Urhobo insists on producing governor

SEVERAL intrigues/ conspiracies are  beginning to unravel among the ethnic groups and governorship aspirants in Delta State as the political parties fine-tune strategies to either select or  hold primaries for their flag bearers in the 2015 gubernatorial election.

Until lately, the Delta Central (Urhobo) senatorial district, parading the likes of former Minister of State for Education, Olorogun Kenneth Gbagi, former Secretary to the State Government, SSG, Ovie Omo Agege, David Edevbie, among others in the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, had believed that the 2015 ticket of the party was for the pick by the district, but current developments tend to suggest otherwise.

*Orubebe

However, PDP is not the only political platform; there is the All Progressives Congress, APC, where one of its distinguished sons, Olorogun O’tega Emerhor, is holding sway and the Labour Party, LP, which appears to be the platform the longstanding Urhobo political giant, Chief Great Ogboru, will use to prosecute the 2015 battle.

The Urhobo Progress Union, UPU, which is the umbrella socio-cultural group of the Urhobo ethnic nationality in the state, has not masked its plan for an Urhobo indigene to succeed Governor Emmanuel Uduaghan in 2015, despite the deafening clamor of the Delta North (Anioma) senatorial district.

Sometime ago, it made a declaration that no Urhobo person should work for the emergence of governor from another senatorial district in 2015, but some  key politicians from the district have lampooned and defied the order.

‘Uvwiammuge Declaration’

The position known as the “Uvwiamuge Declaration” is to the effect that the UPU and, indeed, the whole of Urhobo nation will be rallied to support and deliver as governor only an Urhobo candidate that emerged from either the PDP or the APC! The reasoning allegedly posited for this declaration is that these are the two competing national parties that are strong enough to protect the long term interest of the Urhobo nation.

New UPU strategy

Apparently discovering newly that its choice may not pick the PDP ticket as envisaged, the UPU, which lost its president-general, Major General Patrick Aziza, months ago, has re-strategized under the leadership of its acting president general, Chief Joseph Omene. He has reportedly said the Urhobo quest for governorship in 2015 should not be restricted to PDP and APC platforms. He said the Urhobo people would support any political party that fields an Urhobo indigene as its flag bearer.

The new proclamation appears to be a warning signal to the PDP and it was made public when no less a person than the “people’s general” himself and four-time governorship candidate, Chief Ovadje Ogboru, paid a consultative visit to the UPU executive at the residence of Chief Omene in Mosogar, Ethiope East Local Government Area of the state.

The UPU leader said, “any party that produces an Urhobo candidate is the party that will be voted for in the governorship election. In a case where two Urhobo candidates emerge, we shall look at the party that have alliance with the Federal Government and support that party with the belief that when the Urhobo candidate becomes governor, he will defect to the ruling party because the Urhobos will not want to be in the opposition at the federal level.”

No retreat, no surrender

“UPU has written to Mr. President and soon we shall meet with him and tell him that we need an Urhobo governor, but if his party brings a non-Urhobo, the party that produces an Urhobo candidate is the party that we shall vote for in the governorship election, but vote for Mr. President in the Presidential election in solidarity of our love and support for him,” he added.
While assuring Chief Ogboru, who is running on the platform of the Labour Party of the support of the Urhobos, Omene said: “If LP gives you its ticket, Urhobo will vote for you, but if PDP presents an Urhobo candidate, better for us, because head or tail, Urhobo has won.”

Ogboru’s Mosogar sermon

Speaking, Chief Ogboru said: “LP has come to Delta having seen the pains of the Urhobos and Deltans in general, who are richly blessed by God, but poor and ineffective leadership because the crop of leaders in the state has made it not to attain its full potentials.”

Ogboru: Uduaghan was not a governor

“We are again putting ourselves up to stand and to liberate Delta State and put our sufferings as a people to an end. This is what the LP has come to do in the state. A lot of things are going wrong in Delta today and collectively as a people with the support of all Deltans, LP is here to fix it because though, not only Urhobos make up the state, the position of the Urhobos in terms of their population is a strength and if they join hands with other Deltans, our goal of liberating Delta State from bad governance would have been achieved.”

Anioma opposes UPU

The UPU’s Urhobo 2015 agenda runs contrary to the position of Anioma Congress, the socio-cultural umbrella group of Delta North senatorial district, comprising Ndokwa, Ika, Aniocha and Oshimili people, which is insisting that it was their turn in 2015 to rule the state, having not produced a governor of the state since it was created in 1991.

