Governor of Oyo State
Rashidi Ladoja was elected governor of Oyo State in April 2003 on the PDP platform, and took office on 29 May 2003. He was supported by Alhaji Lamidi Adedibu, a PDP power broker in the state. By August 2004, Ladoja and Adedibu were locked in a fierce struggle over allocation of government appointees. Ladoja was not supported by the party in this dispute. In an interview in late 2005, the PDP national chairman, Ahmadu Ali, said that Rasheed Ladoja should take instructions from Lamidi Adedibu.
On 12 January 2006, Ladoja was impeached by Oyo State legislators and forced out of office. The impeachment may have been due to the argument between Ladoja and Lamidi Adedibu. His deputy, Christopher Adebayo Alao-Akala, was sworn in as the new governor. On 1 November 2006, the Appeal Court in the state capital, Ibadan, declared the impeachment null and illegal, but advised waiting for confirmation of this decision by the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court upheld the decision on November 11, 2009, and Ladajo officially resumed office on December 12, 2006. Anti-riot police were deployed along the main roads leading to the main government offices to prevent violence from supporters of Adebayo Alao-Akala and Lamidi Adedibu during his reinstatement.
Ladoja failed to win the PDP nomination as candidate for a second term. He chose to back the Action Congress candidates for 33 local council chairmanship elections. The PDP refused to participate in the elections. As a result, the Action Congress (AC) won 26 seats and the All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP) won seven. However, his successor as governor, his former deputy and former acting governor Christopher Adebayo Akala, sacked the council chairmen shortly after taking office and replaced them with PDP supporters.
Read more about this topic: Rashidi Adewolu Ladoja
Famous quotes containing the words governor of, governor and/or state:
“Three years ago, also, when the Sims tragedy was acted, I said to myself, There is such an officer, if not such a man, as the Governor of Massachusetts,—what has he been about the last fortnight? Has he had as much as he could do to keep on the fence during this moral earthquake?... He could at least have resigned himself into fame.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“President Lowell of Harvard appealed to students ‘to prepare themselves for such services as the Governor may call upon them to render.’ Dean Greenough organized an ‘emergency committee,’ and Coach Fisher was reported by the press as having declared, ‘To hell with football if men are needed.’”
—For the State of Massachusetts, U.S. public relief program (1935-1943)
“The Apache have a legend that the coyote brought them fire and that the bear in his hibernations communes with the spirits of the “overworld” and later imparts the wisdom gained thereby to the medicine men.”
—Administration in the State of Arizona, U.S. public relief program (1935-1943)