Ahead of the March 18 Governorship/House of Assembly elections, Isaac Omodewu, the Chairman, All Progressives Congress in Oyo State, says members of five pro-Peoples Democratic Party groups have defected to the party.
Omodewu made this known on Monday in Ibadan, the Oyo State capital, while receiving the defectors to the party.
He said they had pledged their supports for the party’s governorship candidate, Senator Teslim Folarin.
The News Agency of Nigeria reports that the groups included: Omititun Youth Vanguard, led by Sanyaolu Adeyemo, and GSM Marines, coordinated by Yemi Oyebamiji.
Others were: All Youth Grand Alliance led by Isamotu Twins; IBK Vanguard of Ibukun Olu-Afolabi; and another group led by Afolami Afolabi.
Welcoming the defectors, Omodewu thanked them for taking the bold step by jumping out of the “sinking PDP boat” and also for identifying the APC as the right alternative.
He said” “Oyo APC is the Noah’s ark of our contemporary Nigeria and anyone who looks away from the broom party is doing himself a lot of harm than good.
“We have found that your respective groups are populated by more than 7,000 people and we are using this medium to encourage you to use your strength in favour of the APC come Saturday.”
Also at the event, the State APC Secretary, Alhaji Tajudeen Olanite, and Vice-Chairman (Oyo Central), Joshua Oyebamiji, welcome the defectors to the APC.
Olanite and Oyebamiji, in their separate remarks, urged the defectors to put the memory of whatever they went through in PDP behind them.
They urged them to focus their attention on massive mobilisation of the good people of the state to vote for APC candidates on March 18.
The duo promised them that all their desires would be met in the government of the broom party at the centre and in the state, if elected.
The leaders of the various groups mobilised their members to the APC Secretariat, where they were formally received.
Adeyemo, Oyebamiji, Olu-Afolabi and Afolabi expressed regret for supporting Seyi Makinde before, during and after the 2019 election when he emerged the Governor of the state.
Adeyemo said that the decision of his group’s members to defect to the APC was because they saw a better alternative in the party.
Oyebamiji said their decision to quit the PDP was because a better alternative existed in the APC, which has retained power at the centre.
According to Afolabi, APC is better positioned to dislodge the incumbent PDP government in the state from office through democratic means on March 18.
NAN reports that there have been intense horse trading between the PDP and APC recently in the state as the two major political parties engaged themselves in superiority battle.
The APC, which was favoured by the outcome of National Assembly elections in the state, had received scores of defectors from other political parties, as well as endorsements.
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