuade in October, 1999 and finally by Otunba Gbenga Daniels in March, 2005. It is also to alert the former Governor of the fact that the group is using his name to breach the public peace”, the statement concluded.
