2018 guber: I don’t know party to use yet –Fayose

From Wole Balogun, Ado Ekiti

Governor of Ekiti State, Ayodele Fayose, of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) said, yesterday, he does not know the platform on which his successor will contest the 2018 governorship poll.

Making reference to the Saturday, November 26 governorship poll in Ondo State, Fayose said emergence of Chief Rotimi Akeredolu, of the All Progressives Congress (APC), does not in any way threaten PDP supremacy in Ekiti.

Fayose, who spoke in Ikere Ekiti, at a meeting with members of the Ikere chapter of the Suppliers’ Association of Nigeria, said: “I don’t know platform I will use for the 2018 election yet, but, I will tell you at the appropriate time. We are still studying the situation. We have to play the game left, right and centre and whoever we are going to use and the platform, you will all be part of the process because party politics is about the people.

“You all saw how people sold their votes in Ondo State, I am confident that that will not happen in Ekiti. I am close to the people and you are the source of my strength. Even if it requires just 48 hours to any election, if I tell you where to go, you will surely follow me there.”

At a separate meeting with junior staff of the state civil service, Fayose boasted that he will repeat his 16-0 victory over his predecessor, Kayode Fayemi in 2014, where he defeated the incumbent in all the 16 local governments.

“APC will be fooling itself if it  thinks it will conquer Ekiti like it did in Ondo. Ekiti is a peculiar place and I am the man on ground here. I want to assure my supporters and Nigerians that APC won’t win a local government here in 2018, even if President Muhammadu Buhari moves down all the money in the Federal Governmemt’s TSA.

“Governor Olusegun Mimiko and Eyitayo Jegede must have lost in Ondo State, but that does not mean the people had voted rightly. Today, I am the only one among the APC governors in the South-West. I am now like the nation of Israel surrounded by enemies, but I shall defeat and triumph over them.

“APC has never defeated me in any battle, either political or legal. Whether they like it or not, I will win in Ekiti, no matter the animosity, because I have the people behind me,” Fayose declared.