The Kogi State All Progressive Congress Governorship campaign flag off that was held today 8th of October, 2023 in Lokoja, the State capital of was nothing but a sham and a signal to the imminent defeat of Usman Ododo, the imposed and annointed candidate of Governor Yahaya Adoza Bello ahead of the November poll.
The APC rally can further be described as an assemblage of security personnel, aides to the Governor himself, his cabinet members, people from the Governor’s LGA, and few expired politicians that won’t be able to win their Wards talk more winning the State for the party; despite the huge resources that was allocated to the Governor’s aides both from the state and across the 21 Local Government Areas and others acclaimed Leaders who are to mobilize people to the venue of the kangaroo rally at a small civic centre instead of the Main Stadium.
It is even laughable that a ruling party that is supposed to use the main Stadium, but out of fear of low turnouts and poor attendance as results of poor governance they ended up using the civic center with minimum capacity, while the opposition parties used the main Stadium.
It is basically from a function like this we should know if the Kogi State government are truly on ground as claimed but the reverse is the case. Mobilizing a poor turnouts of less than 3,000 people out of which majority are even their close ally and relatives instead of at least over 20,000 spectators cutting across the entire State in the Stadium.
It would have been a big shame if President Bola Ahmed Tinubu and other party bigwigs has attended the flag off and experienced the poor turnouts and undignified poor turnouts due to imposition of Party candidate.
This absolute rejection is not far fetched from the maladministration and abysmal leadership witnessed in Kogi State and the people have vowed to use their PVC to vote out Usman Ododo who is one of the accomplice of percentage salary, poor performance and underdevelopment in the State.
There is no gainsaying, APC lacks the support of the good people from Kogi West, East and even parts of the Central respectively in the failed rally that was held today.
Also, the poor performance of Governor Yahaya Adoza Bello necessitated the low turnout, where we have less than 3,000 people in the civic center, the citizens who are the original voters despite lobbying them to attend refused, once again the common patrimony of the state expended and deployed for the failed rally has gone down the drain.
In a nutshell, the rally today is another strong indication that the good people of Kogi State have totally rejected the candidature of Mr Usman Ododo and will do everything practically possible to exercise their civic duty and protect it come November.
Crafty camera angles could not hide yawning gaps in the stands and it was obvious that Mr Usman Ododo and other insignificant few had been fittingly reduced to a shadow of themselves in Kogi State.
Despite the bragging of an overflow rally that would bring the State to a standstill for the day barely registered on the radar reasonable number of Kogites.
“Dismayed by the poor turnout, the state appointees and their aides resorted to theatrics as the 21 LGAs Chairmen have been summoned to appear in APC party secretariat tomorrow in Lokoja to give account on why there was poor turnout despite the huge amount given to them to mobilze enough party faithfuls to the rally and their failure to manage thier home very well. Although, they all cried out now that they tried on their parts but the people are not happy at the grassroots as they collected the money and majority of them ran away claiming they are not fools.
“Even the pitiable sight of the Usman Ododo craving for some level of attention in the midst of his principal, Political appointtees and others is another pointer of his unacceptability.
The gloomy, hopelessness and dejection in the camp of Mr Usman Ododo is another attestation of the failure awaiting them soon.
For the umpteenth time, the poor outing today of the Kogi APC rally is a resounding declaration by the people that nothing would stop it from voting against Mr Usman Ododo in November 11.
I urge the people to remain resolute and resilient as we approach the election.
Ozigi Matthew, A CONCERNED KOGITE.
