- by Akin Awofolaju, PhD, CLE,CSP, CFP, CFE(Cornell) (Neuroeconomist)
The Danger of a Political Binary in Ile-Ife ( APC vs PDP-accord) before its too late: Why Osun’s 2026 Governorship Election Must Not Become an “Ife , First or Nothing” Contest: Ile-Ife, the Osun political battleground: An Analytical lense points of view….
The 2026 Aug.15th Osun State governorship election is increasingly being framed around a powerful political proposition: Ile-Ife must become the decisive political battleground and the governorship must be viewed through an “Ife-first” lens.
There is a legitimate argument behind the proposition. Ile-Ife is politically consequential, historically important and electorally substantial. But there is also a serious danger in reducing the election to a binary political equation “Ife versus the rest of Osun” or “Ife-first versus anti-Ife syndrome.”
That approach may mobilise emotions, but it could ultimately weaken Ile-Ife’s strategic bargaining power.
The smarter question is not “Can Ile-Ife impose the next governor?”
It is:
“How can Ile-Ife convert its substantial voting strength into a decisive negotiating advantage for infrastructure, jobs, education, security, economic investment and political inclusion while building alliances across Osun?”
That distinction is crucial.
The historical statistical datas explain why Ile-Ife matters
The 2026 voter register has fundamentally changed Osun’s electoral mathematics. Osun now has approximately 2.34million registered voters, up from about 1.96 million in 2022 an increase of roughly 384,000 voters, or nearly 20 percent.
More importantly, Ife East alone has 128,515 registered voters, while Ife Central has 122,454. These two local govts stands to be embodiment of electorate stronghold as a bride ready to be engaged by an serious minded political party in Osun but political division in ife pays a loser pawn for lack of political consciousness of power wirhin .Besides, together, these two LGAs account for 250,969 registered voters more than 10 percent of the entire state’s registered electorate.
And that is before adding Ife North and Ife South.
The four LGAs constituting the Ife Federal Constituency Ife East, Ife Central, Ife North and Ife South therefore represent an electoral bloc that no serious governorship campaign can afford to ignore.
This is where the phrase “Ile-Ife is a battleground” becomes analytically justified.
But there is an important caveat:
A large voting bloc is not automatically a winning bloc.
The difference is organisation, turnout, unity, candidate credibility and the ability to build coalitions beyond one’s immediate constituency.
The 2022 election already demonstrated the power and limitation of Ife
The 2022 governorship results provide an important lesson.
Across the four Ife LGAs:
LGA
APC
PDP
Registered voters*
Ife Central
17,880
13,532
113,232
Ife East
19,353
18,071
N/A
Ife North
9,964
10,359
58,672
Ife South
12,481
9,116
N/A
2022 registration figures are shown where available from the cited results.
The 2022 results demonstrate something politically important: Ile-Ife was not a monolithic voting bloc but a non choice dichotomy
APC won Ife Central, Ife East and Ife South, while PDP won Ife North.
That means the political assumption that “Ife will vote as one” is itself questionable.
The electorate is capable of behaving independently according to candidate, party, local interests, mobilisation and political alliances.
That should be celebrated rather than treated as a weakness.
The real danger: turning geography into political absolutism
There is a growing tendency in Nigerian politics to convert legitimate regional grievances into political absolutes especially in Ile-ife, the land of expansion, the disputed cradle of the world, but undisputed cradle of kóòtù o jire race and humanity.
Here is my humble argument:
Ife has not produced a governor therefore Ife must produce the next governor, as it has quite innumerable capacity of a solemn human capital in arrays of all levels of education both home and in diaspora
That is emotionally understandable.
But elections do not operate according to historical entitlement without intertional grassroot organization and real political mechanics on the ground
Ifes need to operate according to votes, block coalitions, turnout and electoral arithmetic.
Feature one block part candidate from Ife who can win, not two candidates of binary political division
A candidate from outside Ife always win, often with magnanimityof ife political movers abd shakers for oersonal interest and it shouldnt be the case. Ifes are politically savvy and knowledgeable but loyal to their leaders.
And a candidate from Ife can lose , if the candidate cannot build sufficient support across the rest of Osun. And that’s the caveat, which winning candidates able to do but ifes are not, for obvious unfounded premonition.
This is why the “Ife-first” conversation should be reframed.
Ife-first should mean putting Ile-Ife’s development interests first not putting Ile-Ife individuals against everybody else.
That is a much more powerful political proposition.
Ile-Ife should negotiate from strength, not isolation, from substance not historical whims
The political value of Ile-Ife is precisely that it possesses enough electoral weight to make every serious candidate negotiate.
That creates an opportunity.
Instead of saying:
“Give us the governorship because we are from Ife,”
Ife’s political leadership could say:
Here is the development agenda of Ile-Ife. Any candidate seeking our votes must tell us clearly HOW his or her government will deliver it.
That changes the political relationship from emotional patronage to measurable accountability.
For example, Ile-Ife could establish a Ife Development Charter containing specific commitments on:
1. Federal University of Health Sciences/health infrastructure expansion.
2. Tourism and heritage development.
3. Road rehabilitation and urban transportation.
4. Water supply.
5. Youth employment and entrepreneurship.
6. Technology and digital economy.
7. Agricultural value chains.
8. Mining and natural-resource development.
9. Security.
10. Housing and urban renewal.
11. Sports development.
12. Industrial investment.
13. Higher education and research.
14. Support for traditional institutions and cultural preservation.
15. A dedicated Ile-Ife economic development programme.
Every governorship candidate could then be asked:
Will you sign it?
