By Adadainfo
The Raji Ayoola Adeleke nuclear family in Ede, Osun State, has been responsible for producing two governors and three senators in the service of Osun State spread over the Second Republic, Aborted Third Republic and current political dispensation.
The latest of the family to win a big political office is Senator Ademola Adeleke of the PDP who defeated the incumbent Governor Adegboyega Oyetola of the APC to win the gubernatorial election in Osun State last weekend.
Adadainfo investigation revealed that Senator Ademola Adeleke is the younger brother of the late Senator Isiaka Adeleke who he replaced in the Nigerian Senate following his death in April 2017.
Two-time Senator Isiaka Adeleke was the first elected governor of the then newly created Osun State on the platform of the Social Democratic Party (SDP) in 1992 during the aborted Third Republic and elder brother of the new governor-elect.
In the present dispensation, Isiaka first won election into the Senate on the platform of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in 2011 before defecting to the All Progressives Congress (APC) in 2015 where he won re-election in 2015 befor e his student death in 2017.
Adadainfo learnt that the patriarch of the family, Chief Raji Ayoola Adeleke was a Second Republic politician who was elected senator under the Unity Party of Nigeria in 1979 to represent Osun State Senatorial District II. He was married twice; his second wife, Mrs Nnena Esther Adeleke was from the Old Enugu, He had five children including Senators Isiaka Adeleke and Ademola Adeleke, who just received his certificate of return from INEC as the winner of the Osun State guber election.
Adadainfo reports that no family in Nigeria has ever achieved such a political feat in democratic Nigeria.
Another Political Dynasty is the Yar’adua Family in Katsina State. While Musa Yar’adua their father was Minister of Lagos in the First Republic, his son Major General Shehu Musa Yar’adua was Chief of General Staff, Supreme Headquarters and de facto second-in-command in General Olusegun Obasanjo’s military junta between 1976 and 1979 before his younger brother Umaru Musa Yar’adua won election to become governor of Katsina State and later the president of Nigeria before his death in 2010.
