Deputy Senate Minority Leader and Osun West Senator Lere Oyewumi and House of Representatives member Lanre Oladebo have secured the Accord Party’s tickets to contest the 2027 general elections, completing a political realignment that has fundamentally redrawn Osun State’s legislative landscape.
The development follows a months-long wave of defections from the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) to the Accord Party, driven largely by a deepening crisis within the PDP’s national leadership and a desire among Osun legislators to align with Governor Ademola Adeleke, who formally joined the Accord Party in December 2025, days after resigning from the PDP, citing the crisis within its national leadership.
Senator Oyewumi was endorsed for re-election to the Osun West Senatorial District seat, with the Accord leadership across the zones ratifying the endorsement after a closed-door meeting. The names of the endorsed aspirants were forwarded to the state leadership of the party for approval. Similarly, incumbent members of the House of Representatives and the State House of Assembly were cleared in their respective constituencies.
Oladebo, who represents the Ayedaade/Irewole/Isokan Federal Constituency, was among the PDP lawmakers who crossed to Accord on March 2, 2026. Announcing the defections, the federal lawmakers declared: “On behalf of my colleagues, we have from today moved to the Accord Party,” urging supporters to participate actively in the forthcoming governorship election.
Until his own defection in March, Senator Oyewumi was the last PDP senator in Osun State, following the earlier defections of colleagues Olubiyi Fadeyi and Francis Fadahunsi to the All Progressives Congress (APC). His defection was formally registered at Ward 9 in Ikire, Irewole Local Government Area of the state, where he was received by the Osun State Chairman of the Accord Party, Victor Akande, alongside other party leaders and stakeholders.
The path to the 2027 tickets, however, was not without internal friction. Tension had been brewing within the Accord Party in Osun State over an alleged plan to grant automatic tickets to lawmakers who recently defected from the PDP. A group under the aegis of the Broad Coalition of Concerned Political Stakeholders and Grassroots Mobilisers warned that sidelining credible aspirants who had invested significant time, resources, and grassroots energy into the democratic process could have serious political consequences across the state.
Oladebo, speaking amid the ongoing primaries, urged fellow politicians not to allow unfavourable outcomes to damage long-term political relationships. He reflected on his political journey, recalling how he eventually made it to the House of Representatives despite losing a primary election in 2022, noting that patience, loyalty, and perseverance open doors that bitterness cannot. He acknowledged the support he received from Senator Oyewumi and other senior officials of the Osun State Government during his political journey.
The broader realignment in Osun is substantial. Last month, Adewale Egbedun, Speaker of the Osun State House of Assembly, 24 members of the state legislature, and Moshood Adeoti, a former Secretary to the State Government, joined the Accord Party. The primaries are ongoing, with at least one other Osun lawmaker, Bamidele Salam, winning the Accord Party ticket for Ede North/Ede South/Egbedore/Ejigbo Federal Constituency through an affirmation supervised by the party’s national publicity secretary.
The 2027 general elections are scheduled to hold in February of that year. With Accord now fielding a near-complete slate of incumbent federal and state legislators from Osun, the party is positioned as the dominant political force in the state, though opposition parties including the APC and newly formed coalitions have also begun fielding candidates across the state’s senatorial and House of Representatives constituencies.
