The governorship candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in Ogun State, Senator Solomon Adeola, popularly known as Yayi, has dismissed claims that his father was buried in Ekiti State.
Yayi described those who keep insisting he is from Ekiti, not Ogun, as jesters.
According to him, his late father was buried in the house he built at Ogunsola Street in Alaguntan, Alimosho Local Government Area of Lagos.
He insisted that he is a bona fide indigene of Ogun, stressing that both his father and mother were from the state.
NEWSNGR reports that Adeola, the Chairman of the Senate Committee on Appropriation, spoke with reporters in Lagos on his governorship ambition on Monday.
“My father is from Ogun State, my mother is from Ogun State. I am from Ogun State. Those who claim I am from Ekiti are jesters.
“My father was not buried in Ekiti; my father was buried in the house he built at Ogunsola Street at Alaguntan in Alimosho,” he said.
He said the claims were mere political gimmicks, which, according to him, would not succeed.
“They are just playing politics with the ridiculous claims, and they will not succeed,” he said.
Adeola said his ambition to become governor was driven by a passion to serve and develop Ogun, not for personal enrichment.
“My ambition to be the governor of this state is not based on personal interest or plan to enrich myself or to be in that exalted office to be called governor, but based on passion to serve. Passion to serve the people of Ogun,” he said.
He said his journey to securing the Ogun governorship ticket had not been smooth.
Adeola recalled that his first attempt to return home from Lagos to contest was met with “a brick wall”, forcing him to return to Lagos West, where he won the senatorial seat.
He said his second attempt to succeed former Gov. Ibikunle Amosun also met stiff resistance, which again took him back to the Senate.
According to him, it was on the third attempt that God answered his prayers when he later secured the Ogun West ticket and won, and now the governorship ticket.
The lawmaker said that with 24 years in the legislature, eight years in the Lagos State House of Assembly, four years in the House of Representatives and 12 years in the Senate, he had acquired the requisite experience to govern the state.
He said what Ogun needed now was consolidation and continuity.
“I strongly feel that the next person in line must come to consolidate on the gains we have made in the last seven and a half years as a state,” Adeola said.
