Yayi Has the Party. Hunye Has the Question. Ogun APC Has a Problem

They call him a joker.

Some call him a spoiler.

Others see him as a political pawn who should have disappeared from the Ogun governorship conversation after Senator Solomon Olamilekan Adeola, popularly known as Yayi, swept the APC primary.

But who exactly is Abayomi Hunye?

Before the courtroom battle, before the controversial zero vote and before the political labels, Hunye had already spent years inside Ogun’s political machinery.

He is a former lawmaker, commissioner, Chairman of the Ogun State Local Government Service Commission and former Managing Director of the Ogun State Waste Management Authority, OGWAMA.

Now, after losing the APC governorship primary to Yayi, he is back in court and insisting that the story is not over.

ValidViewNetwork reports that Hunye’s current battle is not simply about who scored more votes.

It is also about the process that produced the APC’s 2027 governorship candidate.

Who is Abayomi Hunye?

Hunye is from Tube in Ipokia Local Government Area of Ogun State, in Ogun West Senatorial District.

He has described himself as a former Lagos State civil servant who rose to the rank of director before moving deeper into Ogun politics.

He has also said he received professional training in Lagos State and outside Nigeria.

His public career in Ogun dates back more than a decade.

By 2011, contemporary records identified him as Commissioner II in the Ogun State Civil Service Commission under Governor Ibikunle Amosun.

By March 2014, he was still publicly identified in that capacity. His political career later moved into the governorship arena.

In 2018, ahead of the 2019 election, Hunye was one of six APC aspirants cleared to contest the party’s governorship primary in Ogun.

That list included Dapo Abiodun, Jimi Lawal, Bimbo Ashiru, Gbenga Kaka, Adekunle Akinlade and Hunye.

The primary became one of Ogun APC’s most controversial internal contests.

In the National Working Committee-supervised primary, Abiodun won with 102,305 votes, while Hunye recorded 9,110.

A parallel process backed by the Amosun camp produced another result, with Akinlade declared winner and Hunye recorded with 208 votes.

The episode exposed the deep divisions within Ogun APC ahead of the 2019 election.

It also established something about Hunye that remains relevant today.

He was already willing to contest when the political odds were complicated.

From government appointments to OGWAMA

On July 27, 2020, Governor Dapo Abiodun appointed Hunye Chairman of the Ogun State Agricultural Multipurpose Credit Agency, OSAMCA, as part of a wider round of appointments to boards and commissions.

Hunye subsequently returned to the executive side of government.

On August 23, 2022, Abiodun swore him in as Commissioner for Community Development and Cooperatives, alongside six other commissioners.

By 2025, Hunye was serving as Special Adviser to Governor Abiodun on Empowerment, with responsibilities connected to waste management.

He later became Chairman of the Board/Managing Director of OGWAMA.

That appointment brought another chapter of controversy.

Waste vendors accused his administration of high-handedness and extortion, allegations Hunye rejected.

He argued that his actions were connected to efforts to regulate the waste-management sector.

In February 2026, the Ogun Government announced Farook Akintunde as his replacement at OGWAMA.

Reports described the development as Hunye’s removal from office, while Hunye later disputed that account and gave a different explanation of his departure.

The disagreement over his exit from OGWAMA became another political talking point.

The allegations around his past

There is also another part of Hunye’s story that has surfaced during the current political season.

A report published in August 2026 raised allegations questioning aspects of his identity and Lagos employment history.

The report alleged that Hunye may previously have been known as Abayomi Semako Korote and may have worked in the Lagos State local government service.

It further raised questions about an individual bearing that name and alleged disciplinary issues involving a staff cooperative society.

However, those claims remain unverified.

The report itself indicated that documentary records were being sought to establish whether the individual referred to was the same person now known as Abayomi Semako Hunye.

ValidViewNetwork has not independently established those allegations and will therefore not present them as facts.

The timing also deserves context.

Nigeria is already entering a highly charged political season ahead of the 2027 general elections.

Old records are being revisited, political rivals are being scrutinised more closely and fresh allegations are likely to surface around prominent aspirants.

That does not automatically make an allegation false.

It also does not make it true.

The proper journalistic response is verification.

In this case, official employment, personnel and disciplinary records would provide a firmer basis for answering the questions than political claims or campaign-season narratives.

The allegations have also been circulating in the political space, but their persistence should not be confused with proof.

For now, they remain claims requiring verification, not established facts.

That distinction matters because Hunye’s political history can be examined extensively without turning an unresolved allegation into a conviction.

Hunye has been here before

The 2027 contest is not Hunye’s first attempt at the Ogun governorship.

He was already an APC governorship aspirant ahead of the 2019 election.

In 2025, while explaining his latest ambition, Hunye described the 2027 bid as his third attempt at the governorship.

That history matters.

When Hunye now talks about party processes, internal democracy and the legitimacy of the route through which a candidate emerged, it is not a language he suddenly discovered after losing to Yayi.

He has been in this political conversation for years.

Then came Yayi

The 2027 APC governorship contest appeared increasingly settled after Senator Solomon Olamilekan Adeola emerged as the preferred candidate of the party’s major stakeholders.

Yayi had the support of powerful political figures and the advantage of a broad party structure.

The primary eventually settled the contest, at least according to the APC.

The exercise held on May 21, 2026.

APC said 343,292 people were registered and 305,287 were accredited.

Yayi was declared winner with 304,055 votes.

Hunye was recorded with zero.

That single figure has become one of the most discussed elements of the Ogun 2027 political contest.

But Hunye did not accept it.

