6th January, 2015
Kazeem Ugbodaga
The Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, and the All Progressives Congress, APC, have clashed over Monday’s swearing in of new Executive Secretaries for the 20 Local Governments and 37 Local Council Development Areas, LCDAs, of Lagos State by Governor Babatunde Fashola.
The governor swore in 57 Executive Secretaries, ES, to manage the affairs of the local councils pending when election will be conducted into the councils.
But the Lagos PDP reacted angrily to Fashola’s action, describing it as illegal and a ploy by the APC to rig the 2015 general elections in the state.
A statement signed by the PDP’s Publicity Secretary, Taofik Gani, said: “They are not progressives. They are not democrats. They are aiding and abetting destruction of democracy at grassroots. It further exposes them as not democrats and who can run a system down to favour their inordinate ambitions.
“This ambition is the desperation to win Lagos State in 2015. The Executive Secretaries have been sworn in at this time to manipulate the elections in their domains for APC. They will fail and this time Lagosians will vote against APC for depriving them democratic local councils,” Gani said.
The PDP wonders why Fashola, a lawyer and Senior Advocate of Nigeria, SAN, would promote a local government system that is a violation of section 7 of the Constitution which is also a pending subject of litigation in the Lagos High Court.
Reacting to this development, the Lagos APC said there was no way light (APC) and darkness (PDP) could meet, saying it is self-evident in Lagos that PDP does not exist.
Publicity Secretary, APC, Lagos, Joe Igbokwe said: “Governor Fashola is a lawyer and a SAN. He understands the law and knows the law of the land very well. He has just done the needful.
“Nature, they say, abhors a vacuum and hence the need to fill the gap left behind when the tenure of the elected council chairmen ended last year. Now, if the moribund PDP in Lagos says that Governor Fashola did what he did because APC wants to rig 2015 elections, then this party needs to be sympathized with and needs prayers too.
“But one basic truth that is self evident here in Lagos is that PDP does exist and it can never exist here. There is no meeting point between light and darkness in Lagos. There is no meeting point in Lagos between competence and incompetence. There is no meeting point in the land of limitless opportunities between a sound mind and a meretricious mediocrity which PDP represents. This wingless bird called PDP cannot fly in Nigeria this time around and it cannot fly in the Centre of Excellence,” Igbokwe said.