Urhobo had twice produced  governors, Olorogun Felix Ibru and Chief James Ibori, while Delta South senatorial district (Ijaw, Isoko and Itsekiri) is currently taking its turn through the incumbent Governor Emmanuel Uduaghan, whose eight- year tenure will expire in 2015.

On Anioma gov we stand- Leaders, aspirants

However, Delta North political leaders and aspirants, among them Senator Ifeanyi Okowa, former Speaker, Hon Victor Ochei, ex Commissioner, Chief Clement Ofuani, chartered accountant, Chief Johnson Opone, Mrs, Esther Uduehi, . Ngozi Olejeme, Prof Sylvester Monye, Hon Ndudi Elumelu, Chief Godwin Obielum, Dr Festus Okubor, retired permanent secretary, Sir Tony Obuh, Chief Emmanuel Okocha and others are all aware of the Urhobo agenda and are collectively and separately working on counter plots.

In separate sessions with Anioma Media Professionals, AMP, recently, Ochei, retired permanent secretary, Sir Obuh, Chief Ofuani and Chief Opone, all members of the ruling PDP restated their binding position on the emergence of an Anioma governor in 2015.

Vanguard, however, gathered that because of the feeling that Sir Obuh might have been anointed to succeed Uduaghan, the other aspirants are calling for free and fair primaries, while one or two said they may move to other parties to contest the election if the PDP shuts them out. Some are thinking of APC and APGA, but still under the Anioma for governor agenda.

Asagba of Asaba cautions

However, the Asagba of Asaba, Obi (Prof) Chike Edozien, who is at the forefront of the battle by traditional rulers and other Anioma leaders to produce the next governor of the state, had advised the aspirants to go back over their steps and work as brothers to produce a consensus flag bearer. The Anioma Congress had already shortlisted three governorship aspirants, which, nevertheless, is not obligatory on the political parties.

2015 is for Anioma —Nwaoboshi

But, state chairman of the PDP, Chief Peter Nwaoboshi, who had given the Delta Central senatorial district and UPU a hard-hitting fight on the issue of 2015, told a group of senior journalists, under the auspices of Anioma Media Professionals, who visited him at Asaba that the mood of the party  from Abuja to Warri, Ughelli, Oleh, Burutu and Asaba, favors power shift to the North senatorial district.

He maintained that power shift to Delta North was in line with the time-honored principle, which the party is noted for, adding that as state chairman of the party with a long-standing history of equity, justice and fairness, he would say without fear of contradiction that the people of Delta North have the moral standing to aspire to rule the state in the next dispensation.

Nwaoboshi   traced the history of power shift to 1998 when the party was formed, saying that as a founding member of the party, he was in a position to chronicle vividly the genesis and the dynamics of the principle of power rotation, which first produced a governor from Delta Central in James Ibori and now Delta South (Emmanuel Uduaghan).

No backtracking

“It is only reasonable, just and fair that the only senatorial district that has not produced governor in the state, Delta North, does so this time”, he declared.

His words, “We have gone too far in this journey, we have had series of meetings, we have made compromises in times past to ensure equitable distribution of power in the state, we cannot afford to recant our position as a people and as a party.”

“I challenge those who think otherwise to show evidence why power should not shift to Delta North. This is the zone that has shown the most loyalty and commitment to the PDP in the state, returning the highest number of votes for the party in all elections since 1999. The records are there at INEC for anybody to verify”, he asserted.

Payback time

Recounting the various agreements and compromises reached from the days of James Ibori and how the party hierarchy in the state agreed to work together for the realisation of Emmanuel Uduaghan (Delta South) governorship project against strong opposition from Delta Central, he said, “Now is the time for the same party machinery that produced Ibori and Uduaghan to move into action for the realization of the aspiration of Delta North people.”

Nwaoboshi, fondly called the ‘oracle’ of Delta politics, said he could not in all fairness preside over the injustice of pushing for the gubernatorial ambition of a non-Delta North in 2015.

“To do so would mean a desecration of my personal values and principles and much more a betrayal of the common trust which the Anioma nation reposed in me,” he stated.

According to him, “Our party, the PDP, has a history of fairness and equity right from its early days and Delta State being a PDP state cannot be seen to be going against the party creed. Those pushing otherwise are doing incalculable damage to the ethos of Nigeria’s most democratic party.”

Orubebe, Prest keep South senatorial district alive

The contest for the ticket of the strongest party in the state seems to be between aspirants from North and Central senatorial districts, but the South district has the former Minister of Niger Delta, Elder Godsday Orubebe  and entrepreneur, Mr. Anthony Prest as contenders. Nobody is given the district much attention because the incumbent, Governor Uduaghan is from the same district.