Open letter to Mr President on APC crisis in Osun

Your Excellency,

First, I wish to express deep appreciation for the outstanding leadership you are providing, not only for our great country, but also for our durable and vibrant party, the All Progressives Congress (APC), in the midst of a multitude of seemingly daunting challenges.

However, Mr President, in imposing perspectives to the challenges confronting us today, I wish to respectfully draw your attention to the worsening crisis in our party, APC, the ruling party in Osun State, which is my state of origin. Let me affirm that I am a loyal and dedicated member of the party and a deeply concerned stakeholder in its affairs.

It is, therefore, incumbent upon me to point out that the unhealthy rivalry playing out between two leading stakeholders in the state, if not quickly addressed through amicable resolution, will have a negative impact on the party and the state.

It is for this reason, Your Excellency, that I passionately appeal for your most urgent and profound intervention in the very disturbing dispute between the immediate past governor, Rauf Aregbesola, and his successor, Governor Gboyega Oyetola. These two distinguished and highly respected leaders of our party have been squabbling for some time now. So now is the time to step in and bring lasting peace as the pre-eminent leader of the party and father of the nation.

Your urgent intervention is imperative, Mr President, in view of the Osun State gubernatorial election scheduled for July 16, 2022. Time is not on our side, sir.

Remember, Mr President, that Osun State is naturally a progressive state like its counterparts in the South West. But the state is unique in the sense that it is the only state in the zone won by the defunct Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) in the 2011 presidential election.

To that extent sir, we cannot afford to toy with such a state which people so much cherish progressive politics, that they cannot contemplate embracing retrograde conservatives in government. That the opposition is already warming up to exploit the disunity in our party to supplant us and install themselves in power in the July election is no longer in doubt. Mr President, sir, you must not allow this to happen.

If we allow the crisis to fester, the supporters of our leaders will turn against one another, as they are already doing, and destruction of lives and property will intensify in the state. Fathers are turning against mothers, brothers against brothers, sisters against sisters and friends against friends, and no one can predict where the cycle of violence will end. And much worse, should it persist, the opposition will take over Osun and the remarkable achievements of Aregbesola as governor and the consolidation of those achievements by Oyetola will be reversed.

Mr President, this is the predictable outcome of not acting now, sir. As our leader and our father, I beg you in the name of Almighty Allah to please act now by calling the two leaders to a table and resolving the quarrel once and for all.

Thankfully, neither Aregbesola nor Oyetola, has said he is leaving the party. So, that makes the task of reconciliation a warm possibility.

I thank you immensely, sir, and look forward to your earnest intervention in the Osun APC crisis.

I am your loyal compatriot.

Taiwo Adebowale (Jante) [email protected]