Rauf Aregbesola, the immediate past Minister of Interior and former governor of Osun State, has inaugurated a new caucus of the All Progressives Congress (APC) called ‘Omoluabi’ in the state.
Aregbesola stated that the move is part of his renewed commitment to the party, adding that political parties are an amalgamation of different interests and tendencies.
Members of the caucus were drawn from the 332 wards in the state and were represented by five members from each of the local government areas.
A statement issued by his media adviser, Sola Fasure, disclosed that the former governor launched the Omoluabi Caucus on Tuesday in his hometown of Ilesa, Osun State.
Describing Omoluabi as one of the many caucuses in the state, Aregbesola explained that the caucus is not a faction of the party but a union of like-minded people in the state.
“The Omoluabi tendency is a caucus within the APC; it is actually one of the caucuses in the state. We are not a faction. We are the genuine foundation members of the party, and we have no intention of abandoning the ship of the party as it navigates the most turbulent waters. We are not sprinters but long-distance runners, and we will still be standing when all the fair weather [people] have gone.
“What we have come to do here today is to renew our commitment to the path of progressive ideology and politics as inherited from our great past heroes, beginning with Chief Obafemi Awolowo, Chief Michael Adekunle Ajasin, Chief Abraham Adesanya, Chief Bola Ige, and others in the pantheon of progressive politics too numerous to mention.
“Emerging from the ashes of the near annihilation of our party in the governorship election of 2022 and the general election earlier this year, we should rise up and renew our strength and reclaim our place in the political firmament in Osun.
“We have been at this juncture before, after the 2003 election in which our party lost the stakes and was at its nadir in the state. At that point, like-minded progressives under the banner of Oranmiyan emerged to begin a movement that mobilised our members and the people of the state into a veritable electoral machine that won the 2007 governorship election, which ushered in an epoch-making two-term administration in the state and handed over to a successor from our party,” Ogbeni Aregbesola stated.