Omolosho Fatai
Members of the All Progressives Congress faction loyal to the Minister of Information and Culture, Lai Mohammed, in Kwara State have left the party.
It was gathered that a few of aggrieved members have joined Social Democratic Party, while majority of them are still making up a third force and are yet to join a particular existing political party.
Meanwhile, a member of the state House of Assembly, Saheed Popoola, representing Ojomu/Balogun Constituency in Offa Local Government of the state who was a leading member of the faction, announced his defection to the SDP on the floor of the Assembly on Tuesday.
Popoola, the only two-term member in the 24-member House of Assembly was elected on the platform of the APC for a second term tenure in the 2019 elections.
This is the first time any aggrieved member will openly pitch tent with another party since the leadership crisis rocking the APC in the state began.
Popoola was a staunch loyalist of Lai Mohammed, who is the leader of the factional APC in the state.
TOS NEWS reported that the All Progressives Congress (APC) suspended eleven party members of the party believed to be loyalists of the Minister of Information and Culture Alhaji Lai Mohammed for allegedly indulging in anti-party activities.
The suspension letter, dated February 5, 2021, was signed by the National Secretary, Caretaker/Extra-ordinary National Convention Planning Committee, Sen. James Akpanudoedehe, and addressed to Kwara state chairman Hon. Abdullahi Samari Abubakar.
Affected members were Joseph Tsado, Bamidele Ogunbayo, Issa Fulani, Imam Abdulkadir, Morufu Olaniyi Yusuf, Saludeen Lukman, Kerebu Fatai, Bola Ajani, Nurudeen Fasasi, Salman Shehu Babatunde and Abdullateef Ahmed Kolawole.
They were handed the punitive measure for charging the Kwara state chairman Hon. Abdullahi Samari Abubakar to court.
The Minister’s group had opposed the removal Bashir Bolarinwa as the caretaker chairman of the party in Kwara state, leading to the protracted crisis which has broken the party into two factions and pitted Governor AbdulRahman AbdulRazaq against the Minister of Information and Culture, Lai Mohammed, in a struggle for the soul of the party.
