Akogun Iyiola Oyedepo is the chairman of the PDP in Kwara.  He speaks on PDP’s mission to recapture Kwara from APC, saying with unity in the party, the task is achievable. Excerpts:

What challenge does your election as the new PDP chairman in Kwara State place on you?

I have two major challenges, one within and one without. The challenge within is the divisive tendencies within the party which is normal in any political organisation, because politics essentially is management of intrigues. So intrigues within, have to be well managed. People who may want to dominate one another; people who may feel more important than others. Such people are in the party and we have to manage all. That is the problem within. If we solve the problem of the intrigues, certainly all other things would fall in, there would be party unity and once there is party unity, there would be commitment by party members and we would be able to excel and achieve whatever goals we have set for ourselves.

Well, the challenge before me outside the party is facing the government in power. Yes, it is a major problem which has to be acknowledged. We have a government that controls all the instruments of power in this state. They control the executive and the legislature. They control the sixteen local governments and 193 wards of Kwara State. It is a very big challenge and it is a political structure that has been there for sometime, that is the one being controlled by APC now, but serious as the challenge might be, we can beat that challenge, we can get the structure dismantled if we are able to solve the first problem which happily is being solved now.

The opportunity that we have is that much as the APC has the government, resources and any other thing that can be counted for them, they don’t have the goodwill again in Kwara State. Majority of the people of Kwara State are Bukola-fatigued; they are tired and they want a change and that is our selling point; that is what will make things possible for us.

There were insinuations that you were sponsored by certain people,within the party. How will you react to this?

That is why I said politics is the management of intrigues. I want to tell you that we have managed the intrigues within our party. When we were doing the congress, our party was polarised into two. We have the Unity Group and the Freedom Group. To the grace of God and to his glory, we have been able to merged the groups together and I want to tell you that our unity has now led to our freedom. We were able to sit down with the aggrieved members of the party and they laid their cards on the table and we were able to satisfy them including the desire to run an inclusive administration, and that has given them hope and confidence in my leadership. So we don’t have any problem in the PDP in Kwara. There is no division, there is no factionalisation, everybody is ready to work and face the octopus.

The opposition believes there is division in the PDP, people are looking at the division that might arise as a result of nomination to offices. How do you intend to manage this? 

You see it is not for the opposition to believe that we are together. In fact I believe they would be happy if we are not together. They would be sad if we are together. So they want the crisis to continue. I want to tell you that my emergence as chairman of PDP in Kwara State is an act of God and I am on an assignment to bring the divisive tendencies in the party together so as to win elections in this state. So I want to assure everybody that cares to listen, that I am not a candidate or chairman of an individual within the party. Some group along the line came to support my aspiration and my chairmanship, but it is not that one group within the party that sponsored me. I should be a bridge builder, I should not destroy. I am above group interests, I am above individual interest, I am above being controlled by an individual in the party.

Recently you told APC government to be ready to vacate Government House. What gives you the confidence that PDP would recapture power in the state?

You see I still want to maintain that APC in Kwara State is living on a borrowed time, because they have in their hands a stolen mandate. When they ascended power,  it was through the PDP structure, but today they are operating the government using the PDP-won election.

We are going to recover the mandate from them even before 2015, that is why I am calling on our members to go out and work because we may face the general election earlier than scheduled.

Don’t you consider it a herculean task to defeat Saraki’s structure?

It is possible. Whatever has a beginning must have an end. If what Bukola now represents is the structure of Dr. Abubakar Olusola Saraki, he can only continue with the legacy if he has reformed it and repositioned it. But what I can see in Bukola is, he is even more crude in the exercise of power than his late father, therefore nobody will want to continue with that kind of way of administering a party or the system of government. Therefore the dynasty is now very, very weak and there is nobody that has weakened that dynasty other than Bukola Saraki himself. Remember that Senator Gbemisola Saraki (Bukola’s sister) is even with us and so it is a divided dynasty- one is in progressive, our own camp which I consider progressive. The other one is playing an hegemonic politics that can never last. Therefore to face a weak dynasty is not a herculean task, it is something we are prepared for. People are tired and the time is up.