He went to court.

Why is Hunye in court?

Hunye’s argument is not simply that he should have defeated Yayi.

His challenge centres on the process that produced Yayi.

He has maintained that he participated in the primary and that his supporters were present across the state’s wards and local government areas.

He has also questioned how an aspirant who says he participated in the exercise could officially receive zero votes.

The question has attracted attention beyond Hunye’s immediate political circle.

The Eselu of Eseluland, Oba Akintunde Akinyemi, publicly questioned how Hunye could have participated and still recorded zero votes, asking the APC to resolve the dispute.

That does not, by itself, establish that the primary was manipulated.

But it explains why the “zero vote” has become politically difficult to dismiss.

For Yayi and the APC, the primary produced a clear winner.

For Hunye, the primary produced a process that must be tested.

And that is where the courtroom has become his new political battlefield.

Hunye is not Amaechi

The comparison with the famous Rotimi Amaechi and Celestine Omehia case in Rivers State may be tempting, but the two situations are not the same.

Amaechi won the PDP governorship primary in 2006 before his party submitted Omehia’s name to INEC instead.

The Supreme Court eventually ruled that Amaechi was the lawful candidate and ordered that he replace Omehia as governor.

Hunye’s situation is different.

Amaechi went to court as the man who had won his party’s primary.

Hunye is challenging the validity of the primary itself.

That distinction is important.

Hunye does not have to persuade the court that he secretly won 304,055 votes.

His argument is that the process through which Yayi emerged should be examined and, if found unlawful, nullified.

Whether he can establish that is for the court to determine.

Yayi has the crowd. Hunye has the question.

The political contrast is increasingly obvious.

Yayi has the party’s recognition.

He has the political structure.

He has powerful supporters.

He has been holding large rallies and presenting himself as the APC’s candidate for 2027.

Hunye has the lawsuit.

Yet Hunye has also refused to remain invisible while the case continues.

He has continued holding political engagements and unveiled Abayomi Odunowo as his running mate.

He has argued that he remains in the race while his challenge is before the court.

The APC, however, has repeatedly maintained that Yayi is its recognised candidate and has rejected Hunye’s claim to the ticket.

That leaves Ogun with an unusual political picture.

One man has the party’s ticket.

The other is fighting the process that produced it.

Why does Hunye’s persistence matter?

This is where the political calculation becomes more complicated.

Hunye may eventually lose his case.

He may also force the APC to spend months defending the legitimacy of its primary.

That distinction matters in politics.

A rival does not always need to win to become politically relevant.

Sometimes, keeping a dispute alive can force a party to defend its decisions repeatedly, expose internal disagreements and give aggrieved members a rallying point.

It can also provide an opening for opposition parties.

If APC spends valuable political energy fighting itself, its opponents may have less work to do.

But there is no evidence that Hunye is being secretly sponsored by any rival political force.

That claim would require evidence.

The more responsible question is simpler: Who benefits if Hunye remains politically alive?

And another question follows: Who loses if he disappears tomorrow?

Those are legitimate political questions, not proof of a hidden hand.

What about Dapo Abiodun?

Hunye’s relationship with Governor Dapo Abiodun adds another layer to the story.

Hunye served in Abiodun’s administration and held important appointments under the governor.

Today, however, Hunye is challenging the process that produced the APC’s preferred successor.

That does not prove that Abiodun is behind Hunye, it also doesn’t prove that Abiodun isn’t.

There is no basis to make such a claim without evidence.

But Nigerian politics has repeatedly shown that political relationships can change when succession battles begin.

An ally can become a rival.

An appointee can become an aspirant.

And a former insider can become one of the people asking uncomfortable questions about the system he once served.

Ogun West and the bigger question

Both Hunye and Yayi come from Ogun West.

That gives their contest another layer because the senatorial district has spent decades seeking greater access to the governorship.

But this should not become a simple story of one Ogun West politician fighting another.

The bigger question is whether Ogun West’s long-standing political aspiration has moved beyond the question of zoning to the harder question of who can build a winning coalition across Ogun State.

Yayi appears to have built that coalition inside the APC.

Hunye is challenging the process through which it produced him.

The two men are therefore fighting different battles.

So, who is the “joker”?

Perhaps that is the wrong question.

The better question is: what makes a politician who has been told he scored zero refuse to disappear?

Hunye is not a political newcomer.

He has been a lawmaker.

He has served in the Civil Service Commission.

He has chaired a state agricultural credit agency.

He has served as commissioner.

He has worked as a Special Adviser.

He has headed OGWAMA.

He has contested the governorship before.

And now he is challenging the latest chapter of the APC’s succession story in court.

None of this means Hunye will win.

It does not prove that Yayi’s ticket will collapse.

It does not establish that the APC primary was rigged.

It does not prove that Hunye is anybody’s pawn.

But it does mean that reducing him to a joke may be politically premature.

He scored zero votes. He did not score zero relevance.

That may be the most important distinction in the Ogun 2027 story.

The court will eventually determine the legal questions surrounding his challenge.

The electorate will determine the political question in 2027.

Until then, Yayi may have the party structure, the rallies and the recognition.

Hunye has something else.

A case that refuses to go away.

ValidViewNetwork reports that the Hunye-Yayi dispute is no longer merely a contest between two aspirants.

It has become a test of political persistence, internal party democracy and the power of a defeated aspirant to keep a nomination dispute alive.

For a man many have already dismissed as the joker in the pack, Hunye appears determined to prove one thing: The joker may not be holding the winning card, but he has refused to leave the table.

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