Once you are in
politics, especially in this part of the clime, you must be prepared for the
unusual. However, no matter how prepared you are, you can never fully
comprehend some of the absurdities that you come across. The latest is an
incoherent, disjointed and poorly-written article by one George Igbi: “2015:
Great Ogboru should be given another chance.”(Urhobo Times, May 2, 2013,
p.17). His request, as the headline suggests, was not addressed to anybody in
particular, although he went about abusing various individuals and institutions
before ending up with the favourite topic of disgruntled DPP members: abusing
Senator Akpor Pius Ewherido. If the God of George Igbi has already anointed Chief
Great Ogboru as the next governor of Delta State come 2015, as he
claimed, he should go ahead and do thanksgiving to his God. Why bring the
senator into the matter by abusing him?
Ordinarily, igbi does
not deserve a response, but for the sake of the reading public, I will dignify
him with one. He said: “Senator Ewherido is a disobedient politician. We see
him as someone who is biting the finger that fed him. Somebody invited you to
come and eat and you decided to hijack the food…”
Who is Ewherido
disobedient to? On April 28, 2013, he rendered the account of his stewardship
in the last 22 months to his masters, the people of Delta Central. The who is
who in Delta Central, including majority of the Urhobo Ivies, were there. They
were all happy and satisfied with his representation. Nobody complained that he
is disobedient. They also did not complain that Ewherido has bitten any finger
that fed him and that is what matters. So who are the “we” Igbi is talking
about? I am also at a loss as to the “somebody who invited Ewherido to come and
eat,” but I will hazard a guess because this thread of argument sounds typical
and familiar.
It is public knowledge
that Senator Ewherido contested the PDP primaries in 2006. He was not happy
with the conduct of the primaries and decided to
withdraw from active politics after his tenure ended in the Delta State House
of Assembly. During this period of siddon look politics, PDP
made numerous overtures, I do not want to detail here, to him to come back and
actively participate in party activities. So it was not as if PDP
suspended Ewherido or he was a political outcast during this period. He
withdrew from active politics based on principles. So nobody can talk about
politically rehabilitating Ewherido because he did not need it; he was not in
political desolation; his political machinery then even though inactive was
also intact.
Shortly after the
annulment of Uduaghan’s election in 2010, Ogboru personally approached Ewherido
to team up with him to win the governorship rerun, a request, which, to the
consternation of some of his supporters, he obliged. Ogboru did not invite
Ewherido to come and eat; he could not have invited Ewherido to eat because
there was no food. In Nigerian political parlance, when you are invited to come
and eat (as the late Bola Ige was told) it means being invited to share the
spoils of office after an election has been won, not before electoral victory.
An invitation before election means to come and work towards victory. That
was the invitation Ewherido got. At the time Ewherido joined DPP, the party did
not have even a local government councillor. One commentator put it succinctly: “There
was no food in DPP when Ewherido joined. If dinner was ready and served,
Ewherido would not have been invited because he would have been of no use to
DPP; he would have been surplus to requirements. All DPP had were some food
ingredients. Ewherido was brought in to bring more ingredients that were not
available; Ewherido and others who joined in 2010 completed the ingredients and
actively participated in cooking the dinner, in the process showing old DPP
members culinary skills they never knew existed.”
Igbi, you are not only
poorly educated, you are also ill-informed. You said Ewherido had no political
group before he contested the senatorial seat. In his PDP days Ewherido had a
group called Democratic Treasure Forum (DTF). Then he formed Delta Coalition
for Change. This is the group he came into DPP with. And now he is part of the
Prudent Democratic Movement (PDM). It is your problem if you have issues with
PDM.
The rest of your
write-up is incomprehensible and does not make sense, so I do not even know how
to respond to it. You certainly can do with some self-development by going back
to school, whether formal or informal. For the sake of posterity, however, it is
necessary to make a few clarifications.
One, when Ogboru
approached Ewherido in 2010, his request was for Ewherido’s assistance to help
him win the governorship rerun. There was no other election in 2010, so it was
all about the rerun. I dare to say that Ewherido worked vigorously for Ogboru’s
victory. He worked harder than all these people making noise and abusing him in
the newspapers and other platforms. Nobody can fault Ewherido’s commitment
towards Ogboru’s victory at the 2007 governorship election, (yes, and 2007
governorship election), the 2010 governorship rerun and the 2011 governorship
election. That is why even the most violent of Ewherido critics have not
accused him of being culpable, overtly or covertly, for Ogboru’s
inability to ascend the governorship seat.
Two, Ewherido’s
contesting the senate seat on the platform of DPP was incidental to his being
in DPP then to help Ogboru win the governorship. If Ogboru had not invited
Ewherido to join him in the rerun project, Ewherido would not have switched to
DPP and his God who had destined him for the senate would have made another way
to enable His (God) wish come to pass; so those taunting him about the DPP
platform should give me a break. Ogboru and Ewherido’s liaison was initially
solely for the sake of Ogboru’s governorship in 2007 and subsequently the rerun
in 2010. It only became symbiotic in the 2011 general election. Maybe someday
the senator will break his silence on this issue and all these noise makers
will shut up forever.
Three, Senator Ewherido
has always been guided by the interest of the Delta Central people whose sacred
mandate he is in custody of and the larger interest of Deltans. These interests
supersede any personal interests and ambitions including Ewherido’s. All
those who have problems with this position should wake up and catch up with
reality, because it is not going to change; even with the relentless attacks of
his person.
For now Senator
Ewherido is not bothered about the antics of Igbi and his likes. If the attendance
and the reception of the account of his stewardship at the UPU Centre,
Uvwiamughe, Agbarho, are anything to go by, then the Urhobo nation is firmly
behind him in his quest to give his constituents effective and vibrant
representation. Unfortunately for Igbi and his fellow disgruntled DPP members,
the Urhobo Nation train has moved on while they cling to their archaic,
parochial, fruitless, ruinous and unproductive politics.
Urhobo and Delta will be great.
Mr Justice Iyasere is
the Media Aide to Senator Pius Ewherido, National Assembly, Abuja.
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