Adeleke "did not at any point in time reject" Tinubu's APC invitation, his office said on 4 June; on 13 October APC named him Tinubu's Osun coordinator

On 4 June 2026, 72 days before Osun State voted for a governor, the governor's official spokesman published a statement on the state government's website. It said Governor Ademola Adeleke "did not at any point in time reject the Invitation of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to join the All Progressives Congress (APC) but he was blocked by the Marine Minister, Mr Gboyega Oyetola and Osun APC." On 15 August Mr Adeleke, standing for the Accord Party, beat the APC's candidate. On 13 October the APC named him Osun State coordinator of Mr Tinubu's 2027 presidential campaign council. Vero Record set the governor's own releases against the State House record and the dated statements of his campaign, his party, the APC and his nephew Davido. Two things come out of that record. The August election was a real contest between two parties. And on the question of who should be president in 2027, both leading candidates were on the same side, and the winner said so in public before polling day.

The 4 June statement, signed by the spokesman Olawale Rasheed, answered Senator Adenigba Fadahunsi, who had said the governor turned down several invitations from the President in 2025. "Governor Adeleke responded to the invitation of Mr President. He actually met the President with his family members. But the process was truncated by the Minister of Marine and Blue Economy, Mr. Gboyega Oyetola," it said. "After he was blocked, the governor moved ahead to endorse the re-election of Mr President first while he was in PDP and now that he is in the Accord." The family meeting it refers to is on record: on 3 June 2025 the federal broadcaster Voice of Nigeria reported, citing a post by a presidential aide, that Mr Tinubu received the governor, his elder brother Adedeji Adeleke and the musician David Adeleke, known as Davido, at his Ikoyi residence in Lagos.

In 2025 the governor's office described the same period differently. On 3 May 2025, Mr Rasheed said in a statement reported by The Eagle Online: "At no time, past or present, has Governor Ademola Adeleke negotiated or considered defection from the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP)." A release on the state website dated 5 July 2025 quoted the governor: "I assure the good people of Osun that I remain part and parcel of the PDP family. I am not defecting to any party". On 23 July 2025 the Osun APC chairman, Tajudeen Lawal, said the party had refused him, telling TheCable that the governor "sought refuge in the APC out of fear of defeat in 2026". The two sides disagreed about who had wanted what, but by June 2026 both accounts put the closed door on the APC side. The record does not show which of the governor's office's two descriptions of 2025 is complete. He then left the PDP for Accord, not the APC: his resignation letter was delivered on 4 November 2025 and Accord unveiled him in Osogbo on 9 December 2025.

His support for Mr Tinubu's re-election was not concealed. On 22 July 2025, while still in the PDP, he posted on X that "Our party in Osun has also endorsed President Tinubu for re-election in 2027", as Channels Television reported. A release dated 7 March 2026 (posted on the state website on 17 March) quotes him telling cabinet members: "We have no problem with President Tinubu. He is our leader. He represents the South West. I restate our endorsement of Mr President for re-election in the best interest of the South West." The next sentence reads: "Our problem is with Minister Oyetola". A release of 1 May 2026 quotes him: "Mr President has validated our endorsement of him as our preferred candidate for the 2027 race." Further releases of 27 May and 4 June record it again. His own party took another line. On 24 April, Accord's national chairman, Maxwell Mgbudem, told reporters in Abuja, according to P.M. News: "There is nothing like that (Tinubu's endorsement)... This is a political party, and Governor Adeleke is our candidate."

On the ballot, the contest was real. The APC's candidate was Munirudeen Bola Oyebamiji, a former managing director of the National Inland Waterways Authority, according to Channels Television. At the APC's final rally in Osogbo on 13 August, Senate President Godswill Akpabio, representing the President, read a message telling voters to "choose wisely because there is a need to link Osun State to the centre. We are waiting for Osun to join us," Naija News reported. Early on 16 August the Returning Officer, Professor Joshua Olalekan Ogunwale, declared Mr Adeleke elected with 511,067 votes to Mr Oyebamiji's 444,815, a margin of 66,252, with Najeem Salaam of the ADC third on 17,180. Channels Television reported 985,079 valid votes and 1,005,800 votes cast; Leadership printed 985,097 valid votes, but only 985,079 plus the 20,721 rejected ballots gives the 1,005,800 cast. On those figures the two leading candidates took 955,882 of the valid votes, or 97.0 per cent. Vero Record has not seen INEC's own result sheets; these figures are the declaration as reported.

