By Lateef Ibrahim with agency report
Dr Akin Ogunbiyi a gubernatorial aspirant in the Osun 2026 governorship election has hinted that screening method for multiple aspirants in the All Progressives Congress, (APC), for the guber race will be determined by the party leadership.
Ogunbiyi also said the possibility of any aspirant decamping from the party on account of loosing the gubernatorial ticket is unthinkable.
He dropped this hint as he formally declared his intention to contest for the governorship election in Ile-Ogbo on Saturday.
Ogunbiyi, who was a former Accord Party candidate in the Osun 2022 governorship election, dismissed concerns over the growing number of aspirants vying for the position.
He maintained that the party remained united despite the fact that other aspirants have indicated interest in the race.
While stressing that the development would not create chaos in the party, he noted that the party leadership would eventually determine the method of selecting its guber candidate.
He said, “We can have as many as possible aspirants; it doesn’t matter at this point in time. What matters is that at the appropriate time, the leadership will decide whether we will go for primary or otherwise but it can’t tear the party apart.
“If truly all the aspirants are committed to the party and we have the single aspiration for APC to take over the leadership of Osun State, that won’t tear the party apart.
“If you look at our leader, President Bola Tinubu, he is a democrat to the core. We can have twenty or fifty candidates, it doesn’t matter at this point in time.
“What matters is at the appropriate time, the leadership will decide whether we will go form primaries or otherwise but we can’t tear the party apart.”
Ogunbiyi cautioned against defection, stressing that all declared and prospective aspirants share common progressive ideology.
He said, “If truly we are if truly all the aspirants are committed to the party and we have the singular aspirations for APC to take over the leadership of Osun State, that won’t tear the party apart I can assure you.
“All the people that have come out now, we know each other and I want to believe that our focus is the unity within the party and that is unshakeable.
“It will be unthinkable of anybody to say because they didn’t win the primary or didn’t get the party support to decamp. No, we are all progressives.
“All the people that have come out, all the people that will come out, we are all progressives and at the appropriate time, the leadership of the party will determine how we will go from there.”
He added that he is keeping his political plans close to his chest.
“I cannot be relaying my plans to you because now it is a competition, but we will carry you along as we go,” he concluded.
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