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The governorship
candidate of the People’s Democratic Party in Ogun State, Tunji Olurin,
yesterday extended a peace offering to the opposition within the party
led by the state governor, Gbenga Daniel, asking that they work
together to move the state forward rather than sit on the fence.

Mr. Olurin spoke
with journalists in Abeokuta shortly after a church service to mark the
second year’s anniversary of Chapel of Christ The Glorious King,
located within the complex of the Olusegun Obasanjo Presidential
Library in Abeokuta.

“We are all
citizens of Ogun State; there is no winner or loser in this issue. It
is our responsibility to join hands together to develop Ogun State.
Those who are in opposition, I will personnaly call them, embrace them
to come together with me on board to develop the state,” he said.

Accompanied by his
running mate, Tunde Oladunjoye, the party candidate who emerged from
the Olusegun Obasanjo faction of the party said his administration’s
focus would be to make rural areas attractive and stop rural-urban
migration.

“By the time we
make rural areas attractive, we will not have rural-urban migration
anymore, because most of our children go to the cities to sleep under
the bridges because they couldn’t make ends meet in their villages,”
Mr. Olurin said. “We want to transform the villages, we want to give
them the same facilities they could not get in the cities, so they can
remain there, we shall accelerate development.”

He said he is very confident about his ticket, just as he said he would embark on his campaign soon.

The Daniel faction
of the party, however, appears to have foreclosed working with Mr.
Olurin. The state Commissioner for Information and Strategy Sina
Kawonise, said there was no going back on the stance of his group,
which he said was to stick by the recent ruling of an Abeokuta High
Court which declared the Obasanjo group as illegal, null and void.

“The court
judgement still stands; the law is clear on that,” Mr. Kawonise said,
adding that the former president was earlier given a proposal to
resolve the crisis, but rejected it.

Reports at the
weekend alleged that Mr. Obasanjo had refused to entertain the plea of
a reconciliation committee sent by the party to harmonise the list of
candidates produced by the two factions. But the chairman of the PDP’s
harmonised executives, Dayo Soremi, described as false reports that the
former president tore a purported peace list supposedly sent by
President Goodluck Jonathan.

One list

In a press
statement issued yesterday in Abeokuta, Mr. Soremi said: “Our BOT
chairman and elder statesman has absolute respect for the office of the
president, which he had occupied as a military head of state and as a
two-term civilian president. We wish to state categorically that there
were no two lists of candidates in Ogun PDP, other than the one
submitted by the harmonised executives and approved by the national
leadership of our party.

“The list
containing our party’s flagbearers have been submitted and accepted by
INEC. The only alteration we made was the accommodation of Dimeji
Bankole, as directed by President Goodluck Jonathan.”

Mr. Soremi
expressed his happiness over the reaction of people to the
Olurin/Oladunjoye governorship ticket since it was confirmed with the
presentation of flag in Ibadan last Tuesday.

“I can tell you that even opposition parties in Ogun State are already imploding since the ticket was announced,” he said.

A socio-political
organization, Gateway Democrats Coalition (GADECO) at the weekend
described the gubernatorial candidacy of Mr. Olurin as a unifying force
for the 2011 gubernatorial election in Ogun State. The group noted that
the political situation in the state required a leadership that would
return it to its prosperous past and restore hope in the citizenry.

“We believe firmly that Adetunji Olurin’s candidacy will restore
needed hope, peace and bring back the unity of Ogun State,” GADECO
National Coordinator, Adeola Shoaga, said. “The recovery of Ogun State
from the scars of political crisis that has overtaken development
activities in the state in the last five years depends solely on the
election of a credible and “big picture” leader like Mr Olurin.”