Some of the campaign's loudest voices said something else. Davido, who was appointed head of youth mobilisation in the governor's campaign on 22 April (recorded in The Tinubu Files, Part 448.2), posted on X on 10 August, as quoted by Parallel Facts: "Anybody supporting APC in Osun state is an enemy of progress! Lessons will be learnt this weekend." On polling day he posted "MR PRESIDENT TINUBU ! UR KILLING DEMOCRACY." and "I CAN NEVER SUPPORT APC IN MY LIFE !!!", Tribune reported. The candidate's own releases attacked Mr Oyetola and the Osun APC, and in August accused the party of "scheming to swap official outcome with fake result sheets", but none withdrew his endorsement of Mr Tinubu. Three days after the vote Davido drew the line himself. "Maybe I shouldn't have said we, because my uncle came out to declare his support for Tinubu," he told News Central TV on 18 August. "Right now, I don't have a presidential candidate. It might change. It's not going to be APC."

In his acceptance speech, published on the state website on 16 August, the governor said: "Mr President is a son of Osun State, and I hereby reaffirm my earlier endorsement of him for a second term in the 2027 presidential election." The same day a State House release said Mr Tinubu had called him to congratulate him. INEC presented the certificate of return in Osogbo on 19 August, Blueprint reported, and on 20 August the governor took it to the Presidential Villa. "I'm here to thank Mr President, the father of the nation, because he fought for this democracy," he said, according to Daily Trust. On 21 August his campaign spokesman, Pelumi Olajengbesi, told reporters in Abuja, as Naija News reported: "The essence of that visit has nothing to do with Governor Ademola Adeleke joining APC. It's an impossibility. Governor Ademola Adeleke is not joining APC."

Fifty-three days later, on 13 October, the APC released a revised list for its presidential campaign council. In a statement by the party's National Publicity Secretary, Felix Morka, as reported by P.M. News, the governor is named Osun State Campaign Coordinator; the Federal Capital Territory minister, Nyesom Wike, coordinates Rivers State and the FCT. Vero Record did not obtain the APC's original statement. The governor's own camp confirmed the role: the Imole Campaign Council's director-general, Olalere Oyewumi, welcomed "the appointment of Governor Adeleke as State Coordinator of the PBAT Presidential Campaign Council in Osun", New National Star reported. At the council's inauguration in Abuja on 14 October, the State House release records that the governor gave a goodwill message pledging to see the President re-elected, and "electrified the Banquet Hall with his famous dance steps". Vanguard quoted him: "I can feel the victory coming in 2027. Nobody can stop this movement. I'm ready to lead this movement," and "We're going to sing, we're going to dance all the way back to Aso Rock."

What he has not done matters as much. Vero Record found no record that Mr Adeleke has joined the APC: no ward registration, no membership card, no defection event and no APC statement admitting him. In the State House release of 14 October, the APC national chairman, Nentawe Yilwatda, is reported citing "the presence of Governor Ademola Adeleke of the Accord Party (AP)", with Governor Charles Soludo of APGA and Mr Wike of the PDP, as support for the President's re-election. On its words, the 21 August sentence still holds. The APC's national secretary, Ajibola Bashiru, described the arrangement on TVC, as quoted by Naija News: "Our agreement, our understanding is for us to work together for the emergence of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu. Then let us contest the space among the electorate for our candidates at other levels." He said the APC would keep fielding candidates against Accord for the Senate, the House of Representatives and the Osun Assembly. Vero Record found no law that bars a governor from campaigning for another party's presidential candidate. Any sanction would be for Accord under its own rules, and none has been announced.

Others in both parties have objected. Accord's presidential candidate, Gbenga Olawepo-Hashim, told Channels Television on 13 October: "He (Adeleke) can't be the leader, he is a governor that was a beneficiary of office," and "Governor Adeleke cannot compel the people of Osun State to vote for Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu." In Osogbo, The Guardian reported, the Osun APC chairman, Mr Lawal, told a stakeholders' meeting the party would not tolerate parallel campaigns for the President and that all groups should work "under the umbrella of the party in the state". The paper reported that the state's APC stakeholders had expected Mr Oyetola to be named coordinator.

On 15 October the social media commentator Martins Otse, known as VeryDarkMan, posted a video on Instagram. Its caption reads: "Governor Ademola Adeleke finally showed Nigerians what he has been hiding all these while, that he's APC and he has always been APC. A lot of you didn't know, that the election in Osun State was an APC primaries and yes, Davido knew 100 percent that his uncle Ademola Adeleke is APC, he was only against them for the public eyes and because he knew that if his uncle opening confirm that he's APC, he would lose the election." These are his claims. Set against the record: no APC membership is shown, and the governor's own office says the APC kept him out in 2025. What Davido can be shown to have known, the Tinubu endorsement, was published repeatedly, and Davido said himself on 18 August that he did not share it. Whether the result would have changed is a question about an election that was not held, and no record can answer it. Mr Otse also said, according to Legit, that the governor received a congratulatory call and "was asked to collect his certificate of return from Tinubu himself". The call is confirmed by the State House. The certificate was presented by INEC in Osogbo; that he was asked to take it to the President is not shown. Mr Otse has a prior public dispute with Davido: in July he said, in a video reported by Legit, that Davido's team offered him N50 million to campaign for the governor. That claim has not been confirmed.

