Adebayo Shittu

Further to the recent newspaper announcement of the ministerial list where Barrister Adebayo Shittu from Saki West Local Government Area of the Oke Ogun Area of Oyo State was listed as the Oyo State nominee, the Oke Ogun APC Youth Vanguards, made up of professional youths from Barrister Shittu’s Constituency, protested his nomination. In a protest letter the group sent to President Muhammadu Buhari which was signed by the group’s president, Abdulraman Oyefeso and Secretary, Moses Adeola, it listed its reasons:

Barrister Shittu, according to the group, has little or no electoral value in Oyo State, a fact that came to light when all he could garner as the CPC Gubernatorial candidate in the 2011 gubernatorial elections was a paltry 2,000 votes in the whole of Oyo State.

Also, the group argued that Shittu has persistently engaged in anti- party activities such as negative press interviews and court cases against the leadership of the APC in Oyo State in the last two years just to score cheap political points. In some instances, the group said, he even went as far as “instigating court cases against the APC and even appeared as the lawyer for litigants in such cases.”

As a testimony to Bayo Shittu’s deep seated animosity towards the APC in Oyo State, the youths said it is on record that he once boasted to a current Senator in Oyo State how he financed and worked for the Accord Party during the last general elections.

In addition to the above, Barrister Shittu did not contribute any form of financial or moral support to the APC in Oyo State during the last Gubernatorial and Presidential elections only for him to start stealing the show when President Buhari won the Presidential elections in May 2015. It is also on record that despite Barrister Shittu’s unfounded allegations that the CPC was marginalised in Oyo State, the CPC and its members in the State and the Oke Ogun area were well integrated into the APC. In addition, the following CPC members were, as the group argued, given political appointments:

Alhaji Oladimeji, former CPC State Chairman from Ibadan SE LGA who was appointed as the State Commissioner for Establishment and Training; Mrs Esther Adedokun, former Deputy Governorship candidate to Barrister Shittu from Ibadan SS LGA who was appointed as Senior Special Assistant, Political to Governor Ajimobi; Abiodun Olasupo, from Iseyin Local Government, the current Member in the Federal House Of Representatives who was nominated and voted for by the APC to represent the Iseyin/Itesiwaju/Kajola/Iwajowa Federal Constituency; Alhaji Ayinde Olona, the current Youth Leader in Iseyin Local Government and Isiaq Adeniyi Adekunle, Legislative Aide to Senator Fatai Buhari.

In view of the above unruly behaviour and anti -party activities by Barrister Shittu, the group said it was convinced that he is “not fit to adequately represent the party and Oyo State as a Minister.” They added that Shittu’s consistent immature and bellicose behaviour is not in tandem with somebody who is expected to articulate the “new ideals of our great party, therefore, putting him in a leadership position will do more harm than good to the good name of the party and Oyo State in general.”

The group therefore called “on our great Leader and President, Muhammad Buhari to forthwith revoke his nomination as a Minister to represent Oyo State in his cabinet.”