The Ogun State chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Abayomi Tella, has declared that politicians who recently defected from the PDP to the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) have been reduced to “onlookers” and sidelined within their new party.
Tella made the assertion yesterday while speaking to journalists in Abeokuta, barely five months after the state’s immediate past PDP chairman, Sikirulai Ogundele, the party’s 2023 deputy governorship candidate, and several others formally joined the APC in July 2025.
According to Tella, the defectors are being treated as outsiders because they were absent during the APC’s formative struggles and the hard work that delivered electoral victories for the ruling party.
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“It is no longer enviable for a politician to cross from PDP to APC because most of our members who have gone there have become onlookers,” he said.
“They were not part of the system from day one. When APC members were labouring for victory, these defectors were nowhere to be found, so they will continue to be treated as strangers.”
While dismissing the attractiveness of joining the APC, Tella surprisingly left the door wide open for high-profile APC figures with PDP roots to return to the opposition fold, particularly citing the growing rift between Governor Dapo Abiodun and the senator representing Ogun East, Otunba Gbenga Daniel.
The PDP chairman suggested that the party is already strategising to capitalise on the frosty relationship between the two APC heavyweights ahead of the 2027 elections.
“We will begin to look at areas where the PDP can gain from the ongoing rift between Dapo Abiodun and OGD,” Tella stated.
He hinted that should Governor Abiodun fail to secure the APC senatorial ticket for Ogun East or Senator Daniel lose grip on the party structure, either could be “lured” or “harvested” back into the PDP.
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He extended the same olive branch to former Governor Ibikunle Amosun, emphasising that Abiodun, Daniel, and Amosun all began their political careers in the PDP and would be warmly received if ambition or intra-party crises pushed them back.
“Bringing people like OGD, Abiodun, and Amosun into PDP would be a big win for the party,” he added.
Reaffirming the PDP’s resilience in Ogun State despite years of electoral setbacks, Tella declared: “PDP is here to stay. The party can never die. If you try to kill it today, it will resurrect tomorrow. We are making frantic efforts to keep our people together.”
