‘I DID NOT SEND YOU TO YY FOR ANY RECONCILIATION’, JOKE ORELOPE TELLS BADEJO TO VINDICATE CIVICS WEEKLY

-- BOILS OVER ANOTHER SHOW OF BADEJO’S BETRAYAL IN MISMANAGEMENT OF GOVERNORSHIP ELECTION FUNDS BY AREGBE CAMP

Razaq Adedeji Jimoh and Toyo C. Ngem

THE Civics Weekly, your darling magazine, has been vindicated as it came out officially from the horse’s mouth that the purported controversial reconciliation meeting between Pa Abel Badejo and Alhaji Yisa Yusuf (aka Y.Y.) was never to the knowledge of Joke Orelope. Rather more facts is emerging that the “peace meeting” was more of a treachery and sell out than a noble intention on the part of Pa Badejo. This fact came out this past week as the former deputy governor of Lagos State, Princess Adejoke Orelope-Adefulire (OFR) officially disclosed that Pa Badejo held the meeting without her knowledge and consent to make such move.

This was revealed amidst her furious anger that the BATCO-Mandate leadership, a scion of the enigmatic Minister of Interior, Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola’s faction, currently led by Alhaji Abdullahi Enilolobo in proxy, would yet abuse the trust of APC state leadership to mismanage the funds for the Governorship election at detrimental holdings to her own faction, “which membership, in actual fact, are in majority”. And in direct connection to this were also the indications that some leaders feigning loyalty to her own factional ‘Apex Body’ have been operating as Aregbe’s mole in Alimosho for which members of her Asiwaju Solidarity Movement (ASM) appear to be at the receiving end.

In the purported earlier story, entitled How Adunni Will be Impeached with the Badejo/Y.Y. Gambits..., published both in the orthodox media and online version of this magazine, Her Excellency was reported to have said she was not aware of any reconciliation with the Aregbe faction yet in Mosan/Okunola LCDA or anywhere in the Alimosho Federal Constituency. The purported reconciliation particularly became controversial when it led to “an illegal” dissolution of an existing LGA party executives recognized by the State. In the new executives so created and “sworn in”, members believed to be loyal to Her Excellency with a soul to call their own were replaced by those with apparent loyalty to the Aregbe camp in a suspected hatchet job of the Joke Orelope’s supposed trusted ally – Pa Badejo, according to sources.

Engr. Taofic Lawal, the embattled man at centre of then raging storm of removed party executives, did not mince words in describing Badejo’s action as a betrayal of trust. “It’s not my removal as LGA Exco that is worrisome to me, but the mischief and malicious plots behind it, particularly the context of a betrayal of trust against Her Excellency, Adejoke Orelope-Adefulire by her supposedly trusted political ally”, Lawal said.

The story reads further in excerpt as published: “Giving the graphic picture of the alleged (betrayal) plots, Lawal said: the two elders and factional leaders packaged the whole scheme to play out as a peace initiative between the factional camps of Asiwaju Solidarity Movement (ASM) led by Joke Orelope and the BATCO-Mandate led by Alhaji Abdullahi Enilolobo of which Badejo and Alhaji Yusuf were the respective local leaders for Mosan/Okunola. But the end game was a plot to remove the only female LGA Party Chairman in Alimosho, Hon (Mrs.) Opeyemi A. Akindele (aka Adunni) from office so that the leadership will change from ASM to BATCO-Mandate side. But they knew they cannot achieve this without putting me out of the way first. From the video clip you would have seen, Pa Badejo said Her Excellency was aware of the whole things he did…But let me disclose to you that when they were bragging with her involvement in the plot, I sent a message to cross-check the fact with her. In her quick response, she confirmed to me that she did not discuss any change of excos with anybody. That was why I found it amusing when Adeleke called a meeting and told us that Joke-Orelope told him to compile a new list of exco members from the ASM side…

“To substantiate reasons for their action to prove it was the directives of Her Excellency, according to their lies, they claimed Joke Orelope said they should remove me because I still belong to AUF (Asiwaju United Foundation). I just wondered when politics would be free of such destructive gambit of mischief, where you would have to destroy someone in order for you to rise. They said they found out that I was still attending AUF meetings”.

Lawal also gave reasons for the “malicious” intents of both leaders in the context of which Pa Badejo’s cause to sell out his own ASM faction was revealed. Thus he said further: “From the Y.Y. side, he has never hidden his disdain for Adunni as the party chairperson because Adunni too does not recognize him as her leader. So, when Y.Y found an opportunity to explore in Chief Badejo's offer of peace initiatives through Prince Adeleke, he (Y.Y.) simply sought a trade by batter. The plot was that in the name of negotiating peace deal, Badejo would accept a change in the composition of the LGA executives. The direct gain for Chief Badejo in it are many, which I do not intend to talk about here. But the long time ancillary gain he hopes to get is the push for the aspiration of his man, Prince Adeleke, to contest for the council chairmanship of this LCDA for which they would need the support of Y.Y. Now this tells you the direct interest of Adeleke in the Y.Y. gambits.”.

Soon after the publication, a barrage of attacks – some vitriolic, some in civil courtesy – were launched at Civics Weekly, including the most earlier one from the LCDA party Chairperson, the concerned Hon Adunni, who also almost came forth with claim that “Mama knows about everything”. In general, the reactions converged on the argument that Pa Badejo could not have gone to Y.Y. without the knowledge and consent of Joke Orelope, who is currently the Senior Special Assistant to the President on Sustainable Development Goal (SSAP-SDG), spending more times outside Lagos in line with schedule of her duty.

