By DAYO JOHNSON

AKURE — TWO chieftains of the Action Congress of Nigeria, ACN, in Ondo State, Senator Ajayi Boroffice and the governorship candidate of the party in the last election, Rotimi Akeredolu, SAN, are at loggerheads over the leadership of the party in the state ahead of the 2014 elections.

While Boroffice is insisting that as the highest political office holder in the party the leadership mantle falls on him, Akeredolu said Boroffice joined the party few months to the governorship election and was not qualified to control the party.

The simmering crisis within the party was blown open when Boroffice led other leaders of the party to inauguration of the All Progressive Congress, APC, merger committee in the state without recourse to Akeredolu or the state executive of the party.

The state executive of the party allegedly acting the script of Akeredolu reacted within 24 hours after the inauguration to dissociate the party from the action of Boroffice.

The state Publicity Secretary of the party Mr. Rotimi Agbede said that the “Senator Ajayi Boroffice-led merger panel was null and void because it was without the support of the national secretariat of the ACN.

Agbede in a statement disowning Boroffice committee said: “The meeting expressed its utter dismay and condemned in strong terms, a publication in some national dailies announcing the constitution of a steering committee for the APC purportedly by some members in the state.

“The ACN in the state wish to make it clear that the merger of some political parties to form the APC was an idea of the affected parties that saw the need to rescue Nigeria from its precarious situation and restore it to its enviable position in the comity of great nations.

“The directives for the activities that will lead to the final consummation of the merger plans have been flowing directly from the national secretariats of the merging parties to all state chapters.

But in his reaction Boroffice dismissed the submissions of the ACN executive in the state and declared that they lacked necessary locus standi to issue such statement.

Boroffice said “I was given the mandate to midwife the process of bringing all the parties involved in the merger process together being the highest political office holder in the Ondo ACN by the national leadership of the party at a meeting recently and there was a communique to that effect.

“There is no executive of ACN again in Ondo state because it had been dissolved. The APC held its convention in Lagos where the decision was taken. We had submitted our party’s licence and certificate.

“The problem with those still parading themselves as executives of the ACN in Ondo state is that they have the ambition of automatically becoming officers of the APC after the full merger and that is not constitutional.”

Boroffice therefore pledged to carry out his assignment of ensuring a perfect merger of all the participating political parties in the state not minding the position of the executive of the ACN in the state.

An aide to Akeredolu said that how can Boroffice who jumped ship from Labour Party be directed by the National Secretariat of the party to inaugurate the merger committee without recourse to other chieftain of the party especially Akeredolu.

Speaking in confidence, he said that Boroffice was trying to hijack the party and position himself ahead of the 2015 election.

According to him the leaders of the party knows who to relate to and that Boroffice was only dropping names by saying that the leadership of the party gave him the directive.