The Governorship candidate of the Social Democratic Party SDP Engineer Tony Ojeshina disclosed this during a press conference held in Abeokuta on Friday.
Recalled that Ten out of the thirteen political parties that participated in the 2023 governoship election in Ogun State, rejected the result of the election, alleging that the election was fraught with “violence, manipulation and irregularities.
Ojeshina lamented that despite the effort of the coalition and the massive support of the people of Ogun State, Prince Abiodun of the APC was declared winner despite obvious electoral malpractices, voter's suppression and intimidation, ballot box snatching and over voting.
According to him" As a law abiding citizen and someone who has respect for due process, our candidate, Hon. Adebutu approached the tribunal with hard evidence against the All Progressives Congress and its candidate, since the time the petition was filed at the tribunal, Prince Dapo Abiodun and his party have made frantic efforts to ensure that our candidate did not proceed with the tribunal and has failed in their several attempts to suppress Hon. Adebutu’s bid to recover the mandate of the good people of Ogun State, Prince Dapo Abiodun and his party have now resorted to engage in media trial, blackmailing, name calling and rumor peddling against our candidate.
"It is surprising that Prince Abiodun’s cohorts are usurping the responsibility of the Police Public Relations Officers by revealing information of an ongoing investigation which our candidate was not prior to before he left the country on April 25th for his usual medical routine checkup. It is important for the public to know that Hon. Adebutu, whom we supported under the aegis of COALITION OF POLITICAL PARTIES, is a man of reputable character and a philanthropist per excellence was not involved in any vote-buying as being peddled by the APC.
" Some of these attributes of him formed our decision to give him our needed support. We are not unaware of the antics of Prince Abiodun and his party APC’s deliberate effort to sway public attention away from his many unforgivable transgressions in the electoral process and also to cause distraction for the tribunal through his consistent media trial and rumor peddling against our candidate, Hon Adebutu.
"We would like to urge members of the public not to be swayed by the machinations and conjectures of Prince Abiodun and his party but to remain resolute in our support for Hon Adebutu as we are confident that the relief Ogun people wanted is very near. While we are also confident of the Judiciary's commitment to upholding the tenets of democracy through upholding the rule of law, we are urging members of the Ogun State Governorship Election Petition Tribunal not to be distracted by the Prince Abiodun and his party which is an attempt to cause distraction for the tribunal.
"We are confident of the tribunal's commitment to fair hearing of the petitions before it. Also, while we remain confident in the Nigerian Police Force to be independent in the discharge of its duties, we want to urge the NPF not to allow themselves to be used as an instrument of cohesion and intimidation by Prince Abiodun with his expected numbered days as the Governor of Ogun State.
"We are advising Prince Abiodun to honourably find ways to defend the hard evidence against him and his party rather than engaging in cheap propaganda, media bullying and trial, rumor peddling and name calling of a man whose mandate he wants to dubiously steal. "
Parties at the press conference included Social Democratic Party (SDP), Action Alliance (AA), Accord Party (AP), Allied People’s Movement (APM), Labour Party (LP), Action Democratic Party (ADP), African Action Congress (AAC), All Peoples Party (APP) and National Rescue Movement (NRM).
