Oyo PDP splits further over South West Zonal Chairman’s vote of no confidence

The Oyo state chapter of the Peoples Democratic Party was on Tuesday further polarised as a faction disagreed with Monday’s vote of no confidence passed on the party’s South West Zonal Chairman, Dr. Eddy Olafeso, by the Alhaji Kunmi Mustafa-led state executive.
Mustafa, believed to be loyal to the party’s leader in the state, Senator Rashidi Ladoja, had told journalists that the Zonal Chairman was unduly supporting proponents of harmonization plot to destabilise the PDP in the state.
But a former Deputy Senate Chief Whip, Hosea Ayoola Agboola, flanked by a former Deputy Governor in the state, Alhaji Azeem Gbolarumi; a former Speaker of the State House of Assembly, Moruf Atilola; and a host of other loyalists of a PDP governorship aspirant, Seyi Makinde, told journalists that the panacea to a united PDP was for the Ladoja group to embrace the said harmonization in the spirit of oneness and progress.
Agboola affirmed the confidence of the faction in Oyefeso and the harmonisation of the state executives, stressing that the former Chairman of the caretaker committee of the party, Senator Ahmed Makarfi, was aware of the effort and had assented to it.
The former Senate Chief Whip said: “It is a notorious fact that the press conference purportedly held and addressed by Mustafa was filled with half truths, outright misrepresentation and wishful thinking. It is unfortunate that this factional group would wish away the harmonisation of the Oyo State executives which was in the first place the template submitted for the resolution of the congresses which were separately held in Ibadan last year, and which was subsequently acceded to at a meeting jointly attended by leaders of both factions at the party’s headquarters in Abuja on Tuesday February 20, 2018.
“Accusing the Zonal Chairman of South-West, Olafeso, of connivance and passing a vote of no confidence on him is as strange as it is unfair. It would appear that they are merely looking for a scape goat. With all the emphasis at our disposal and the unity of purpose as exhibited by the Abuja declaration, we hereby pass a vote of confidence on the Oyefeso and admonish him to continue with his good work. We also rebuke the Kunmi Mustapha-faction for openly criticising the national body for performing its legitimate function.”
Agboola added that it would be counter-productive to the aspiration of the party to reclaim the state in 2019 if old wound of the PDP had to be revisited, especially after the issues leading to the holding of parallel congresses had been resolved.