The recent attempt by the Oyo State opposition to smear Hon. Bimbo Adekanmbi over his business interests is a classic case of the pot calling the kettle black, and the APC should be embarrassed by how transparently hollow the attack really is. Every serious-minded citizen is expected to have a livelihood, a profession, or a business beyond politics before aspiring to public office; it is called having a second address, and it is a mark of responsibility, not a crime. Hon. Adekanmbi owning a construction company, even alongside his wife, is not a scandal; it is a credential. It means he understands the built environment, land development, and job creation from the inside, which is precisely the kind of private-sector experience Oyo State needs at the helm. The APC’s attempt to dress this up as a conspiracy is nothing but the loud publicising of their own ignorance, revealing that they neither understand how legitimate businesses operate nor respect the dignity of enterprise.
What the opposition conveniently forgets is that enterprise is not a disqualification for public service, it is a preparation for it. A man who has built a company, signed payrolls, and navigated the realities of the construction sector brings to governance a practical wisdom that career politicians simply cannot fake. Rather than demonising legitimate business ownership, the APC should explain why they consider competence suspicious and why they fear a candidate who has actually created value outside the corridors of power. The people of Oyo State deserve leaders who have met a payroll and balanced a budget in the real world, not those whose only qualification is an appetite for office.
The irony deepens when one asks the APC a simple question they cannot answer: what business does their own candidate own? A man who failed as a local government chairman and failed again as a senator now wants us to believe he is the answer to Oyo’s problems, yet his only visible enterprise appears to be recycling failed ambitions. Before lecturing Oyo State about land and business, the APC should first account for their own record of failure and explain what they have ever built beyond political noise.
As the wise saying goes, “When you point one finger at someone else, three fingers point back at you.” This is campaign season, and desperate opponents will throw mud hoping some of it sticks, but the people of Oyo are smarter than that. They can tell the difference between a builder and a heckler, between a man with a second address and a man with nothing but a second chance at power. Oyo State’s interest deserves serious conversation, not the publicising of ignorance dressed up as scrutiny.
