The true story of how Akeredolu emerged as the APC Guber Candidate in Ondo

Rotimi Akeredolu's emergence as the All Progressives Congress gubernatorial candidate in Ondo State took place with a price and held its ground despite the agitations from nefarious groups as politics entail. 

The adage which posits that you don’t have to be a phenomenon before being phenomenal finds great validity in the political emergence of Oluwarotimi Odunayo Akeredolu, publicly accepted as ‘AKETI’ in our terrestrial political landscape.

Reliable sources revealed that Aketi trudged with great labour the entire 18 Local Government Areas of Ondo State twice at the preparatory stage towards the Governorship primaries, Aketi in this pursuit dared to venture into an uncommon approach towards re-enacting the objectives of the All Progressives Congress as a party particularly with one on one interaction with the delegates of the party at the ward level which collectively constitute the foot soldiers of the party.

Several grievances were settled with the freedom guaranteed delegates on burning issues which were unrestrictedly conveyed to Aketi’s face.

Reliable information sourced from various tabloids and inhabitants tell that while traversing the Southern Senatiorial District, Aketi summoned the courage to meet his detractors, he embraced the truth about the public perception of him from the delegates, both constructive and parochial, he saw the need to be more receptive and the conviction grew in length on the peculiarities of the people’s expectation of him.

In this clime, it is very rare and uncommon to identify a professional, trained as a lawyer with no political ancestry to embrace such arduous and somewhat, stultifying assignment within our complex, money oriented society. Irrespective of the reverse in our customary expectation and practises that a visitor is hosted and made welcome in the community, Aketi made use of the situation to show his uncanning and unalloyed acts of philantrophism to the party delegates and various stakeholders, i.e market women, farmers, artisans and the aged.

Thus, when you show how much you value people as human being you will surely see an amazing return of loyalty and support from your admirers; the very essence of the support AKETI enjoyed in the face of divided platforms during the primaries.

Most exceptionally fulfilled politicians are those who have witnessed the side of victory and failure, usually not self -denying of the fundamental indices constituting failure; these set of politicians are often always renewed and often inspired because they are growing exceedingly by guarded attention to their own weakness and need for quick recovery from past mistakes.

Aketi learnt from the mistakes of the past, invested enormously in knowing his people the more and embraced his mistakes, of his loyal and disloyal political friends who hitherto were deliberately inadequate or politically vindictive in 2012 election.

Significantly, being able to navigate through the old complex web of loyalty and disloyalty to form a contemporary political base premised on commitment from difficult and politically polluted minds is what exemplified the man in view.

In short retrospect, the enthusiasm and positive mindedness subconsciously manifested by Aketi as shown in his unprepared and on the spot speech immediately after the APC governorship Primaries in Ondo State ordinarily is convincing of how better, swifter, more flexible and additionally reflective Aketi has become politically.

Aketi enthusiastically professed thus “looking forward to working together, we have witnessed transparent process, we have said over and over, party politics will raise dust, this is normal; when the dust settles, we must act as one family and aspirants, we will do so”

"…we thank the committee for the wonderful job, thanks to all my colleagues,thanks to all who have participated… we will change and give governance a new face"

The above phrases tell of the re-arrival of a politician who is totally ready and committed to team work, reconciliation, party compromise and willingness to do differently what was not done in 2012, whereby all other aggrieved aspirants went into their respective cocoon without any remarkable effort to appease them.

In a similar vein, without recourse to the typical legalistic approach of a lawyer, Aketi sent a strong statement of unity to all co-aspirants upon submission of his name to INEC as the party candidate, in his refreshingly hospitable words:

"I MAKE BOLD TO SAY TO MY CO-ASPIRANTS IN THE APC, THAT WE ARE ALL WINNERS. NONE IS VANQUISHED. WE ARE ALL VICTORS. NONE IS A LOSER. I HOLD THE TICKET OF THE PARTY IN TRUST FOR ALL OF YOU. I AM NOT PERFECT. NO ONE IS. BUT I WILL MAKE UP FOR MY IMPERFECTIONS BY DRAWING FROM OUR COLLECTIVE STRENGTH. TOGETHER WE SHALL WORK IN ONE ACCORD."

Undoubtedly, the consistency in his candidacy has shown that Aketi has attained full political stature. With his salutary and unrelenting effort towards acquiring more political platforms and political friends , it is instructive to encourage him to march on in reconciling the aggrieved aspirants.

Aketi in sustaining this present political mindset will transmit more vibes to his teeming followers near and wide and collectively help in establishing him as a reliable leader needed in this demanding time.

The full mental picture of the political future for Ondo State rest squarely in our collective will to formidably lend our voice, energy and support to this course.

[tori.ng]