Osun Council Crisis Deepens as APC and State Government Trade Letters Over Court Ruling

The political dispute over control of local government councils in Osun State escalated sharply on Thursday, with the state government writing to police to protect PDP-elected chairmen and facilitate their return to office, while the APC warned that any attempt to execute the court judgment before its appeal is concluded would be illegal and potentially dangerous.

At the centre of it all is a Federal High Court ruling handed down in Osogbo on June 15, 2026, which dismissed a lawsuit filed by APC chairmen elected in the October 15, 2022 local government election and denied their plea for a tenure extension.

The judgment was unambiguous on the relief sought. All of the APC chairmen's prayers were denied. The originating summons was dismissed in its entirety.

Counsel to the Osun State Government and the local government areas, Oluwabusola Oluwaniyi, made this point explicitly in a letter dated June 18, 2026, addressed to the Assistant Inspector-General of Police at Zone XI Headquarters in Osogbo.

"All the reliefs specifically sought by them were expressly refused by the court, and their originating summons was dismissed in its entirety. The filing of an appeal did not amount to a stay of execution," the letter read.

The state government asked the police to remove APC chairmen currently occupying council secretariats across the state, protect officials elected in the February 22, 2025 local government election, and facilitate their return to work. Governor Ademola Adeleke, the letter stated, had directed security services to support this process.

The APC's position is that the legal process is not finished, and that acting on the judgment before it is fully resolved would itself be unlawful.

The party, through a statement signed by media director Kola Olabisi, said its affected chairmen had filed a notice of appeal at the Court of Appeal's Akure Division on June 16, one day after the judgment, and had simultaneously filed a motion for stay of execution at the Federal High Court on the same day.

Kunle Adegoke, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria representing the APC chairmen, wrote separately to the Inspector-General of Police in Abuja to formally notify him of these filings and urge restraint.

"We respectfully urge you and your good offices to refrain from taking any step towards the execution of the judgment, as such execution will undermine the pending judicial process at the Court of Appeal and occasion a grave miscarriage of justice," Adegoke wrote.

The APC also warned that PDP and Accord Party members were preparing to move on council secretariats from Friday, and held Governor Adeleke responsible for any breakdown of law and order that followed.

To understand the Osun State local government crisis, you need to understand one specific legal argument, because everything else flows from it.

The APC's position, supported by Adegoke's citation of Court of Appeal precedent in M. O. Kanu, Sons and Co. v. F.B.N. Plc, is that once an appeal and a stay application have been filed, no party can proceed to execute the judgment while those applications remain pending. The act of filing, they argue, creates a legal pause.

The state government's counter-position is that filing an appeal does not automatically stay execution. A stay of execution requires a court to grant it. Until a court actually grants the stay, the judgment stands and can be enforced.

Both of these positions have legal support in Nigerian jurisprudence. They are not equally strong in all circumstances, and the specifics of this case will determine which applies. But the fact that both sides can make a coherent legal argument is precisely why the police are now in the uncomfortable position of being lobbied by both parties simultaneously.

The police cannot resolve this legal question. Only a court can. And until a court definitively addresses the stay application, whoever holds the council secretariats physically has a practical advantage regardless of what the law eventually says.