Edo State All Progressives Congress (APC) chieftain, John Mayaki, has accused Deputy Governor, Philip Shaibu of cajoling Labour Party’s supporters in a bid to generate support for his rumoured 2024 governorship ambition.

He was responding to the deputy governor’s recent statement in which he praised the youths of the country behind the Obidient wave, while also criticising the conduct of the just-concluded general elections, with blame laid at the feet of President Muhammadu Buhari and other electoral stakeholders.

Mayaki said: “The deputy governor is merely trying to revive his political career, which is presently dead, by pandering to a growing voter base in Edo State.

“In his usual opportunistic style of joining any trend perceived to be popular, similar to how he began to wear khaki to copy a self-professed mentor, Shaibu seeks to lie his way into the Obidient fold ahead of a possible exit from the PDP to pursue his governorship ambition next year.

"It t is funny to see Shaibu take a moral high ground on the subject of rigging after he connived with his principal to unleash the worst kind of terror on Edo North voters, especially the same Obidients he now embarrassingly genuflects to, in the recently-concluded State Assembly election.”

Mayaki also dismissed as duplicitous Shaibu’s call for the old guard to surrender power to the youths.

According to him, “If the almost sixty-year-old Shaibu is serious about a change of guard in the country, then he should announce his withdrawal from the 2024 governorship contest in Edo State and back a younger candidate in his stead.”

“Just because his actions and character fail to reflect his biological clock doesn’t mean he is a child. A man nearer to 60 than he is to fifty, yet unrelenting in his quest for power in a country where the median age is 18, should not be leading conversations about the transfer of power to the youths unless, of course, such a man lacks self-awareness. Obidients in Edo State must shine their eyes” he said.

(Daily Sun)

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