Analysis (grade C, Vero Record's own reading): Accord against the APC was a real contest for the Osun governorship, fought with an APC candidate, an APC rally and an APC message from the President. It was not a contest on the 2027 presidential question, because the winner had endorsed Mr Tinubu in at least four releases on the state website between March and June and the loser was the President's own party's candidate. Voters who heard the youth campaign's message against the APC were hearing Davido's position, not the candidate's. The record shows no hidden endorsement. It does show that the 4 June account of an accepted invitation, the 21 August "It's an impossibility" and the 13 October appointment do not sit easily together, and it shows nothing about when the coordinator role was first discussed.

This report builds on Vero Record's earlier work. The Tinubu Files records the result and Davido's role at Part 448, sets the 2022 and 2026 results side by side at Part 455, and enters "The Osun governor defected to the APC" in its register as "No, to the Accord Party" at Part 457; that entry remains correct on 16 October. A report on 4 October re-added INEC's Osun voter card table. Vero Record did not reach the governor's office, the Accord Party or the Osun APC for this story. Any reply from them will be published at the same length as the passage it answers.

What this rests on

Primary records read for this report: Osun State Government releases on osunstate.gov.ng dated 5 July 2025 (denial of defection), 7 March 2026 (endorsement restated; posted 17 March), 1 May 2026, 27 May 2026 and 4 June 2026 (spokesman's reply to Senator Fadahunsi), and the governor's acceptance speech of 16 August 2026; State House releases of 16 August 2026 (President's congratulatory call), 22 August 2026 (first campaign council list) and 14 October 2026 (inauguration of the campaign council). All were retrieved and read on 16 October 2026; the four crops shown are screenshots of those pages. Reported, not primary (grade B): the INEC declaration (Channels Television, Leadership), the APC's 13 October list (P.M. News; original statement not obtained), the 3 May 2025 Rasheed statement (The Eagle Online), the 22 July 2025 X post (Channels), Davido's posts and interview (Parallel Facts, Tribune, allAfrica/Vanguard), the 21 August campaign statement (Naija News), the Bashiru, Olawepo-Hashim, Lawal and Mgbudem remarks, and Mr Otse's caption (from a screenshot of the Instagram post; also transcribed by Ladun Liadi and Gistlover). Arithmetic: 511,067 - 444,815 = 66,252. 511,067 + 444,815 = 955,882; 955,882 / 985,079 = 97.0 per cent. 985,079 + 20,721 = 1,005,800, matching the reported votes cast; Leadership's 985,097 + 20,721 = 1,005,818, which does not, so 985,079 is used. Days: 4 June to 15 August 2026 = 26 + 31 + 15 = 72; 21 August to 13 October = 10 + 30 + 13 = 53; 7 March to 15 August = 24 + 30 + 31 + 30 + 31 + 15 = 161. Releases on osunstate.gov.ng recording the Tinubu endorsement before polling day: 7 March, 1 May, 27 May and 4 June 2026 = four.

What this does not establish

That Governor Adeleke has joined the APC: no membership, registration, defection event or APC admission was found as of 16 October 2026, and the State House still describes him as an Accord governor. Any agreement before the election about the campaign role, or when the role was first discussed. Which of the governor's office's two accounts of 2025 ("never negotiated or considered" in May 2025, "did not at any point in time reject" in June 2026) is complete. Whether the result would have differed had anything been said differently; that is a counterfactual. VeryDarkMan's claims that the governor "has always been APC", that Davido "knew 100 percent", and that he was asked to collect his certificate from the President; his separate N50 million claim. Davido's 10 August post was not retrieved from X; it is quoted from Parallel Facts. INEC's result sheets were not examined; the result is the Returning Officer's declaration as reported. Leadership reported 2,339,544 registered voters at the declaration, 311 more than the 2,339,233 in INEC's signed 13 August release; no explanation for the difference was found and the figure was reported by one outlet only. The APC's original 13 October statement was not obtained. Nothing in this report suggests that changing political alignment, or backing another party's candidate, is unlawful.