Victor Ogunje in Ado Ekiti
A coalition of youth groups under the aegis of Ekiti South Agenda Youth Movement (EKSAYM) has urged the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) and the All Progressives Congress (APC) to concede the 2022 governorship ticket to candidates from the senatorial district.
The coalition, also, warned the two dominant political parties against treating the people of the senatorial district as inferior citizens in the 2022 governorship contest.
This was contained in a statement by the Coordinator of the coalition, Mr. Ayodele Oguntuase, calling the leaders of the political parties to concede their tickets to Ekiti South.
Oguntuase, a legal practitioner, warned that the people of Ekiti South “are not inferior to their counterparts in Ekiti Central and North. Time is ripe for the district to produce the next governor of the state.”
He traced the state’s history of democratic development since its creation on October 1, 1996, noting that the north and the central “have consistently dominated the political hemisphere of the state.
On this ground, according to him, the dominant political parties in Ekiti should cede their tickets to Ekiti South in 2022, in the spirit of equity, fairness and justice among Ekiti people.
As indicated in his statement, Oguntuase said: “In 1999, at the inception of democratic government in Ekiti, Otunba Niyi Adebayo was elected from Ekiti Central. His successor, Mr Ayodele Fayose, who ruled Ekiti twice, is also from Ekiti Central, making 12 years.
“Chief Segun Oni, who succeeded Fayose as a democratically elected governor, is from Ekiti North. He ruled the state for three and half years while the incumbent, Dr Kayode Fayemi, who hails also from Ekiti North took over from him, through judicial pronouncement and he is spending his second term.
“By 2022, North would have ruled the state for eleven and half years, while the South is kept at bay. This is not the best way to build an egalitarian society as no society built on inequality of opportunities can develop, it is going to be crisis-ridden.
“It is our firm belief that what is politically good for Ekiti North and Central Senatorial Districts, is also good and befitting to Ekiti South. Ekiti South is overripe, even overdue to produce the governor and the most auspicious time is 2022,” he said.
Oguntuase explained that the senatorial district “has eminently qualified and highly exposed scholars with global respect and reckoning that can be elected as governor and make Ekiti proud with good governance.”
He said the senatorial district would not take flimsy excuses from any political party, groups or individuals with a penchant for playing on people’s intelligence and emotion with a pretentious claim that Ekiti is one and should not be allowed to be ripped off by ambition.
He said: “In 2007, all our elders across parties supported zoning of the governorship ticket to Ekiti North. This was the statistics that favoured Fayemi and Oni in the defunct Action Congress and the PDP respectively.
“We are not cowards and the time to fight for our rights is now. We are more than capable and worthy to produce the next governor and this agitation (Ekiti South Agenda) is not negotiable.”
