As Ogun State prepares for the 2027 governorship election, the familiar debate over power rotation has resurfaced with renewed intensity, pitching the state’s four major ethnic blocs: Egba, Ijebu, Remo and Yewa (Egbado), against one another in what is fast becoming one of the defining issues of the contest, TUNDE BODUNRIN reports.
Although political parties insist that candidates emerge through competitive primaries, the agitation over which zone should produce the next governor of Ogun State has taken precedence over party ideology. Across the state, political leaders, traditional rulers, socio-cultural groups and opinion moulders are increasingly framing the election around equity, inclusion and historical justice.
The race to Oke Mosan is therefore no longer merely about who wins the election, but whose turn it is to govern. While the Ijebus argue that they have not occupied the governorship since the advent of the Fourth Republic in 1999, the Yewas insist they remain the only major bloc in Ogun State that has never produced an elected governor despite decades of political participation.
Since the beginning of the Fourth Republic, the governorship has largely rotated between the Egba and Remo axis. Chief Olusegun Osoba, an Egba indigene, governed between May 1999 and May 2003 under the platform of the Alliance for Democracy (AD). He was succeeded by Gbenga Daniel from Remo, who served between 2003 and 2011 under the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). Another Egba son, Senator Ibikunle Amosun, occupied Oke Mosan from 2011 to 2019 under the All Progressives Congress (APC), before Prince Dapo Abiodun, from Iperu-Remo, assumed office in 2019 under the same party and is expected to complete his second term in 2027.
This pattern has fuelled persistent complaints from both Ijebu and Yewa that they have remained spectators while the state’s highest political office alternates between two blocs.
What differentiates the agitation of the Ijebus from that of the Yewas, however, is that Ijebu is part of Ogun East Senatorial District, which has produced three governors. First was the late Chief Olabisi Onabanjo during the Second Republic, followed by Daniel and Abiodun under the current Fourth Republic, although both are from the Remo axis of the district.
By contrast, Ogun West, which is predominantly inhabited by the Yewa people and comprises five local government areas, Ado-Odo/Ota, Imeko-Afon, Ipokia, Yewa North and Yewa South, has yet to produce a governor since the state was created in 1976.
