Anthonia Duru
Gubernatorial candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in the 2019 election in Ogun State, Sen. Buruji Kashamu, has accused the suspended chairman of the party in the state, Mr. Bayo Dayo of planning to sell the party structure to Hon. Kessington Adubutu, insisting that the party was not for sale.
Kashamu, who alleged that Dayo was planning to ‘sell’ the party to billionaire Adebutu, whose son, Ladi Adebutu, is the leader of a PDP faction in the state for N100 million, warned both Dayo and Adebutu that nobody has the power to sell the structure of the party in the state.
It would be recalled that Dayo was suspended, on Monday, as the chairman of the party in Ogun State for allegedly involving in anti-party activities.
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Kashamu, a stalwart of the PDP, in a statement he personally signed and dated Tuesday, April 14, alleged that, “We have the evidence of the meeting at Equity Hotel, Ijebu Ode, where Dayo collected money to sell the Ogun State structures of the PDP to Kessington Adebutu.
“What the Adebutus should realize is that they have been scammed, as Dayo has no power to transfer the structures of the Party to anyone.
“This illegal transaction shows the low mentality of Dayo. Otherwise, how can anyone think that he can sell a political structure comprising many interests, major stakeholders for a mere 100 million naira?
“No one is against the reconciliation of any aggrieved members but the question members of the Party continue to ask is: how Dayo could claim that he was trying to reconcile anyone when he did not have any meeting with any stakeholder or any of the Party Executive Committees at LGA or ward level and carried nobody in the State Executive Committee along before signing his contract with the Adebutus.
“What is more intriguing is: how would someone who calls himself PDP Chairman want to sell the party to people who still have a binding and subsisting three-year agreement with the Allied People’s Movement (APM) in Ogun State.
“The agreement, which was publicly announced on the 7th of March, 2019. They have just done a year and the agreement will lapse in 2022. These elements have neither repudiated the agreement nor have they formally returned to the PDP.
“The party structure, which he has betrayed, is the same one that has sustained him as party leader in the state for the last 10 years, first as Ogun East Senatorial District Chairman for two years and then as State Chairman for 8 years.
“Dayo has proven time and again that his greed can never be satisfied. He used the chairmanship position to enrich himself and his family.
“In 2015, he embezzled about N50 million campaign funds, just as he got he got a plot of land in Abuja as Chairman of the PDP in Ogun State which he sold for N25 million.
“He was meant to share the money with other Exco members and leaders. But, he didn’t. He pocketed everything.
“Still in 2015, he misappropriated over N100 million; N50 million realized from the sale of nomination forms and another N50 million of campaign funds. Of the millions realized from the sale of nomination forms sold ahead of the 2019 election, about N60 million was misappropriated without recourse to the leaders, elders and other stakeholders.
“During the 2019 election, I personally paid him N40 million to be shared between him and the erstwhile State Secretary, Alhaji Semiu Sodipo. He took N25 million and gave N15 million to Sodipo. Another sum of N34 million was facilitated for him through a kinsman, Mr. Teslim Giwa.
“He (Dayo) collected over N10 million from me for the just concluded Ward, Local Government and State Congresses in Ogun State without giving the delegates any money.
“For the past eight years, he got between N5 million and N10million monthly for the running of his office and the Party Secretariat where he inflated staff salaries and paid ghost or non-existent workers.
“These are a few of the many deals he struck while he held sway as the State PDP Chairman and yet his greedy nature won’t leave him.
“Yet, Dayo thinks he can now sell everyone in Ogun PDP to the Adebutus. He is the greatest betrayer of all time. No right thinking person should have anything to do with him.”
On the suspension of the embattled Chairman, Kashamu said, “Constitutionally, the suspension of Adebayo Dayo was very much in order as prescribed by Article 57(3) of the PDP constitution.
“This provision empowers the Ogun State Working Committee (OGSWC) of the PDP to suspend any member of the Party for a period not exceeding one month during which period such a member may be referred to the appropriate Disciplinary Committee.
“The OGSWC did not entertain any motion to discipline Adebayo Dayo. It only considered a motion to lodge a complaint against him at the National Executive Committee (NEC) of the PDP, for his activities against the Ogun State Executive Committee (OGSWC) and the Party in Ogun State.
“Once it was resolved to lodge a complaint at the NEC against Dayo for the question of his discipline to be entertained by the NEC of the party, the members of the OGSWC further resolved that he should be suspended in the interim until the NEC decides whether or not to initiate the necessary disciplinary process against him.”
Kashamu, however, urged members of the party to remain peaceful and calm, assuring them that “the future of the Party in Ogun State is bright and all will be well.”
Reacting to the allegations by Sen. Kashamu, media aide to Hon. Adebutu, Afolabi Orekoya, dismissed the allegations as ‘baseless’.
According to Orekoya, “This to any rational person would sound stupid, how can someone in his right thinking sense cook that an individual can sell or buy a political party.
“He thinks everybody will be like him who only believes in party merchandising and rituals, he should be asked that when he was a leader of the same party, how much did he buy it?
“We don’t want to join issues with anybody, it is so clear that the claimant is confused, how can a party as strong and viable be sold by an individual to another individual.
“Moreso, Hon. Oladipupo Adebutu is a one of the faithful National Leader of People’s Democratic Party in Ogun State, how can he intend to buy the party in which he is a leader. Please, we will like to answer a more reasonable question on the progress the PDP is making and efforts being made towards cushion the effect of this ongoing lockdown.”
There’s never any intention to buy PDP by the Adebutu family,” Orekoya said in an exclusive chat with our reporter.
