Ogun 2023: IPAC, PDP endorse Sowunmi for governorship race

By Kolawole Olayinka, Abeokut

Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and Inter-Party Advisory Committee (IPAC) have endorsed the spokesman of the Atiku Abubakar Campaign Organization in the 2019 presidential election, Segun Sowunmi for the Ogun State governorship race.

Sowunmi had earlier called for a stakeholders’ meeting with party members across the 20 local government areas of the state, but in solidarity, they all compelled him to contest the number one seat in the state.

The party chieftains and members in their thousands unanimously called on him to contest, saying it was time to wrestle power from the ruling All Progressives Congress.

According to them, Sowunmi is their best bet if the PDP will ever take back power from the APC.

About six political parties, representing IPAC, were present at the rally. The chairmen of the parties expressed their readiness to join hands with the PDP to wrestle power from APC, only if the party could field “someone as strong and deep rooted as Segun Sowunmi.”

Members of IPAC, led by the state Chairman, Samson Ogunsanya, therefore declared their support for Sowunmi at the rally held in Abeokuta.

He insisted that if the PDP is to make any appreciable impact in Ogun State, Sowunmi must be adopted as the governorship candidate of the party.

Ogunsanya described Sowunmi as a selfless politician with the capacity to deliver Ogun State from the misrule of the APC.

“As the umbrella body of the opposition parties in Ogun State, we are here to show our support for our brother, Segun Sowunmi. Sowunmi is a politician with an enviable track record. We believe that he has the capacity to deliver Ogun State from backwardness the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) has put the state in.

“We believe that with Sowunmi at the helms of affairs, Ogun State will witness tremendous progress, therefore, we urge all of you here to support him,” Ogunsanya said.

Also speaking, National Publicity Secretary of Labour Party (LP), Abayomi Arabambi, advised the national leadership of PDP, Oyo State Governor, Seyi Makinde and other stakeholders of the party to align with the governorship ambition of Sowunmi.

He commended Sowunmi for rescuing the PDP from those who had hijacked the party structure and stifling its growth in the state.

Sowunmi in his response, declared his ambition to contest the 2023 governorship election in the state.

He blamed the inability of the PDP to win the governorship seat in the past elections to the infighting in the party and urged all members to jettison their personal interest and work for the progress of the party.

Sowunmi said: “All our (PDP) efforts has not produced any result for some time and the main reason is the unnecessary infighting.

“All you have said concerning Segun Sowunmi to come and run for governor, I have heard and I heard clearly. I will definitely, most definitely and extremely definitely run for the governorship of Ogun State in 2023.

“I have spent the last 20 years or more in this political dispensation serving them, speaking for them, improving them, running for them and I have now realized that I’m the leader I have been searching for and I tell you again with every sense of responsibility that you have never seen governance at the level I intend to do it.

“The business of governance of cutting tape because of road is not what we are talking about here. Obafemi Awolowo’s vision for Yoruba nation has now come to be, improved, rewritten and expanded.”