The Battle For Osun Ends: Accord wins Ademola Adeleke

  The Battle For Osun Ends: Accord wins Ademola Adeleke 

The Osun 2026 governorship election, held on August 15, 2026, was a landmark event. It wasn’t just a state but a major political test and a significant moment.

With all the controversies from the election it was announced that the incumbent Governor, Ademola Adeleke won the election fair and square, with a total of 511,067 votes.

In the  2022 governorship election Ademola Adeleke was initially declared winner over Gboyega Oyetola. The result was subsequently challenged and the election tribunal later overturned Adeleke’s victory with that year's 2026 election the INEC published an Official timetable for the process. This timetable tells everything we need to know about the election.

 The election was stated to be held on the 8th of August was later pushed to the 15th August.

The campaign started as early as march which became a big story

The first Big Question was “would Adeleke remain in PDP?

This became a big story people kept predicting on prediction sites like OpinionMarket.ng , because remember Ademola Adeleke won the 2022 Osun governorship under PDP he defected the then incumbent governor with over 403,371 votes to Oyetola’s 375,027 so everyone expected that going into 2026 it would be Adeleke + PDP VS APC

But then PDP itself fell apart and their major leadership crisis inside the PDP with different factions fighting over control of the party. With this Adeleke eventually had to resign from PDP and he submitted his Resignation letter on the 4th of November 2025 he stated the party leadership crisis was his reason for leaving which he eventually did in December.

And this is where the story becomes interesting

ADELEKE’S Move to Accord

With rumours flying around about him decamping to APC his rival party and the party rejecting him he later came out in December of 2025 where he formally unveiled his move to Accord Party.

In his argument he said and I quote

“I need a stable political platform to defend my governorship”

And that he had tried to resolve the PDP crisis but the situation continues to deteriorate.

So suddenly the 2026 election wasn’t PDP’S Adeleke Vs APC

It became

Accord’s Adeleke Vs APC

 The strange PDP situation: the party had no candidate but supported Adeleke. This was probably one of the most unusual parts of the election, The PDP itself did not end up with its own candidate on the ballot. But Osun PDP chairman Sunday Bisi said the PDP structure in Osun would support Adeleke despite his having left the party.

In other words: PDP candidate: Nobody.

PDP’s political structure/support: Adeleke.

The PDP chairman said he himself remained in the PDP but that the party’s structure was behind Adeleke’s second-term bid.

That meant Adeleke was technically running under Accord, but he wasn’t necessarily starting from zero. He was attempting to carry over the grassroots network that had helped him win in 2022.

That’s why political analysts viewed the election as partly a test of:

Can Adeleke’s personal political structure survive without the PDP name?

Then APC selected Bola Oyebamiji

The APC’s answer to Adeleke was Bola Oyebamiji, popularly known as AMBO, Oyebamiji had previously served in Osun government, including as commissioner, and had also been Managing Director of the National Inland Waterways Authority. He emerged as the APC candidate through a consensus primary in December 2025. But Oyebamiji wasn’t operating alone, behind him was a very powerful APC structure.

And one of the biggest figures was Gboyega Oyetola.

Remember him?

He was the man Adeleke defeated in 2022.

So, the 2026 election effectively brought the Adeleke vs Oyetola political rivalry back to life, except this time Oyetola wasn’t personally on the ballot.

Oyetola backed Oyebamiji and became one of the major figures in the APC campaign.

 So, what was the APC’s strategy?

The APC’s argument was essentially: Adeleke may have won in 2022, but the APC has rebuilt itself. The party presented Oyebamiji as someone who could return the state to APC control. The APC also had something Adeleke’s Accord didn’t have:

A much larger national party structure.

Oyebamiji repeatedly presented himself as the candidate backed by President Bola Tinubu and the APC establishment.

The election therefore became more than:

Adeleke vs Oyebamiji.

It was also: Adeleke’s grassroots structure vs APC’s political machinery.

And then ADC entered the picture; The African Democratic Congress (ADC) also became important, its candidate was Najeem Salaam, a former Speaker of the Osun State House of Assembly and a political figure associated with former governor Rauf Aregbesola.

Salaam emerged as ADC’s candidate after a primary in which he was the sole contestant. All 520 valid votes went to him. So, the three names people increasingly focused on were:

 Accord: Ademola Adeleke — incumbent governor

 APC: Bola Oyebamiji (AMBO) — main challenger

ADC: Najeem Salaam — former Speaker

There were actually 15 candidates on the final ballot, but the serious political conversation increasingly centred around those three, particularly Adeleke and Oyebamiji.

