Senator Iyiola Omisore, the National Secretary of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), has demanded damages of N500 million from the party’s National Vice Chairman, North-West, Dr Salihu Lukman for accusing him of mismanaging Osun State governorship election campaign funds.
According to Daily Post reports, Omisore also demanded a retraction and an apology to be published in two major newspapers and several online news outlets within 48 hours.
It would be recalled that Lukman had made the allegation on Tuesday while featuring on a programme AIT.
“Part of the issue with that is that I’m aware the party has given some campaign funds to Osun which was handled by the National Secretary and to some extent, he has either mismanaged it but more importantly, he’s not accounting to anybody and you have to activate the process of accountability,” he had alleged.
However, Omisore in a letter through his lawyer dated March 15th and addressed to Lukman insisted that his allegation has caused damage to his character and integrity.
The APC chieftain noted that it was clear beyond doubt that Lukman’s statement and publication were a political ploy with the intent to damage his reputation and integrity in the eyes of right-thinking members of the public.
He maintained that it was a deliberate attempt sponsored and designed to malign his image and his political stature as a leader of note in Osun State, the South-West geopolitical zone and Nigeria as a whole.
Prior to this development, Lukman had called for called for the resignation of the National Chairman of the party, Senator Abdullahi Adamu and National Secretary, Senator Iyiola Omisore.
He stressed that with a National Chairman who is also a Muslim, it would be important that every necessary step is taken to inject a change of leadership in the party so that a new National Chairman who is a Christian can take over.
He pointed out that apart from changing the National Chairman, there was the need to also recognise the case of the National Secretary of the party, saying he has become a source of stronger dispute in Osun State.
The APC stalwart said rather than serving as a unifying factor for the party leadership in Osun State, Omisore is more of a divisive factor, which might have been responsible for why APC lost the 2022 governorship election to a political mediocre whose only qualification in politics may appear to be a comic dancing skill.
Lukman said to save Osun State and bring it back to its old standard of national political reckoning, Omisore would need to resign as National Secretary of APC, and a new unifying National Secretary elected.
He pointed out that beyond Omisore, any member of the National Working Committee of the party who is not a unifying leader in his/her state should be changed.
Content created and supplied by: Yidiat90 (via Opera News )
COMMENTS