July 08, (THEWILL) – If you’re still in a quandary on the chaotic descent of the Osun state chapter of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Mr Kola Olabisi, the spokesman for its chairman, Tajudeen Lawal, provided some clarity. In an article entitled, “The whys and wherefores of the bungled Adeleke’s free train ride during Eid-el-Kabir”, Mr Olabisi failed in his thoughtless agenda to cast the Adeleke administration as dreadful and incapable.
Echoing a repeated line of lies that defined him before and since losing power in the state, Mr Olabisi struggled so hard to sell one narrative – Adeleke is bad for Osun. True, it is never an easy experience to be booted out of power, however, it is a bad unrewarded strategy to be banking on sheer falsehood, as the only tool to gain the trust of the people shattered by the gross abuse and mismanagement of resources for 12 years of APC holding sway.
I will give it to Mr Olabisi, he is failing miserably in doing almost everything to hoodwink unsuspecting people into buying his misleading narrative about Osun. Apart from the fact his claims in the article in question are patently false, it showed how low the APC is willing to go in its desperation to create a false impression about the Adeleke administration in the mind of the people.
To understand this drift, you need to look at some of the issues raised in the article. Take, for instance, the issue of political violence, which Mr Olabisi tried so hard to tag around the neck of the PDP administration, even to the point of throwing up unfounded, alarmist statistics of deaths among APC supporters. The attacker is failingly assuming the garb of a victim.
Anyone who is familiar with Mr Olabisi’s antics, will not be so surprised about this latest campaign of falsehood. Since the APC lost power in Osun last year, it has become a habit for Mr Olabisi to knowingly cook up tales, just to paint the PDP administration bad, and more, a convenient excuse for the resounding rejection of the APC by the Osun people. He ends up on each occasion deepening the anger of the populace against the Olule group.
If it is not a tale of imaginary failings in governance, it is a concoction of an inexistent ‘record’ of victims of violence just to manipulate thoughts. All through the 2023 elections, the Osun people witnessed the crude faith that many PDP members suffered at the hands of the APC violence machinery. Unlike the APC, which only parades ‘records’ of non-existent victims, the PDP has verifiable names of casualties of the (APC) atrocious violence.
Rafiu Quadri Abiodun, from Ilosi, and Elijah Baba Ewe, from Ayinrin, are PDP members shot dead in the open by assailants believed to be APC thugs in Ilesa, in the buildup to the 2023 elections. Gbenga Femi, from Olorunsogo, was only fortunate to survive the brutal attack that was captured in a viral video, which could still be assessed on the internet, but the injury sustained will definitely be lifelong.
In Ife South local government, Wole, a vulcaniser by profession, was brutally murdered on the eve of the election. Like many other victims of APC acts of violence, his only crime was being a PDP member. The same faith was visited on Gani Gele, a PDP member in Ila local government, shot dead by an APC chieftain on election grounds. All of these are just a tip of the reign of terror that the APC wrought on the PDP, and by extension, the Osun people, in its desperation to tinkle with the choice of the people.
So, it is not just perplexing, but also mischievous for anyone to try to paint a different picture of the history of events we all witnessed. The Nazis’ propaganda maxim, “the more the lies, the better the believability”, no longer applies in modern-day communications. Chief Olabisi belongs to the old school and so cannot adopt the new age of verifiable data-driven communications. That is, quite simply, a big mistake on his part, to think he can tweak an event to present the villain as a victim and the victim as the aggressor.
And to the issue of the appointment of permanent secretaries, Mr Olabisi, just like in many other issues, pandered more to politics rather than rationality. The story of how former Governor, Gboyega Oyetola, rushed and bastardised the appointment of permanent secretaries after losing the election, is well known. So, it smacks of hypocrisy to suggest that they were ‘relegated’ because Governor Adeleke just wanted to do it. Again, the less-than-qualified hack writer takes Osun people for a fool. Osun today has a properly restructured public service with duly screened and meritoriously posted permanent secretaries.
In fact, what Governor Adeleke did was to save the state from the seed of bad precedent sowed by Oyetola, because credible information available was that the former governor bypassed most senior and qualified candidates in his choice of permanent secretaries. What that would mean, should it be allowed to stand, is colossal damage to the civil service, if not now, but in the future, if not for Governor Adeleke’s intervention.
Now, let us come to the issue of the suspension of free train rides for Eid-el-Kabir. To be sincere, I was expecting Mr Olabisi to offer a convincing argument to counter the explanation of the Government for not going ahead with the service, but as usual, it was all based on assumption, and worse, erroneous deductions.
Just like the government, the opposition is a serious business, but with what Mr Olabisi and most of the APC faithful have shown so far, I am afraid the party is failing in its new role, just as it failed while in government.
Let us not forget that the railway service, as of today, is the exclusive preserve of the federal government, and one wonders how Mr Olabisi and his party expect the state government to convey passengers on a broken track. The railway corporation informed the state of an accident along the Abeokuta-Lagos line and that it cannot provide the service.
What is the illogical publicist expecting the state to do, especially when the monopoly service provider has issued such notifications?
No matter how anyone may try to twist it, the reality of the Governor Adeleke-led administration is too refreshing for the Osun people. So, no amount of conjecture can change this fact. Let those who bleed Osun to almost death realise soon enough that their antics to mislead the public are failing. Osun people won’t be tricked to return to the dark days the APC represents.
I suggest my brother, Chief Olabisi, return to communications school, to learn new-age tactics. He is fast becoming worse than an inconsequential writer, due to his personification of everything false and detestable in political messaging.
*** Written by Sarafa Ibrahim, a Special Assistant to Governor Ademola Adeleke on Print Media. He writes from Osogbo, Osun State.
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