That would be far more strategically valuable than simply demanding political zoning.
The student revolution changes the equation
There is another factor that could fundamentally reshape the election.
The 2026 register identifies approximately 752,800 students as registered voters, making students the largest occupational category in the state’s electorate.
That is enormous.
It means the traditional political machinery of godfathers, party executives and established political structures may not be sufficient.
Young voters are potentially interested in:
• employment;
• education;
• affordable transportation;
• technology;
• housing;
• entrepreneurship;
• security;
• healthcare;
• cost of living;
• internet access;
• skills development.
Ile-Ife, with its concentration of higher educational institutions and young people, should therefore be thinking beyond traditional political mobilisation.
The youth vote could be more important than ethnic or historical narratives.
Ife cannot afford to become the political battlefield in the literal sense
This is perhaps the most serious concern.
Recent pre-election assessments have identified Ife North and Ife Central among high risk areas for political violence in Osun. The broader assessment identified 13 LGAs as high risk amid political tension.
That should concern every responsible political leader.
Once political competition becomes framed as:
“Ife versus them,”
political disagreement can easily become communal confrontation.
That is dangerous.
Ile-Ife has far too much historical, cultural and economic importance to become synonymous with electoral violence.
The city should instead aspire to become Osun’s model for peaceful, issue-based democratic competition.
The 2022 lesson: every vote matters
Osun’s electoral history demonstrates just how narrow governorship contests can become.
In 2022, PDP defeated APC statewide by approximately 27,444 votes based on the reported totals.
That is tiny relative to a statewide electorate exceeding two million.
And the history is even more dramatic.
In the 2018 election, the initial margin between Adeleke and Oyetola was only 353 votes, before the supplementary election changed the final outcome.
This tells us something profound:
Osun elections are not necessarily won by overwhelming the entire state. They can be determined by relatively small movements in strategic LGAs.
Consequently, Ile-Ife’s importance should not be exaggerated into the claim that it alone determines the election.
Rather, its importance lies in its capacity to become one of the critical swing blocs that candidates must win or substantially penetrate.
The real political calculation: Ife + coalition
The winning formula should therefore not be:
Ife vs Osun.
It should be:
Ife + Ede + Osogbo + Ijesaland + Iwo + Igbomina + other constituencies = winning Osun coalition.
That is the political arithmetic of a modern governorship campaign.
The candidate who understands this will approach Ile-Ife differently.
He or she will not merely ask:
“How many votes can I get from Ife?”
The better question is:
“How can I make Ife stakeholders partners in a statewide development coalition?”
That is considerably more sophisticated.
Ife’s political capital should translate into economic capital
This is where the discussion should ultimately go.
The greatest danger would be for Ile-Ife to produce another political campaign, mobilise tens of thousands of voters, negotiate political appointments and four years later discover that its roads remain poor, youth unemployment remains high, tourism remains underdeveloped and its enormous historical heritage remains economically underutilised.
The real objective should therefore be:
Votes → bargaining power → policy commitments → investment → measurable development.
Imagine if the four Ife LGAs collectively established an independent Ife Electoral Development Scorecard.
Every governorship candidate would be evaluated annually on:
• roads;
• employment;
• security;
• education;
• healthcare;
• water;
• investment;
• tourism;
• infrastructure;
• youth development;
• internally generated revenue;
• industrialisation.
That would transform politics.
A new political doctrine for Ile-Ife
Ile-Ife should consider replacing the politics of entitlement with the politics of strategic leverage.
The message should be:
“We are not asking Osun to give Ile-Ife power because we are Ile-Ife. We are asking every candidate to recognise the enormous contribution Ile-Ife can make to Osun’s future and to present a credible plan for unlocking it.”
That approach is inclusive.
It does not antagonise Ijesaland.
It does not alienate Ede.
It does not threaten Osogbo.
It does not marginalise Iwo.
It does not create an unnecessary ethnic contest.
Instead, it positions Ile-Ife as a strategic political and economic centre within a greater Osun coalition.
Conclusion: Ile-Ife should be the bridge, not the battlefield
There is no question that Ile-Ife is electorally significant.
The 2026 voter register confirms that Osun’s electorate has expanded dramatically, while Ife East and Ife Central alone account for roughly 251,000 registered voters.
But the greatest mistake would be to translate that strength into political isolation.
Ile-Ife does not need to threaten Osun with its votes. It needs to demonstrate the value of those votes.
The city should become the intellectual centre of a new political conversation:
Whoever wants our votes must earn them.
Not through ethnic rhetoric.
Not through political intimidation.
Not through empty promises.
But through a measurable development contract with the people.
The 2026 election therefore presents Ile-Ife with a historic choice.
It can become the battlefield of Osun politics where competing political forces fight over its votes.
Or it can become the political bridge of Osun where competing candidates are compelled to compete over its development agenda.
The second option is far more powerful.
Ife-first should not mean Ife against Osun.
It should mean:
Ife first in development, first in accountability, first in strategic thinking and first in building a coalition for a more prosperous Osun State.
That is how a voting bloc becomes a political institution rather than merely a numerical constituency.
