As different voices inside the party publicly repeated their viewpoints on the party’s structure and political direction ahead of the upcoming governorship race, new information regarding the leadership crisis afflicting the PDP’s Osun State chapter have surfaced.
The status of Sunday Bisi, the state chairman, who has denied allegations that he has been removed from office, is at the heart of the controversy.
The stakeholders’ forum’s announcement of his alleged expulsion, according to Bisi, was unconstitutional and ineffective.
Speaking to reporters on Thursday in Osogbo, Bisi insisted that his term as the state’s legitimate party chairman is still in effect.
The forum does not have the authority or mandate to alter or abolish the party’s elected structures. “I am still the chairman,” he declared.
He maintained that decisions impacting elected officials could only be made by the party’s duly formed institutions operating within the parameters of its constitution.
Bisi said that the Osun PDP had supported Governor Ademola Adeleke for reelection rather than putting forward a candidate for the August governorship election.
“The PDP has supported Governor Ademola Adeleke for reelection because it does not have a candidate for the August gubernatorial poll. That’s the reality,” he said.
According to Bisi, the majority of the state’s elected politicians are still PDP members, despite the party’s internal conflicts.
“The PDP still has our elected officials, with the exception of the governor and deputy governor. Since our party doesn’t have a candidate, we have endorsed Governor Adeleke,” he continued.
The chairman also reacted to statements ascribed to Prince Olagunsoye Oyinlola, the former governor, saying that they were at odds with the stance of what he called the Osun party’s mainstream structure.
Bisi declared, “The statement attributed to former Governor Olagunsoye Oyinlola is an open betrayal and a continuation of a failed 2022 plot to stop Governor Adeleke.”
He clarified that certain strategic moves had been prompted by the uncertainty surrounding the governor’s political future caused by internal PDP splits at the national level.
“Our governor’s candidacy was in danger because to the rift within the PDP national leadership. The governor made the correct decision by looking for a reelection platform. He said that Prince Oyinlola was the first to propose this idea.
Bisi maintained that the Osun party’s core leadership and membership base continued to support the decisions made by the state executive.
He declared, “The governor, our leadership, and our elected mandate as state officers are supported by the mainstream of the Osun PDP and cannot be truncated by any unelected, illegal, and unauthorized group.”
Prince Oyinlola had previously insisted that the PDP was still a strong political force in the state during a different stakeholders’ gathering in Osogbo, even though it was claimed that Governor Adeleke had defected to the Accord Party.
He said the purpose of the gathering was to explain the party’s national and state-level developments.
According to Oyinlola, “there have been some confusing narratives being pushed out about the status of PDP, especially in Osun State. What we made today is to narrate situations as they are to our members, so that the entire wards and local governments in Osun will know exactly where PDP stands today in Osun State.”
Oyinlola refuted claims that the state’s PDP apparatus had been dismantled to create the Accord Party in order to help Adeleke win reelection.
The PDP is a party with a presence in every corner of this nation. We won’t let it die in our own time,” he declared.
“We are holding on to PDP,” he said, adding that the party was still receptive to future developments. Our governor is welcome to return tomorrow to be with his family in the PDP, but for the time being, the PDP is firmly established in Osun State.
