The Labour Party on Thursday declared support for AbdulRahman Abdulrazaq, the candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC) for Saturday’s governorship election in Kwara state.
This is coming less than 24 hours after 34 political parties in the state adopted the APC gubernatorial candidate.
At a brief ceremony held at the Africa’s People hall of Mustapha Akanbi Foundation, Ilorin, labour leaders and scores of members of both Labour Party and APC embraced the development.
Speaking at the ceremony, Labour Party’s governorship candidate, Comrade Issa Aremu, said the event marked the beginning of liberation from one party which had ruled the state for 16 years.
“What we are saying is whether you believe in Otoge slogan of APC or Odopin (the end has come) of Labour Party, we must ensure that PDP did not win Saturday’s elections.
“This coming elections and last Saturday’s presidential and national assembly elections, are not only about winning; it is about liberation of our state from dictatorship of one person, one party,” he said.
Aremu while addressing the APC candidate said “Alhaji AbdulRahman, why I think we should align with you is for the greater interest of Kwara.
“Having campaigned vigorously to all the nooks and crannies of Kwara and nationally, since I made my declaration to run for governorship since July 2018, we lower our ambition for the greater interest of Kwara, and we will work our talk. As from now, I will go back to our people and explain this to them.
“Both Otoge and Odopin, are the same thing, we have decided that we are going to back the governorship of Alhaji AbdulRahman Abdulrazaq.”
Aremu urged Abdulrazaq to give priority to women during his administration.
Aremu who had earlier in the day commissioned a new toilet which he constructed for a girls’ secondary school in Eyen n korin, Ilorin decried the poor state of education in the state.
Responding, AbdulRasaq who expressed delight over the development described the marriage as coming together of progressive forces.
“It’s a great day today, the coming together of progressive forces; it marks the beginning of the end of a dynasty so to say,” he said.
The governorship hopeful assured the organised labour that his government will pay new minimum wage to workers.
He however declared that the new minimum wage regime in the state could only be possible if the organised labour cooperate with his government to address the issue of what he called “over bloated civil service”.
“On whether the N30,000 minimum wage is possible, I believe this state can afford it ,what is happening is that we have an over bloated civil service, we going to expunge them, we should be able to pay,” he said.
On education, he said his government will declare an emergency in the sector with a vow to fixing the infrastructure challenges in the sector.
“We intend to tackle this, we are going to declare an emergency in education sector and hold a summit,” he said.
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