The campaign organisation of Senator Sharafadeen Alli, the All Progressives Congress (APC) governorship candidate in Oyo State, has dismissed criticism of his manifesto by Bimbo Adekanmbi, the Allied Peoples Movement (APM) candidate. It described the criticism as frustration at a superior plan.
Oyo AHEAD manifesto: campaign responds to criticism
In a statement on Wednesday, Bisi Oladele, Director of Media and Publicity of the Senator Sharafadeen Alli Campaign Organisation (SSACO), said Adekanmbi’s position reflected a desperate effort to defend Governor Seyi Makinde’s administration. The Oyo AHEAD manifesto, it said, offers a grassroots development strategy and addresses what it called failures in health, education, agriculture and youth development over the past seven years.
The APM had earlier criticised the document as lacking originality and recycling proposals already being implemented by the Makinde administration. SSACO rejected this. “Is it not intellectually disingenuous to describe policies as not original simply because previous governments had announced similar initiatives?” the statement asked.
Oyo AHEAD manifesto: claims against the Makinde administration
SSACO alleged that Oyo State has the highest number of out-of-school children in the Southwest, that many hospitals lack a single doctor, and that no farm settlement is functioning despite multibillion-naira appropriations. It also questioned why the state ranked 27th in WAEC performance. These claims were made by the campaign and were not independently verified in the statement.
The campaign challenged Adekanmbi to explain why poorly staffed primary healthcare centres should stop a future government from building better-equipped and better-funded facilities.
Oyo AHEAD manifesto: Alli’s record
SSACO described Alli as a home-grown leader trusted by the people. It noted that he previously led Ibadan North Local Government, served as Secretary to the State Government and Chief of Staff under former governor Rashidi Ladoja, and now represents Oyo South Senatorial District. It called the manifesto “a surgery for the illness inflicted on the people of Oyo State” that sets measurable targets.
Oyo AHEAD manifesto and the 2027 governorship race
Political observers expect the race to centre on four candidates: Oriyomi Hamzat, Adekanmbi, Alli and Adegoke. Adekanmbi enters the contest with technocratic credentials, government experience and the backing of Governor Makinde. The Makinde administration had not responded to the allegations at the time of reporting.
SSACO urged voters to back Alli, “who they know very well as one of them.”
