The recent events in the African Democratic Congress (ADC) in Kogi West have once again reminded us how fragile political institutions become when commandeered by individuals who place personal ambition above collective interest. The now-expelled Leke Abejide–led EXCO stands as a textbook case of how a party structure can be hijacked, distorted, and nearly destroyed under the weight of ego-driven leadership.
For months, Abejide and his loyalists paraded themselves as the authentic custodians of the ADC in Kogi West. Their claim was loud, aggressive, and strategically designed to create confusion. But like all structures built on political quicksand, the façade eventually collapsed. The official unveiling of the legitimate ADC structure in Kogi West did not just inaugurate a new beginning—it exposed the shallow foundation on which Abejide’s faction had been operating.
The Abejide group represented everything an opposition party should never become: divisive, uncoordinated, and tone-deaf to the needs of the electorate. Instead of strengthening the party’s footprint in the district, the faction spent its time fueling internal acrimony, issuing contradictory statements, and undermining the confidence of genuine party members.
Their expulsion was not only overdue—it was necessary.
A party that hopes to stand as a credible alternative cannot afford the luxury of rogue executives whose only mission is to seize the steering wheel even when they do not understand the direction, the map, or the destination. Abejide’s temporary hold on the structure demonstrated no vision, no ideology, and no capacity for building sustainable political machinery.
And then there is the controversy surrounding Hon. Abejide, the House of Representatives member whose name keeps surfacing in whispers and allegations. While these claims remain unverified, the constant association of the Abejide faction with questionable external influences should trouble anyone concerned with the health of democracy in Kogi West. At the very least, it reveals how vulnerable the expelled EXCO was to manipulation and how disconnected it had become from the interests of the party faithful.
The new leadership of the ADC deserves credit for refusing to allow the party to drift into irrelevance. By decisively dismantling the Abejide-led structure, they restored the confidence of stakeholders and re-established order in a space that had been polluted by needless factional theatrics.
The lesson from this episode is clear: political parties must guard their internal mechanisms against opportunists who mistake temporary noise for legitimate influence. Kogi West’s ADC has survived a major internal storm, but the work of rebuilding begins now—brick by brick, ward by ward, community by community.
The Abejide era is over. The damage it caused should never be repeated.
– Ahmad Ibrahim writes from Lokoja.