With all this a huge legal drama rose as Accord was threatened with deregistration this is something you shouldn’t overlook.

In June 2026, the Federal High Court in Abuja ordered INEC to deregister Accord and four other political parties, arguing that they had failed to meet constitutional performance requirements.

That was potentially devastating for Adeleke because: Accord = his ballot platform. If Accord disappeared from the ballot, what would happen to his candidacy?

Adeleke rejected the judgment and argued that it should not prevent him from contesting. The court situation became another major political/legal battle in the run-up to the election. Ultimately, Adeleke remained on the ballot as Accord’s candidate.

 Then the campaign became extremely hostile

As August approached, the rhetoric between Adeleke’s camp and APC became increasingly aggressive.

There were accusations flying in both directions: a lot of political violence, intimidation, vote buying, attempts to manipulate voters, attempts to disrupt the election, misuse of security agencies, political persecution.

Adeleke accused Oyetola, Oyebamiji and other APC figures of being involved in political violence. The APC rejected the accusations and accused the Adeleke administration of failing to maintain law and order.

So, this wasn’t just a normal campaign.

There was genuine fear that the election could become violent.

Then came the PVC controversy In July, Adeleke accused APC agents of trying to obtain voters’ cards and PIN information through financial inducements.

His allegation was that this could prevent people from voting.

The governor urged voters: “Don’t sell or surrender your PVC”.

These were allegations from Adeleke’s government, not findings established by INEC as fact, so they need to be treated as political allegations rather than proven electoral malpractice.

PRE ELECTION/ELECTION DAY SAGA

The INEC PVC centre being attacked

This was more concrete, in late July, armed men attacked an INEC PVC distribution centre in Odo-Otin LGA. Police said the attackers took three packs of PVCs and some BVAS devices. That raised serious security concerns because it happened shortly before election day. INEC nevertheless said the stolen PVCs could not simply be used to vote because voters still had to pass biometric verification through BVAS.

 The alleged vote-buying investigation

Another major pre-election incident involved the Osun Secretary to the State Government, Teslim Igbalaye, Police arrested him and others over allegations connected to vote buying. Police reportedly recovered money, voter cards, voter registers and equipment during the operation.

The Osun government rejected the action and described it as politically motivated.

Again, the important distinction is an arrest/allegation is not the same thing as a conviction.

 Then we finally reached 15 August

This is where all the political calculations had to meet reality.

There were: 2.3 million+ registered voters, about 1.9 million collected PVCs,763 polling units, 30 LGAs and 15 candidates.

What happened at the polling units?

In many areas, the morning was relatively calm, and voters began arriving early.

They checked the voters’ registers and waited for accreditation.

Security personnel were deployed.

At Adeleke’s own polling unit in Ede North, he arrived around 8:32 a.m., was accredited around 8:35 a.m. and voted shortly afterwards.

Oyebamiji also voted and expressed confidence that he would win.

His deputy, Kayode Adereti, described the BVAS operation at his polling location as smooth; the overall picture was not one of statewide chaos.

There were concerns and isolated incidents, but many polling units operated normally.

Then the real battle started: counting

Once voting closed, the ballots were counted at the polling units.

This is where the election started giving us clues about the final result.

Polling-unit results were uploaded to INEC’s IReV portal.

There were thousands of results to upload.

At one point on election night, hundreds had been uploaded; later the number moved into the thousands. By late Saturday night, about 94% had reportedly been uploaded.

And the early numbers showed something interesting.

Adeleke was leading.

But it wasn’t initially a gigantic lead.

At one stage, with hundreds of ward results collated, Adeleke was ahead of Oyebamiji.

The contest looked genuinely competitive.

 

Party                          Candidates                Votes               

Accord                    Ademola Adeleke      511,067

 APC                          Bola Oyebamiji        444,815

ADC                           Najeem Salaam  17,180

And geographically, the result was:

Accord/Adeleke — 19 LGAs

APC/Oyebamiji — 11 LGAs

Finally, Ademola Adeleke was declared winner by INEC for the second time as the Governor of Osun State.

And that is what makes elections more than just a day at the polls. Long before voters cast their ballots, people are already asking: Who will win? Which party will take the lead? Will an incumbent survive? Can an unexpected candidate pull off an upset?

These are the kinds of real-world questions that make prediction markets interesting.

On OpinionMarket, you can follow markets built around events happening in politics, sports, entertainment and beyond and put your own view to the test. Explore OpinionMarket⁠.

 It’s seeing whether you called it before everyone else did.