2011: Ibadan community vow to disown non-performing politicians

Specifically, they maintained that anybody that would represent them in government at any level in the next political dispensation would be subjected to acid test before his or her emergence as their candidates. Many residents of the community who spoke at the official launching of Apata Solidarity Forum on Wednesday  lamented the absence of basic […]

Specifically, they maintained that anybody that would represent them in government at any level in the next political dispensation would be subjected to acid test before his or her emergence as their candidates.

Many residents of the community who spoke at the official launching of Apata Solidarity Forum on Wednesday  lamented the absence of basic social amenities in the community located between Ibadan South-West and Ido Local Government Areas of Oyo state.

In attendance at the occasion were prominent politicians from the community including the immediate past Deputy-Speaker of the Oyo State House of Assembly, Hon. Kazeem Ayilara, Mr. Olawale Ayoola, Mr. Ahmed Kolawole Giwa and Architect Gbenga Onanuga, among others.

Briefing journalists shortly after the inauguration, the President of the group, Elder Micheal Babatunde Bankole and another leader of the community, Deacon Kenneth Adeniyi Tinuala submitted that it was unfortunate that despite the fact that the community had produced many political office holders, it had continued to remain underdeveloped.

They maintained that Apata community had been deprived of basic social amenities like potable water supply, electricity and good roads over the years.

According to them, majority of those who have had the privilege to represent the Apata community in the state government since 1999 had always been those who only claimed to be members of the community for parochial interests, and not indigenes.

To this end, the group maintained that efforts were now on-going to mobilise Apata people in order to ensure that only credible members of the community were voted into political power in the forthcoming 2011 elections to represent the interest of the area.

The President of the Apata Solidarity Forum, Elder Bankole remarked that in order to fulfill its mission, the group would soon be launched in all the 12 wards that make up the Ibadan South-West local government area of the state just as he explained that presently, the group had not got any political affiliation since it was purely for the progress and development of the Apata community.

In this regard, he said, all well meaning sons and daughters of the community would be welcomed to the fold.