House of Representatives member and Ekiti State Gubernatorial candidate of Labour Party in the last election, Opeyemi Bamidele, on Tuesday formally joined the All Progressives Congress (APC) with his supporters promising to contribute his quota to strengthen the party.
Addressing a news conference in his native Iyin Ekiti in Irepodun/Ifelodun Local Government Area, Bamidele explained that he had consulted widely with members of his political family, Ekiti Bibiire Coalition (EBC) and the national leadership of the APC before arriving at the decision.
The Chairman of House of Representatives Committee on Legislative Budget and Research said EBC members are now at liberty to attend ward APC ward meetings and register as members.
Bamidele left the defunct Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN), one of the legacy parties that merged to form the APC and the platform through which he was elected into the House of Representatives, to join the Labour Party (LP) in November 2013.
He joined the LP and contested on its platform in the June 21, 2014 governorship election in which he came third.
Before joining the APC formally, Bamidele had on January 24 appeared at a presidentially campaign rally addressed by President-elect Muhammadu Buhari where he announced a working agreement between LP and APC for the March 28 presidential poll.
Bamidele had clarified on the day of the APC presidential rally that he still remained a member of LP and would join APC after the general elections since his former party was presenting candidates for the national and state assembly elections.
While thanking LP for giving him a platform to fulfill his political aspiration when he needed one, Bamidele explained that he had no alternative than to leave the party for APC because he was returning to his natural habitat.
Bamidele argued that his joining APC was not borne out of personal ambition but to join the change train the party represents adding that politicians of like minds should join the party in the interest of the people.
According to him, “Our coming together with those that are there before will further strengthen the party”.
He praised the national leaders of the party including Gen. Buhari, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, National Chairman Chief John Odigie-Oyegun and his predecessor, Chief Adebisi Akande for their roles in his return to the progressives fold.
Bamidele added that despite leaving APC, he was always in talks with leaders of the party saying he would work hard to ensure peace, unity and stability of the party.
He assured that with his entry into APC, the party would not be “the same APC the electorate rejected three times at the last general elections”.
He said: “By and large, politics, if it is meant to serve the common interest, must be a dynamic aspect of human endeavour that embodies a whole process of expression, competition and reconciliation of personal interests for the ultimate benefit of the people.
“Let me use this opportunity to reiterate that my decision to contest for the governorship of Ekiti State was borne out of my innate conviction and that of many like-minds of mine, most of whom are illustrious sons and daughters of this great State, that though the ACN-led administration then was doing its best, however, its best was not enough for our much expectant but highly disillusioned people.
“Invariably, I would have loved to stand in for the gubernatorial race on the platform of the ACN as a vision-driven progressive party under the leadership of an equally dynamic leader, benefactor and mentor of mine, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu.
“But when it became apparent that party primaries for candidate selection was not likely to hold in the Ekiti Chapter of the ACN/APC, I had no choice at some point in the course of expressing my intent to offer our people a better leadership, than to move to another suitable party where I could be offered the ticket to contest in the ensuing governorship election.
“All of us the candidates contested on different platforms. But as we all know in any contest, someone must emerge the winner.
Whether or not the contest was fair, posterity and the court of law shall judge. That is not the bone of contention for today’s press briefing. I sincerely urge you to let us defer that to another day.
“Today, by the special leading of Almighty God and after the due consultation with my immediate family, friends, confidants and political associates within and outside Ekiti State, I, Hon. Opeyemi Bamidele, the Federal lawmaker representing Ado/Irepodun-Ifelodun Federal Constituency hereby wish to declare my intent to decamp to the All Progressives Congress (APC) as from today, Tuesday, 19th May, 2015”, he said.
Bamidele said the progressives bloc offers Nigerians the hope for the realization of a great country where poverty would be history and where corruption would be a thing of the last.
“This was the more reason I felt comfortable to be part of the movement for the realization of the Buhari/Osinbajo project despite my membership of the Labour Party then.
“It was an age-long vision of the progressives in the Southern part of the country to join forces with equally visionary and progressive politicians in the North to rescue our nation from bad leadership and its attendant hydra-headed manifestations that have come to characterize Nigeria in recent history: corruption, poverty and insecurity.” [The Nation]
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