Bola Tinubu, a national leader of the All Progressives Congress, APC, has been told by women leaders of the party in Ondo State not to handpick a governorship candidate for the party.
A letter jointly signed by the women leaders on Monday, August 15, 2016, said that the preferred choice of Tinubu for the governorship in the state election was not popular.
The signatories of the letter, obtained by Punch, included Mrs. T. O. Oparinde, Ondo-Central senatorial district, Mrs. Adejoro Lydia, Ondo-North senatorial district, Mrs. E. Y. Akinlaja, Ondo-South senatorial district, among several others.
While affirming their loyalty to the leadership of Tinubu, the women leaders said that the preference of Dr. Segun Abraham by the national leader of the party would spell doom for the APC during the forthcoming poll.
Advising Tinubu to allow a free and fair governorship primary, the women leaders said handpicking a candidate for the party would destabilise the APC in Ondo State.
The letter, which was addressed to Tinubu, denounced the choice of one of the aspirants as the preferred aspirant out of the 25 vying for the governorship ticket of the party.
It said, “Recent rumour in Ondo State about your decision to back one of the aspirants has got us seriously worried. It would have been less worrisome if the particular aspirant has some measure of popularity that can be leveraged upon to win the governorship election.
“Unfortunately, the reverse is the case. The number of those of us that sign this letter shows that our opinion cuts across all the part of the state.”
While calling for an urgent stakeholders’ meeting, the women leaders blamed the turn of event in the countdown to the governorship primary on “some selfish leaders who go to Lagos to feed Asiwaju with lies.”
“We appeal that you urgently convey a stakeholders’ meeting and listen to the genuine views or the Ondo people and not some few selfish individuals that are disconnected from the practical political reality in Ondo by their own selfish agenda. You are the father of all, don’t let them narrow you to a selfish agenda that will make us fail again.”
