No one will talk about Ogbomoso politics and winning elections in Ogbomoso zone without mentioning Otunba Adebayo Alao-Akala.
Akala, a former Governor of Oyo State, died in the early hours of Wednesday at the age of 71.
Alao-Akala, a retired police officer, was also a former Chairman of Ogbomoso North Local Government.
He was deputy governor of Oyo State from 2003 to 2007, and later governor from 2007 to 2011 on the platform of the Peoples Democratic Party.
Below are 10 things to known about him:
1 – He was born on the 3rd of June 1950, at Ogbomoso in the Ogbomoso North Local Government Area of Oyo State.
2- Alao-Akala had his elementary school at Osupa Baptist Day School, Ogbomoso. He proceeded to the Kamina Barracks Middle School, 5th Battalion of Infantry in Tamale, Ghana.
3 – He was enlisted as Cadet Inspector of Police in June 1974 at the Nigeria Police College, Ikeja. He was a police officer and served in various capacities before he retired from the Nigeria Police as the Assistant Commissioner of Police in charge of Logistics and Supply, Oyo State Police Command, Eleyele, Ibadan. Besides public service, Dr Alao-Akala is a businessman. He was the founder and chairman of TDB Global Ventures and Parrot FM radio station, both in Ogbomoso, Oyo State.
4 – He started his political career as a member of the New Dimension and participated in the zero-party local government election of 1996 and later co-founded the UNP before its fusion with UNC to form UNCP. He participated in the Ogbomoso Federal Constituency (One) primary election of the UNCP in 1997.
5 – He contested and won the chairmanship seat of the Ogbomoso North Local Government along with seven councillors under the platform of APP in 1998. He was elected the vice-chairman of ALGON, Oyo State Chapter between 1999 and 2002.
6- Alao-Akala founded the Ogbomoso Unity Forum, a political association that later joined the PDP. He was the Chairman of Ogbomoso North Local Government from 1999 to 2002.
7 – He served as the Deputy Governor of Oyo State from May 2003 to January 2006. Following the impeachment of then-incumbent Governor (Rashidi Ladoja), Alao-Akala was sworn into office in January 2006 and served for 11 months. In December 2006, the impeachment was overturned by the Supreme Court and Rashidi Ladoja was reinstated.
8 – Alao-Akala contested and won the gubernatorial election in 2007 under the platform of the People’s Democratic Party and became the Executive Governor of Oyo state, serving a full term till May 2011.
9 – On 8 December 2014, Alao-Akala defected to the Labour Party in Oyo State from the People’s Democratic Party. On 10 December 2014, he formally declared his intention to re-contest in the gubernatorial election of Oyo State on the platform of the Labour Party in the February 2015 general elections in Nigeria.
10 – On 16 December 2017, he defected to the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) in a huge ceremony in Ibadan, the capital city of Oyo State.
