A former governorship candidate of the Labour Party (LP) in Lagos State, Gbadebo Rhodes-Vivour, has accused governors of being spineless amid the mass defections into the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC).
The APC has about 31 governors in their ranks, a sharp increase from about 19 it had after the 2023 general elections due to defections mainly from the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). Several lawmakers at the federal and state levels have also joined the ruling party.
But Rhodes-Vivour says the defections reflect a lack of strong character from the governors, unlike what was obtainable when the APC was in the opposition.
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“On governors decamping: if governors had more spine, they would make different decisions,” the politician said on Tuesday’s edition of Channels Television’s The Morning Brief.
“Look at the quality of governors who put the APC together originally—their audacity and understanding of their position relative to the quality of governors we have now.”
He accused the APC of muzzling opposition parties and making elections a “do-or-die affair”.
“I’ve seen videos of the current President castigating then-President Goodluck Jonathan,” he said.
“We had a thriving democracy then. People weren’t being picked up for being in the opposition. The PDP allowed for a thriving opposition; it was not ‘do or die’ or the level of violence we saw in 2023.”
Despite the accusations, President Bola Tinubu and the APC have denied claims of “killing” the opposition.
“Critics must talk. When they accused me of killing the opposition, but I didn’t have a gun,” Tinubu said during an interfaith Iftar with senators at the Presidential Villa in Abuja last month.
“I could have given myself a licence when I had the authority,” he said at the event.
Watch Rhodes-Vivour’s interview below:
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