Gbadebo Rhodes-Vivour, a former gubernatorial aspirant in the Peoples Democratic Party, will officially announce his defection to Labour Party (LP) “next week”.
Mr Rhodes-Vivour, one of the favourites to clinch the PDP’s guber ticket for the 2023 general election, withdrew from the race hours before the party’s primaries.
His withdrawal, alongside three other aspirants, paved the way for the emergence of Olajide Adediran, popularly known as Jandor, as the PDP governorship candidate.
A source close to Mr Rhodes-Vivour, told PREMIUM TIMES that the former aspirant is leaving the PDP because of his dissatisfaction with the party’s internal politics.
The source further said Mr Rhodes-Vivour’s defection is connected to the way the PDP handled its guber primaries.
Some media reports had also stated that his dissatisfaction stemmed from the refusal of Mr Adediran to name him as running mate despite being endorsed by all 20 local government chairpersons of the party in the state.
Mr Rhodes-Vivour, 39, was the KOWA Party candidate in Ikeja in the 2017 local government election in Lagos State.
He later joined the PDP and ran for the Lagos West senatorial ticket, narrowly losing to the incumbent senator, Solomon Adeola, of the APC, polling 243,516 votes to Mr Adeola’s 323,817.
Ifagbemi Awamaridi, the LP chairman in Lagos, said he is not aware of Mr Rhodes-Vivour’s decision to join his party yet.
“You know he has to join from the ward, and when he does, the ward and the local government chairmen will be aware,” said Mr Awamaridi, who is also the LP guber candidate for 2023.
“Once he registers with his ward, I’ll be aware.
“A lot of people always announce they are joining the party and if the person is a political novice, they will just collect money from him.”
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