NEWS
Cracks Emerge in OK Movement as Convener Dismisses Leadership Changes, Says X Account Was Hijacked
Fresh cracks have emerged within the OK Movement, a political platform backing the joint presidential ambition of Nigerian Democratic Congress (NDC) presidential candidate Peter Obi and his running mate, Engr. Rabi’u Kwankwaso, following reports of a purported leadership shake-up announced through the group’s official X (formerly Twitter) account.
The development has sparked confusion among supporters after the social media platform announced a series of new appointments, despite the movement’s official website retaining its existing leadership structure.
Reacting to the controversy, the Convener of the OK Movement and former National Publicity Secretary of the New Nigerian Peoples Party (NNPP), Ladipo Johnson, firmly dismissed the announcements, insisting that there has been no change in the leadership of the organisation.
Johnson explained that the movement’s X account had effectively been taken over by one of its former administrators, Jackie Wayas, who, according to him, is not a member of the movement’s leadership team but still had access to the account.
He alleged that Wayas used the account to issue unauthorized statements announcing the appointment of former presidential candidate and National Chairman of the Inter Party Advisory Council (IPAC), High Chief Peter Ameh, as Director-General, Muhammad Hamisu as National Secretary, and the Director of the Abuja School of Social and Political Thought, Sam Amadi, as Head of the Advisory Council.
The Convener maintained that none of those announcements reflected the position of the movement’s leadership, stressing that John Ughulu remains the authentic Director-General of the OK Movement.
Johnson described the situation as an internal misunderstanding that escalated after one of the account administrators allegedly changed the account password and began issuing directives without the approval of the leadership.
According to him, “The bottom line is that it is an unfortunate incident that is wrong. It is not correct. John Ughulu is still the DG. It’s difficult for me to say because I know all the parties involved. Yes, and I think that I don’t want to use words such as people being misguided.
“You cannot have personal issues with a DG, and then you now turn it into oh, we want to remove him, and then different people joining up, forgetting that every action will bring about a reaction and it might be inimical to the chances of your principal that you formed the group to work for in the first place.
“If you start fighting on the streets, you are bringing bad publicity, and then you will not know that some of the people urging you on are people from the outside who don’t want you to win in the first place.
“Well, what is happening that has brought it out is that one or two young ones have some issues to grind, maybe with the DG, and the main person took advantage of the fact that she was one of those who had the passwords to the Twitter accounts, to the X account.
“I think she changed the password, and from there began to issue statements ‘We’ve changed this, we’ve changed that.’ So people felt it was coming from the OK Movement.
“So if you want to put it starkly, the Twitter account was maybe it was hacked. It wasn’t hacked by her because she had the password, but she can’t say that she issued directives of the leadership.
“She did it alone, but of course she has some support of some youthful people who might not even be members of the OK Movement.
“But the bottom line is that John Ughulu, along with a gentleman, Alhaji Adeleke. They were the ones many years ago that started this Obi and Kwankwaso and Obi coming together. They had conceptualized it before they even brought it to me.“
The controversy has raised fresh questions about internal cohesion within the OK Movement, with observers warning that public disagreements and conflicting leadership claims could undermine the credibility of the political platform at a time when unity is considered crucial ahead of future political engagements.
Despite the social media announcements, Johnson insisted that the officially recognised leadership remains unchanged and urged supporters not to be misled by statements issued through the compromised X account until normal control of the platform is restored.