The African Democratic Congress has condemned what it described as a coordinated attempt to intimidate its national secretary and former Minister of Interior, Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola.
The party said efforts to brand him a traitor to the Yoruba people for leaving the All Progressives Congress were both dangerous and undemocratic.
In a statement on Monday, August 18, the party’s spokesman, Bolaji Abdullahi, said, “It is incredible to see the zeal with which some President BAT supporters are trying to mobilise the Yoruba and South West people against Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola for merely exercising his democratic rights and choosing to stand with the Nigerian people. This is sheer perfidy and should be condemned.”
Abdullahi recalled that after the June 12 election crisis, Nigerians collectively agreed that supporting a Yoruba man for president was a way to heal the country.
“Nigerians, in an unprecedented act of political consensus, thought that the best way to heal the country and strengthen national unity was to support a Yoruba man to become President. Nigerians overwhelmingly voted for President Obasanjo,” he said.
The statement followed the disruption of an ADC rally in Sagamu, Ogun State, on August 14, where Aregbesola was scheduled to lead the campaign for House of Representatives bye-election candidate, Solomon Osho.
His loyalists had also raised alarm a day earlier about an alleged plot to eliminate him.
Drawing on history, Abdullahi noted that no one accused Bola Tinubu of betrayal when he openly clashed with Obasanjo’s government.
“No one challenged Obasanjo and his Federal Government more vociferously than BAT, who almost made Lagos State an alternative source of power—rightly so.
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“Yet, no one accused BAT of treachery against the Yoruba race, even when he antagonised Afenifere, the Yoruba socio-cultural group.”
He questioned the current efforts to demonise Aregbesola, saying, “We therefore have strong doubts that Asiwaju would approve of what is being done in his name today.
“Attempts to demonise Aregbesola and other Yoruba leaders in the opposition are undemocratic and disgraceful.
“They are also inimical to the long-term political interests of the Yoruba people. President BAT is not the South West, and the South West is not him.”
Abdullahi alleged that fear of Aregbesola’s political clout was driving the smear campaign.
“The impression one gets is that Tinubu’s people are so afraid of Aregbesola that they are throwing everything at him—even recruiting Sunday Igboho, a self-declared ethnic warlord, into the fight.
“But the narrative they are creating is that tribal and personal loyalty is more important to the Yoruba than the national interest. This is wrong and dangerous.”
While stressing that Aregbesola could defend himself politically, the ADC warned against what it described as an assault on democracy.
“Ogbeni Aregbesola is immensely capable of fighting his own battles. But as a party, we condemn this act of intolerance and assault on freedom. It must cease immediately,” the statement concluded.