Wole Oluyede backs Tinubu for 2027 after meeting Biodun Oyebanji, pledging grassroots mobilisation and a 90% target for Ekiti

PDP chieftain and former Ekiti governorship candidate Dr Wole Oluyede met Governor Biodun Oyebanji in Lagos on Thursday, August 20, 2026, to reaffirm his support for President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s 2027 re-election bid and pledge a grassroots campaign aimed at delivering 90 per cent of Ekiti’s presidential vote to the president.

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The meeting marks an unusual political rapprochement in Ekiti only two months after Oyebanji defeated Oluyede in the June 20 governorship election, securing a second term on the All Progressives Congress platform.

Oluyede said the encounter was about more than electoral calculations, describing it as a gesture of reciprocity following a visit Oyebanji made to him immediately after the governorship election.

“Governor Oyebanji came to visit me on June 21, immediately after the election. We discussed Ekiti and how we could all come together as brothers to move Ekiti forward,” Oluyede said.

“For me, it is about reciprocity, but more importantly, it is about Ekiti.”

The meeting carries added political significance because Oluyede contested the governorship election under the PDP while Oyebanji campaigned for the APC. The election produced a decisive victory for Oyebanji, who polled 319,224 votes against Oluyede’s 40,543, according to results announced by the Independent National Electoral Commission. The African Democratic Congress candidate, Dare Bejide, finished third with 12,872 votes.

Oyebanji’s victory came despite Oluyede winning his own polling unit in Ikere Local Government Area. At one of the polling units where Oluyede voted, the PDP candidate secured 119 votes against Oyebanji’s 113.

The overall result, however, gave the APC governor a commanding lead across the state and secured his return for another term.

Against that backdrop, Oluyede’s decision to work with Oyebanji for Tinubu represents a significant shift from the intense competition of the governorship campaign.

Oluyede recently announced that he would support Tinubu’s re-election alongside members of the Oluyede Progressive Alliance for Renewed Hope Agenda, known as OPARHA. He now says the next stage is to convert that declaration into an organised grassroots operation.

“I want us to focus on 2027 and how we can win Ekiti for Mr President. To achieve that, everybody needs to come together,” Oluyede said.

“Today’s meeting is part of the move and the commitment I made to work with Mr Governor towards the victory of President Tinubu in Ekiti come 2027.”

His proposed campaign is deliberately local in character.

Oluyede said he and his team would move from house to house, village to village and community to community across the state, engaging residents directly and seeking support for Tinubu.

“We will go from house to house, village to village and community to community. We are going to speak directly with our people, listen to them and mobilise them for President Tinubu,” he said.

The former PDP candidate said the mobilisation would extend across Ekiti’s 16 local government areas and involve political leaders, traditional rulers, community leaders, young people, women, professionals and business owners.

His stated target is ambitious: 90 per cent of the presidential vote in Ekiti for Tinubu.

“Our target is clear. We want Ekiti to give President Tinubu 90 per cent. We are going to work for it,” Oluyede said.

The proposed alliance also draws on a longstanding theme in Ekiti political culture, with Oluyede presenting cross-party cooperation as part of the state’s tradition of communal identity.

“We may belong to different political parties, but at the end of the day, we are Ekiti people. We are brothers. We can disagree politically without becoming enemies,” he said.

Oluyede invoked the Yoruba concept of Omoluabi, associated with character, responsibility and good conduct, saying political disagreements should not destroy relationships among Ekiti people.

“What they know Ekiti for is Omoluabi, and we will forever remain so. Political differences should not destroy the bonds that unite us as Ekiti people,” he said.

Oyebanji welcomed the gesture, according to his Special Adviser on Media, Yinka Oyebode.

Oyebode said Oluyede briefed the governor on his decision to support Tinubu and that the two men also discussed the progress of Ekiti and the governor’s second-term administration, which is scheduled to begin on October 16.

Oyebanji thanked Oluyede for what he described as his statesmanship and commitment to Ekiti’s progress and national development.

The political significance of the development extends beyond the personal relationship between the two men.

The 2026 Ekiti election demonstrated the strength of the APC’s position in the state. Oyebanji secured 319,224 votes, more than seven times Oluyede’s 40,543, while the ADC recorded 12,872 votes.

The result followed a campaign in which Oyebanji also won several politically symbolic polling units, including the unit of Senate Leader Opeyemi Bamidele, where the governor received 164 votes against Oluyede’s eight.

Oluyede’s new role could therefore give the Tinubu campaign an opportunity to broaden its appeal beyond the APC’s established structure, particularly among PDP supporters and voters who backed the opposition candidate in the governorship contest.

Whether that support translates into votes will depend on the ability of the proposed coalition to move beyond elite-level meetings and connect with voters at community level.

That challenge is particularly relevant because the 2027 presidential contest will take place against a national backdrop shaped by economic reforms, the removal of petrol subsidies, the cost of living and competing claims over the direction of the Nigerian economy.

For Oluyede, however, the immediate emphasis is on unity.

The former PDP candidate is asking Ekiti political actors to separate electoral disagreements from the broader interests of the state and country.

His partnership with Oyebanji suggests that the fierce contest of June has already given way, at least between the two men, to a more pragmatic political relationship.

The photographs from their Lagos meeting capture that shift: a PDP figure who once sought to unseat Oyebanji now standing alongside the governor in support of the president’s next electoral campaign.

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Whether the 90 per cent target can be achieved remains to be seen. But with Oluyede promising an extensive grassroots effort, the alliance has introduced a new and potentially influential dynamic into Tinubu’s 2027 campaign in Ekiti.