Secession: Amosun’s statement on OPC reckless, shameful, says Gani Adams

The National Coordinator of Oodua Peoples Congress (OPC), Otunba Gani Adams, has cautioned Governor Ibikunle Amosun of Ogun State from making frivolous allegations against ethnic militia groups in Nigeria.
In a statement on Wednesday, Adams described the statement credited to Amosun, alleging that OPC and other militias have secessionist tendencies as “hopelessly unfortunate, reckless, frivolous in intention and an act which is very undignified of the personality of a South-West Governor”.
Adams pointed out that “I would have ignored the comment as the ranting of an ant but coming out from the mouth of a Yoruba personality and a Governor of a state in Yorubaland, who is supposed to know the import and magnitude of secession to the sovereignty and unity of Nigeria, then I have to make our stand clear and clean.
“To show that the statement is not only shameful and unexpected but a brazen act of blackmail which is totally false in concept and malicious is the fact that for the past 12 years, OPC has not done anything or embark on any act that is secessionist in nature.
Adams said: “We have not, neither through act or deed, nor neither through spoken word or press release, made mention of secession or break up of this country. It is thus surprising where the Executive Governor of Ogun State came about his so-called secessionist tendencies of OPC.
“Governor Amosun must be hallucinating or coming from a bad dream for I don’t know where he came about his allegation of secession or felony and OPC.
“It is a criminal libel for Governor Amosun to label OPC as a secessionist group. We are a socio-cultural group determined to protect the territorial-cultural integrity of Yoruba people within the confine of a truly Federal Republic of Nigeria. This is why I participated in the National Confab with a resolve for Regionalism, not breaking up of the country.
“It is sad that people like Governor Amosun, who were hiding their heads and carousing under the comfort of their families during the Abacha tenure of terror when we were fighting for the re-establishment of democracy in Nigeria, are the ones reaping where they did not sow.
“We don’t even begrudge them for this but they are now assaulting our integrity with aggressive and intimidating verbal cholera to project us, who were in the trenches, as felonists and secessionists.
“I hereby call on Governor Amosun to look for a more better and presentable onions to sell and position himself for a national recognition and respect, instead of telling brazen lies and outright falsehood against OPC.
“I expected him to read the statement of the Governor of Ondo State, Dr Segun Mimiko, who publicly testified to the confidence in the conduct and protection of OPC members
to even the police. That is a statement from a culturally-responsible governor who appreciates and values the essence of OPC in Yoruba land.
“I am not disappointed in him. It is the effect of what they call folio de grandeur, stupidity of greatness. But he should remember that governor’s tenure is temporal but Yoruba race and its development will outlive him.”
Adams appealed to OPC members not to be demoralised with the “reckless statement of Governor Amosun which must have been a product of hallucination and frustration which is not supposed to be displaced on us”.