Prince Gbemileke Alagbe, also known as Eleniyan, is a governorship aspirant on the platform of the African Democratic Congress (ADC), in this interview with RUKIYAT OGUNWADE, he speaks about the deepening crisis rocking the party over its governorship candidate in Oyo State, his political ambition among other issues. Excerpts;
There is currently confusion in the ADC in Oyo State over who the authentic governorship candidate is but INEC uploaded Chief Adegboyega’s name last Saturday. How did we get to this point?
At no time did INEC upload the name of Adegoke . What they basically did was to just display his name in one of the notice boards, which we know, is illegal, it’s criminal, and it is undemocratic. Number one, I’m the authentic candidate of the party. I contested the election, the primary election on May 22nd, 2026.
The primary election was conducted in the 351 wards of the Oyo State, and the final collation was done at the University of Ibadan and INEC was present throughout, both at the ward, at the local government, and at the state collation. After the primaries, I was declared a winner with over 15, 000 votes.
Two weeks later, we applied to INEC for a Certified True Copy of the report of the primaries. So they gave us a certified true copy report, and that to us is sufficient as the true winner of the primary.
That is actually the only certified true copy that was issued by INEC. INEC has not issued any other certified true copy report of the primaries ever since.
So I am the authentic candidate of the party. Whoever smuggles Adegoke’s name into the INEC portal is just a joker. If INEC monitor primaries, if INEC issues certified true copy of the report of the primaries in line with Section 4(i) of the Electoral Act, I don’t think INEC has any right to publish any other person’s name.
My name had been uploaded already, and you can listen to him in one of the short videos that was going viral, where he admitted that he and God knows how they get their names into the INEC portal.
The party leadership at the national level seems divided. What is your relationship with the ADC National Working Committee right now, and whose directive are you following?
For now, we have the presidential candidate and the vice presidential candidate, we have the party executives, in person of the chairman and the secretary, we are totally good, except the national secretary who seems to be insisting on imposing a candidate on us but he must have been living in the past because the present reality shows that you cannot impose a candidate on anybody, except you want to lose the election, not only the lose the election, you want to invalidate your candidacy because Section 29(i) of the electoral act is very clear that the party shall nominate the name of the duly elected candidate of the party to the INEC. So, the party has no option but to send the name of the person who truly won the primaries to INEC. So, if one person out of 1000 wants to impose an unpopular candidate on us in Oyo state, it’s not going to work. What happened in Osun and the Ekiti, cannot work in Oyo State. Oyo State is cosmopolitan, Oyo state is dynamic, and our state is a cradle of the Yorùbá politics.
Many party members say this crisis is about money and godfatherism. Is that true?
What? Well, I don’t understand because I’m hearing that for the first time. Yes, if you say godfatherism, God, the father is my own God father, and he, on the other hand, Aregbesola, is his God father. I understand. If you say money, well, I don’t think any of us is poor. You are in my house, everybody knows that nobody will be at this stage and be poor. So I don’t see how money comes into it. But maybe you can enlighten me because I really don’t understand the idea of money, but godfatherism will not work in Oyo state politics. We are more sophisticated than that, especially when you want to come from Osun to impose a candidate on us in Oyo state. It will fail flatly.
Also, there is a lot of allegation of bribery, some people were alleging that some party executives must have been compromised, that is, criminal. Maybe, himself and the people who put his name to INEC should tell us how they are able to do it without bribery. I understand why some people are alleging bribery because they must have been used. They must have been bribed. But we will look onto it eventually. If they actually go ahead with that threat to impose or to substitute me, I am going to call for a criminal investigation to the whole process because I know some people must have been compromised or induced using money because how else a political party would wants to substitute a candidate without informing the candidate? How else would you substitute a candidate without even following due process? Because the constitution says that the candidate needs to sworn an affidavit and if INEC are out of this, who compromised who
Chief Adegoke’s name is currently on the INEC portal. Does that mean the battle is already lost for you, or do you have other option?
I don’t see his name being on the portal. If INEC confirms his name is on the portal, that means we need to sue them and claim damages. They did not confirm to me that his name was on the portal. What they are telling us is that, the matter is still in court, that his name is nowhere. So as at today, I remain the validly elected candidate of ADC in Oyo State, the authentic, and whatever he is doing, all that he is parading to get a ticket of somebody attempting to submit his name somewhere, which to me is a waste of time and energy. So, if INEC do so, they should let us know so that we can sue them for damages.
There is a court case coming up in a few weeks regarding the authentic ADC candidate. What exactly are you asking the court to determine?
We are just asking the court to preserve our mandates. We told the court that we are the winner of the primaries, and we know that these people are desperate, and they can go to whatever extent to change or manipulate our mandates, so we are asking the courts to preserve the mandate. We are seeking the court to protect our mandate. We are asking the courts not to allow anybody to do otherwise. So we are asking for an injunction that no other name should be recognised, either by the party or by INEC, except my name, which I think is a normal thing in politics and a normal thing in litigation.
How confident are you that the judgment will go in your favour?
We will not tell you our strategy but will tell you things that we can tell the public, let me tell you one point. The electoral act is with us because I have quoted section 29 and section 84 during the course of this interview, and I can bet you I can put over 10 constitutional electoral act provisions that are strongly in our favour. The constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, 1999 amended, is strongly in our favour because it is an abuse of the right to be voted for, and for anybody to want to substitute your name without your consent. So it’s a violation of my fundamental rights for anybody, be it INEC, the party, be it Aregbesola, or whatever, want to substitute my name without my consent, having been truly voted for by the people, it is a violation of my rights. Number three, it is an abuse of the court process for any other person to claim to have been a candidate of the party, because before the primaries there has been a ruling by Justice Malik of Federal High Court, Abuja stating that it is only my group that is recognised by law, and they still appeal that judgment. The court of appeal still ruled that it is only my group that is recognised by law in Oyo State.
If the court rule against you, what will be your next line of action, will you support the party’s candidate?
Number one, the court will not rule against me. Number two, I have told you that this battle is going up to the Supreme Court. As far as I am concerned, there must be a case in the analogue of Nigerian history called Gbemileke vs INEC and ADC. There must be that case that the world will cites, and I am ready to pursue the case up to Supreme Court. So, they should not make the mess of themselves by thinking the court will rule against me because the court will not rule against me, and even if that was done, we are appealing up to Supreme Court. Nobody should think he has a monopoly of instrumentality of law. We have over 32 lawyers, and we are going to use those lawyers to our maximum benefit. We are going to use the law to our maximum advantage.
Beyond the legal battle, how is this crisis affecting the party unity and the morale of ADC members in Oyo?
Well, I have been going around to tell our members to continue to support our presidential candidate, Atiku Abubakar and the vice presidential candidate, Rotimi Amaechi. We are campaigning every day, a day before yesterday, I was campaigning for House of Representatives and Senates in Ibadan Southwest, and we are going round to mobilise for our presidential candidate and our National Assembly candidates. And I can bet you when they lift ban on campaign for governorship, I’m going out with my campaign. If he likes he should be campaigning. That is his own business. But eventually, we know that he will be campaigning for us because we are the ones standing by the law. No court of law will rule in favour of somebody who conducted his primary in contravention with a court pronouncement, a court judgement. No courts of law. We have not descended into the abysmal of corruption and abysmal of illegality to that extent, we are a country of law, we are a country of rule and regulation, and we are a country of law and order. So whatever they are trying to do is impunity, and impunity will not stand.