The Oodua Renaissance Movement (ORM) has warned the All Progressive Congress (APC) leadership in Lagos to curb the lingering manipulation of a section of the party to force candidates on the people.
The group, in a statement signed by its Director of Publicity, Nelson Ikusagba accused the Ajomale led exco in the state of favouritism and gross bent towards the dictates of James Faleke, a member of the House of Representative, from the Ikeja constituency.
Congresses in recent time to present candidates for the forthcoming elections have been marred with crisis, the recent being the one held in Badagry which was thwarted by aggrieved members who saw traces of intended manipulation by the Faleke group to flaw primary elections and impose their favoured candidates..
According to ikusagba, “the recent development is a canker-worm that could lead to the depletion of the hard earned democracy in the country and Lagos State in particular.
“We are unbiased, but absolutely uncomfortable with the recent trend where the only perceived opposition party is depleting into the abyss of irrelevance and democratic recklessness.”
The group which said it has conducted a research to prove the unpopularity of James Faleke in his Ikeja constituency advised the party leaderships to beam searchlight on happenings in the preliminary warm up for the elections, and come out with foolproof candidates acceptable to the people.
“The democracy we have in Nigeria today is at variance with what we shed our bloods to attain. People who are alien to the struggle are holding sway while the genuinely concerned are now mere underdogs. We say unequivocally that Faleke should be withdrawn for other credible Lagosians to hold sway.”
Faleke who was once the Ojodu Local Government Chairman was accused of amassing wealth to himself to the detriment of the development of his constituency and has been using same tactic to cow his people.
The youth wing of the party rose in a, meeting chaired by Jacob Erinfolami with a resolution that they may pull out of the party’s political fortune if urgent and drastic measure was not taken to ameliorate the lingering trend.
“As a group that is genuinely concerned about the political situation in the country, we feel we would be culpable and guilty if this trend should be allowed to sail unperturbed, Faleke is a Nigerian just like all of us, our agitation is that he should be nominated by popular vote and not through the back-door as the Ajomale led exco is bent to do.”
Reckless brigandage and use of dangerous weapon has characterized the congress meetings of the APC in Lagos State even as the party leadership has been coming up with lists of candidates that are not supported by the grassroots.
