Osun State Governor, Ademola Adeleke, has dismissed allegations by the All Progressives Congress (APC) that he bribed leaders of the National Union of Local Government Employees (NULGE), describing the claims as false, baseless, and a direct assault on democracy and the judiciary.
In a statement released on Sunday by his spokesperson, Olawale Rasheed, Governor Adeleke accused the APC of spreading deliberate misinformation to undermine the rule of law and destabilize the state’s political atmosphere.
“The level of impunity on display by the state APC constitutes a serious threat to our democratic life,” Adeleke said. “The party started by falsifying a Court of Appeal judgment to claim a fake reinstatement of its court-sacked chairmen.”
According to him, the APC disregarded a valid court ruling affirming the legality of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) chairmen and councillors across Osun’s local governments.
“Behaving like political robbers in a lawless country, the state APC invaded council secretariats without any legal mandate and even attempted to claim public funds until they were stopped by the courts,” he added.
Adeleke accused the opposition of open defiance of the judiciary and warned that such disregard for the rule of law poses a grave danger to democracy.
He urged the public to dismiss the APC’s “new bag of lies,” insisting that NULGE is an independent body acting in defense of workers’ interests, not one that can be “induced or bought.”
“The fight to stop the attempted looting of local government funds is a collective effort. The people have resisted illegality, and the judiciary will soon give its final verdict,” the governor maintained.
Earlier, the APC, through its Director of Media and Information, Kola Olabisi, alleged that Governor Adeleke paid huge sums to senior NULGE officials to prolong their ongoing strike.
The party claimed that a viral video showed that each Head of Local Government Administration in the 69 councils and LCDAs received ₦750,000, while Directors of Administration and Finance got ₦500,000 each. Other NULGE leaders allegedly received ₦250,000 to sustain the eight-month work stoppage.
“It is strange that a government could fund an illegal strike against itself,” Olabisi said, adding that the situation has worsened the hardship of grassroots residents and delayed local government fund disbursements.
He accused NULGE leaders of betraying their members’ welfare and vowed that the APC would restore “the lost glory” of Osun State when it returns to power in 2026.
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