As at the penultimate Friday when a reporter of this magazine had an impromptu rendezvous with two leaders of Alimosho APC that are said to belong to ASM, the duo yet pushed forward the same conviction that Joke was aware of the whole scheme. One from Agbado/Oke Odo and the other from heartland of the issue – Mosan/Okunola, the two argued that the change of excos could not have happened without the explicit directive of Joke Orelope. Accordingly, they seemed to hold a strong belief that any contrary opinion to that is a fallacy. This was strengthened with the polemics that the reporter could not have known the insider fact more than a party leader from the LCDA. All this was advanced to weaken the reporter’s line of grandstanding poser that "for what reason would Her Excellency want to deny a directive she gave" – an action that should tantamount to telling lies at best.

Also as late as Tuesday the following week, the reporter was also caught in argument with another ASM chieftain in Egbeda that Pa Badejo acted on the instruction of Her Excellency. This nevertheless happened less than about 24hours to the time Joke Orelope would reveal the whole truth in direct confrontation with Badejo. The ASM chieftain happened to be in attendance at the meeting for a living witness to the hours of truth.

The moment of truth soon reportedly came at the purported apex meeting where everyone, including Pa Badejo, was in attendance with Her Excellency presiding. The one from Agabdo-Okeodo was however absent. As matters of the election fund mismanagement got heated up, Her Excellency reportedly confronted Pa badejo: “Did you tell me you were going to Y.Y? Did I know about your meeting with YY?... I am aware of Adunni’s visit to him (YY) because she informed me before going. But you, did you tell me about the meeting with Y.Y?”

Although Her Excellency had earlier ordered the reinstatement of the substantive party executive members as Engr. Lawal had subsequently confirmed to this magazine a couple of weeks back, it nevertheless happened only after she had done her own diligent checks and facts finding. Such was the raising of a three-man emissary she sent to Pa Badejo to find out what was amiss. Members of the committee included Chief Adedayo Salvador (aka Blacknight) from Constituency 02 and Alhaji Babs Kareem for Constituency 01. All that Pa Badejo could tell the emissary body, according to sources, was that those removed from the excos, particularly Engr. Lawal in his mention, were no longer “loyal” to him; a statement that purportedly angered Babs Kareem to chastise him “for giving unreasonable excuses” for such a weighty matter.

Perhaps the report of this emissary “may be the reason she stopped a so called Constituency Executive body of ASM that used to hold at Badejo’s house just a couple of weeks back”, another insider source said.

Given all this, as some observers said, no discernible mind might consider it an irony that Pa Badejo would yet be caught pants down in this latest “connivance” with YY to deprive his own factional group of the election money. As a party member's comment on this further revealed, the Special Assistant to the President could have "thought it wise" to put the issue straight to Badejo when she reportedly passed this final instruction to the elderly man, though in vernacular as the language of the sitting: “I am not interested in whatever pecuniary reason for which you may be doing all this, I am now sending you back to the YY: go and tell him that nobody sent you to him for any reconciliation or harmonization with him. Please take it that I am not worth to send you message (thoughtfully on account of respect for age), but I will send you this to YY: tell him that If he is interested in any reconciliation, he should come here (meeting of this Apex body) to do that.”

What this magazine had refused to publish in the earlier story in ref for ethical consideration was the accusation gathered that Pa Badejo may have sold out his ASM camp to Aregbe faction for pecuniary gains of some shop allocations and a specified sum of monthly allowance being given to him by the Council under the Executive Chairman loyal to YY side. To Joke Orelope, as sources further revealed, this was not any of her concern. “It’s your due right you may be collecting” she reportedly told Badejo. But, in spite of all this courtesy, as some party faithful have argued, she had only refrained herself from tagging the elder a ‘traitor’ in specific word. “She had only shown the spirit of leadership by restraining herself from being overwhelmed by her anger when she also discovered that Pa Badejo yet played another compromising betrayal role against the his ASM side in mismanagement of the governorship election funds by the YY’s BATCO-Mandate faction”, another source close to her said.

As sources revealed, the issue came to her knowledge in surprise when she began to hear discordant tune from the ASM local leadership camp that majority of them did not receive funds “adequately due” to their side in measure of the sum released per polling unit for the election by the state. She would later discover that some of the members of her own Apex Body may have finally exhibited the long suspected “mole of Aregbe” they were thought to be in the Alimosho APC ab initio. A former commissioner in the State Cabinet was fingered to be one that played a leading role in this sell out.

A source close to her revealed: “what pained Mama is that she doesn’t joke with election funding. She had in fact prepared herself for the governorship election in case what happened at the presidential election where the money for election was not released by the person it was given, even though the amount so released could not have been adequate enough as well. She had prepared herself for how she would support the funding so that Alimosho would deliver quality votes. In fact, she had listed how her own funding would go. But when money from the state came and she was satisfied that it was adequate and sufficient enough, she had to relax as there was no need for further augmentation from her”.

In his outburst at the Lagos West Senatorial Leaders parley with local party leaders held at Ifako/Ijaiye about the month of December last year, Engr. Lawal had raised a fundamental issue that many of the so called local leaders were “not working for interests of the party”. They were only struggling for the custody and “control of the election money” they would get at end of the day. He would seem to have been vindicated again with all the controversy and brouhaha that had trailed the election funds after the general elections. And now that the truth is in the open, and evolving as it were, "where would the traitors be pitching their tents?" a party chieftain queried. Of course, only time will provide the answer to that, as Civics Weekly is a novice in acts of political gambits beyond evaluations of unfolding political events.