Osun APC in Turmoil: 76 Leaders Seek Inclusion as Defections Mount

The All Progressives Congress (APC) in Osun State has battled internal fractures for years, but by August 2026, those cracks had widened into deep fault lines.

What should have been a straightforward campaign season became a crisis of loyalty, defections and mounting grievances, forcing the Presidency itself to intervene.
Five days before the governorship election, 76 APC leaders from Osun State were summoned to Abuja for a late-night meeting with President Bola Ahmed Tinubu. The meeting followed a call from the National Security Adviser (NSA), who had alerted the Presidency to the growing discontent within the Osun APC. The warning was political, not about violence. The NSA reportedly told the Presidency that the grievances among party leaders had reached a level capable of undermining the APC’s campaign machinery in the state.
The delegation that arrived at Aso Rock included Olubunmi Ete, former Speaker of the House of Representatives; Mojeed Alabi, Adejare Bello and Wale Afolabi, all former Speakers of the Osun State House of Assembly; as well as senior party chieftains such as Alhaji Shuaib Oyedokun, Poju Odusola and Bode Olanipekun. Others included Babajide Omoworare, a former presidential aide, and APC National Secretary Ajibola Basiru, who coordinated the meeting.
These were not fringe figures. They were leaders who had carried the party’s banner for years, commanded constituencies and influenced legislation. Their grievance was straightforward: exclusion.
For three years, federal appointments and patronage from Osun were said to have flowed largely through former governor and current Minister of Marine and Blue Economy, Adegboyega Oyetola, and his IleriOluwa faction. Other party leaders felt sidelined, humiliated before their supporters and stripped of political relevance.
At the Villa, the 76 leaders demanded recognition. They sought a share of federal appointments, contracts and political influence. They wanted assurances that the APC was not simply Oyetola’s personal political empire.
Some also expressed doubts about Bola Oyebamiji, the APC governorship candidate and former commissioner under Oyetola, questioning whether he would operate differently if elected.
President Tinubu’s assurance that there would be room for everyone at the federal level if state positions were exhausted offered some reassurance, but it did not fully address the grievances. Instead, the meeting appeared to postpone rather than resolve the deeper crisis.
Beyond the 76 leaders seeking inclusion were others whose grievances had gone much further—those who felt completely discarded by the party.
In December 2025, the APC screening committee disqualified seven of the nine governorship aspirants ahead of the party’s primary. The official reason was their failure to provide proof of sponsorship from registered party members across the required local government areas. However, to many party members, the development appeared to be a deliberate purge intended to clear the way for Oyetola’s preferred candidate.
Among those disqualified were Senator Iyiola Omisore, former deputy governor and immediate past APC National Secretary; Babajide Omoworare; Benedict Alabi; Akin Ogunbiyi; Dotun Babayemi; Babatunde Oralusi; and Adegoke Rasheed.
Bola Oyebamiji, regarded as an Oyetola loyalist, eventually emerged as the party’s candidate.
Omisore, in particular, felt betrayed. He accused party insiders of orchestrating what he described as a hatchet job to favour Oyetola’s camp. He challenged his disqualification in court but later withdrew the case following interventions by senior party leaders.
The withdrawal of the suit, however, did not heal the political wound. Omisore’s loyalty was gone.
About 20 of his supporters subsequently defected to Governor Ademola Adeleke’s Accord Party. Among them were two former commissioners who served under Oyetola’s administration—Folorunsho Bamisayemi and Yemi Lawal.
That defection came on the heels of an earlier wave. In November 2024, 32 APC leaders drawn from all 30 local government areas, led by Hon. Oluomo Owolabi, defected to the PDP. They cited a survey which reportedly indicated that 45 per cent of Oyetola’s faction had already moved to the opposition.
The figures tell a compelling story: 76 leaders summoned to Abuja for reassurance; about 20 Omisore loyalists defecting to Accord; and 32 APC leaders moving to the PDP in 2024, representing nearly half of one faction.
Individually, none of these figures is enough to bring down the APC in Osun. Collectively, however, they reveal a party steadily losing members and grassroots strength while attempting to patch its internal wounds with promises rather than a broader redistribution of political opportunities.
The APC’s response appears to have been one of delay and deflection, with hopes that the election would arrive before the arithmetic of defections became fatal. But politics can be unforgiving.
Every defection weakens grassroots structures, erodes confidence and gives the opposition greater room to operate.
The Villa meeting, therefore, was less a triumph of political strategy than a desperate response to a political warning from the National Security Adviser. It was an attempt to buy time rather than a definitive solution to the party’s problems.
The APC in Osun appears to have overlooked one of the simplest lessons of politics: inclusion matters.
Patronage cannot be monopolised indefinitely without consequences. When leaders are excluded, they may defect. When aspirants feel humiliated, they may rebel. And when grievances are ignored for too long, they can eventually turn into betrayal.
President Tinubu’s assurances at Aso Rock may have created temporary calm, but they did not erase the underlying grievances. The 76 leaders left Abuja with promises, not positions. The discarded aspirants were left with bitterness rather than reconciliation. Meanwhile, the defectors had already found new political homes in Accord and the PDP.
For three years, the APC has, in effect, allowed grievances to translate into departures. Every promise has served as a bandage, while every defection has deepened the wound.
The party is bleeding, and the Villa meeting appeared to be an attempt to slow the hemorrhage.
The story of Osun APC is ultimately the story of a party whose factional battles have gradually weakened its collective strength.
The 76 leaders who met President Tinubu represent those who are still willing to negotiate. The approximately 20 Omisore loyalists who defected represent those who have already moved on. The 32 leaders who joined the PDP represent those who, according to the account, gave up much earlier.
Whether the APC survives the election may therefore depend less on what was said at Aso Rock than on how many of the 76 leaders eventually conclude, privately, that those who defected made the right decision.
The warning from the National Security Adviser was clear: political exclusion can breed political collapse. The Villa meeting was a response to that warning, not necessarily a masterstroke.
Unless the APC learns to share power and broaden inclusion, it may continue to bleed—slowly, steadily and, perhaps, fatally.
For comments, reflections and further conversation, reach me at samuelagogo4one@yahoo.com or call +2348055847364.