Governor of Ondo State, Lucky Aiyedatiwa, has disclosed that he will contest for the ticket of the All Progressives Congress (APC) ahead of the November 16 governorship election in the state.
Aiyedatiwa, who succeeded his late boss in December 2023 to complete the tenure of Oluwarotimi Akeredolu, revealed that he cannot afford to be the governor of the state for just one year.
The governor, who stated this while featuring on TVC News shortly after the interment of his late boss on Friday, emphasised that he will win the party’s primaries in April as well as the governorship polls, which will allow him to run the state for five years.
Aiyedatiwa maintained that, by the constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, as required, he is eligible to run for one more term.
He said: “Definitely, I will be running because I am already a sitting governor, and let me say this: nobody wants to be governor for one year.
“Give me what the constitution allows me to do; at least let me have a chance of running for one more term as it were.”
The governor, who insisted that he never had any issue with his late principal, stated that those who were also interested in the number one seat of the state were behind the crisis when the late Akeredolu was ill.
“Let me put this straight for the record sake: I never had issues with the former principal; there was no time we had a face-off; there was no time we had an issue that would demand that I have to make up with him.
“All that was being pushed out at a time was basically political; there were all falsehoods and insinuations because the election was coming, and they knew the governor was so sick, and a lot of things were at play.
“There was no time; I had an issue that I needed to resolve with him in terms of crisis. All that you saw at one time was basically political. It was driven by the ambition of a few people who knew there was going to be transition in the state, and I was advantaged as the deputy.”
He also added that the same ambition was behind the move by some five members of the House of Representatives from the state who wrote to President Bola Tinubu over the purported crisis in the state chapter of the party.
“Everybody is entitled to his or her own opinion. That is just the opinion of some people who are so driven by ambition. If you look at the profiles of those five members of the House of Representatives,
“One of them is actually an aspirant; what do you expect from an aspirant? He wants to say something to demonise somebody who is having a great advantage; the other one is the director general of a campaign for an aspirant.
“So, all of them have their own ambitions for who they want to be governor. That is an unprogressive position, and the party has actually responded that there was no crisis in the party and that they are not at loggerheads with me.”
