President Bola Ahmed Tinubu has been urged to intervene in the sudden removal of the name of the gubernatorial candidate of Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) In Ekiti State, Dr Wole Oluyede, from the published Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC)’s official list of June 20, 2026 governorship candidates.

The appeal is following the former Chairman of Ado Local Government Area of Ekiti State and the representative of an apolitical pressure group, Ekiti Liberation Agenda (ELA), Motunde Fajuyi’s, allegation that the Ekiti State Governor, Biodun Oyebanji and the Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Prof. Joash Amupitan masterminded the alleged removal of Oluyede’s name from INEC’s official list of gubernatorial candidates.

Fajuyi who recalled that Oluyede had emerged winner from a free and fair governorship primary election duly monitored and reportedly cleared by INEC officials, questioned why his name was later excluded without any formal explanation.

She further alleged that the INEC’s decision was influenced by the incumbent state government, claiming that those who approached the Commission’s Chairman were told he was ‘acting on orders’.

According to her, the controversy surrounding the PDP candidate’s omission compounded earlier grievances within the state’s All Progressives Congress (APC), where she alleged that credible aspirants, including Engr Kayode Ojo and another female aspirant, Abimbola Olajumoke, were unjustly disqualified without reasons during party’s primaries.

She said these developments and some others informed her decision to step aside from partisan politics and joined other concerned citizens to form the Ekiti Liberation Agenda, which she described as a platform to resist what she termed systemic injustice and political exclusion in the state.

She called on President Bola Tinubu to intervene, warning that continued silence by authorities could heighten tension in the state.

She demanded the immediate restoration of Oluyede’s name to the INEC list, insisting that failure to do so would deepen political discontent in the state.

“Forget about the lies, forget about the misconceptions of so many things or misrepresentations. I was in the state when it was created, we know a bit about here, we have not had it this bad.

“When the politics is being played in such a way that will not encourage the best option, we have issues where the ruling government disqualified one of our sons and one of our daughters, Engr Kayode Ojo and Abimbola Jumoke.

“No reasons were adduced for their disqualification. Nobody does that. The ruling government is just the ruling party that is taking everybody for granted. I was a member of APC but because of what happened, I had to step aside.

“And we heard some terrible stories about how Ekiti money was being taken to negotiate things so that there won’t be a contest. And they came around to make a sham of the primaries. It is not my business because I am not a party member. The party members should complain, not me. But Nigeria is such that shutting your mouth, being muted, has become the trademark but some of us cannot just be muted. We cannot be shut down or shut up.

“But that is okay. It is their internal thing. Now, INEC published their list and they omitted the PDP candidate, Dr Wole Oluyede who had free and fair primaries. If they had issues in their party. I am not a PDP member either, they know how to treat it internally but INEC was there. I have read the report of INEC.

“Why will INEC now say they are not listing his name? It has been alleged that the same incumbent here now is the one using INEC because when it got to the INEC chairman, he said he.is acting on orders. In a democracy, some of us will talk, even when those who are supposed to talk are not talking, we will talk. It is not for a person to just manipulate anyhow.

“It cannot be treated as a doormat. All these things have been in the papers, in the news, online platforms, in the print media, in the electronic media. Yet, the leaders there are not doing anything about it.

“Mr. President, if he doesn’t want fire to start burning from Ekiti, to please take cognizance of what is happening and rectify them. Ekiti is such a place that good will always start from and the other good will always start from here.

“So, let the powers that be please, intervene. We don’t just disqualify the best of our packs. How will you want to be in a position you don’t want to contest? Contest takes you to where you want to lead. So that is the major focus here and Ekiti has had enough of all this

rigmarole and twisting. I represent Ekiti Liberation Agenda, we won’t be slaves to anybody again.

“But how can somebody who has gone to the primaries in his party and has done it well and INEC has clarified and has agreed that it was a properly conducted primary now say you are removing his name. Let his name be restored, or there will be issues.

“Let Amupitan deny it, because I know those who went to him have him on record and they can come out and testify to that. I am not PDP. I am not APC. I am not in any party. ELA is a brainchild of some of us who felt concerned that it is being maltreated, it is being short changed. And we came together recently, about two months ago, to say enough is enough. But then the PDP thing now became the height of it, it became the abrasion of the wound.

“There was a wound in APC, when some of them were supporting Kayode Ojo then the wound was abrased by this PDP, non-inclusion, in the whatever. Let them not put fire in Ekiti.

“You can’t be cheating someone and you expect that person to keep quiet. If they keep quiet forever, then they may die with that situation. That is why I say, Ekiti will not take this lying low. It is no threat.”

Reacting to ELA’s allegations, APC spokesman in the state, Mr Segun Dipe dismissed the allegations, describing members of the group as mere ‘meddlesome interlopers’.

According to him, ELA had never been known in the political participation of any election in Ekiti, and wondered as to how they came about their allegations.

” It is not possible for APC to mastermind the exclusion of any person in any party, or to disqualify its own member, but only the national headquarters who conduct the primary, having not met some qualifications.

” Besides, go and read INEC position, it is clear some, including Oluyede may not have uploaded at the time they are supposed to do, so as to be accepted by INEC. So, how did that concern us?

” Again in PDP, remember they have three different factions, as INEC did observe, and told them. Again, how does this concern Ekiti APC or government?

It is never in our interest to get anyone disqualified,” Dipe concluded. (The Sun)

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