Hon. Patrick Obahiagbon (aka Igodomigodo) is the
Chief of Staff to Governor Adams Oshiomhole of Edo
State. In this interview, Obahiagbon assesses the
administration of President Muhammadu Buhari. He
also speaks on some issues affecting Edo, asserting
that the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) stands no
chance in the guber election scheduled to be held in
the state in 2016.
You ran in the senatorial primary of the APC for Edo
South ahead of the 2015 polls but lost to Hon.
Samson Osagie. How were you able to move on?
Moving on was nothing of a quagmire at all and that
is because as a student of mysticism and
hermeticism,I hold the view very tenaciously that “as
above so below”, meaning that nothing happens in
the life of a student of light by accident. I gave it all
my best and vicariously yearned again for another
parliamentary lacuna to use parliament as a pizza for
social engineering and legislative dialectics, but when
it did not happen, it just meant that the cosmic
keyboard was vibrating at its own rhythm and
harmonics according to the law of the cycles which is
itself an immutable divine law.
Some Nigerians believe that the administration of
President Muhammadu Buhari has been sluggish. Do
you share that sentiment?
President Buhari has left no one in doubt-except of
course incorrigible political Philistines and
revanchists-that he has set his hands on the plough
and no political Jupiter can stop him now from
cleansing the Augean stable and navigating the ship
of the Nigerian state from Bermuda Triangle. He has
demonstrated a diaphanous commitment to
pulverize the monster of corruption by not just
vacuous sloganeering as it was in the past, but has
announced a willingness to begin an epic prosecution
of economic vandals. The constitution of a
Presidential Advisory Committee against corruption,
headed by the fiery and no nonsense Professor Itse
Sagay, is a further demonstration of his commitment.
I simply don’t understand what they mean by
sluggishness. Mr President met a country in a state of
economic phlebotomy, social anomie, moral
putrescence and political erebusism. Was he
supposed to have, against this background, begin to
take precipitate steps bordering on the harum
scarum just to satiate the dramatic proclivities of
those who lightly cogitate that Nigeria is a political
cinematography? No no no.
Fixing the Nigerian economy just now requires
systematic methodology,a sangfroid disposition and a
calculative mind as cool as cucumber. His shuttle
diplomacy to rally Nigeria’s neighbours and the
international community at regional and global levels
are already paying off in the war against Boko Haram.
His spartan discipline and respect for the rule of law,
especially on fiscal matters, are already yielding
positive mileage for the economy. Nigerians are used
to theatrics and histrionics but President Buhari is
not a man of theatre and drama.He is a
man of few words but much action.
The PDP in Edo recently kicked against the approval
of the National Assembly of the World Bank loan
being negotiated by the state government. What is
your take on the argument that it will further plunge
the state into debt?
The objurgations of the PDP in Edo State against the
loan deal, as you call it, before the National Assembly
is sheer jejune political polyphony and sciamachy.
The World Bank, as you know, would not indulge
anybody who plays ducks and drakes on financial
matters and, in any case,the laudable achievements
of Edo State government is palpably visible to the
blind and audible to the deaf.These are facts too
gargantuan and irrefutable to be contested except
and save those habilimented in astigmatic political
monocles. The Edo PDP Chairman is a comedian; any
time he wants to act, he beckons on journalists to tell
them to come. We are not bothered about their
criticisms. As you can see, Edo is working. Once Edo
people are happy with the Comrade Governor, Orbih
and his cohorts are inconsequential.
But are you not worried that with the achievement of
the PDP in Edo South in the National Assembly
elections, it might replicate that success come 2016
governorship election?
What were the results achieved by the PDP in the last
elections? They simply latched in on the South/South
sentiments and the Christian/Muslim stratagem
during the presidential election and, even at that, the
final results were a photo finish and, of course, when
the House of Assembly election took place, when the
issues were now local and internal to Edo, was it not
now conspicuously demonstrated that APC owns
papa’s land, going by the outcome of the elections? If
anything has changed since then it’s that the people
of Edo are now more attracted to the APC and the
Comrade Governor, especially with the non-
performance of the PDP also at the federal level and
their eventual defeat.So what is the tension? Edo is
APC state anytime, any day and come rain, come sun.
2016 will come and go and I can tell you that it will
be wishful thinking for the PDP to dream of winning
the governorship in Edo, not now and not in the
nearest future.
But the agitation by some people in Edo South that
they should be allowed to produce Oshiomhole’s
successor and not the governor, don’t you think it
might lead to crisis in your party?
I laugh and shudder when I hear views such as this
and, that is because if you like, it will be an ignis
fatuus to ever think that it would ever be possible at
anytime for there to be unanimity of opinion among
Edo South leaders of APC as to its choice of a
gubernatorial candidate, when that time comes. In
any case, who says the governor is not also from Edo
South as he is also from Edo Central and Edo North
respectively?
The governor is a democrat who will not impose any
candidate. Did the governor impose me on the
people as his Chief of Staff during the senatorial
nominations? Did he impose Prof.Julius Ihonvbere,
the Secretary to Edo State Government on the
people of Edo North, when he ran for the Senate?
But we must all be conscious of the fact that the
achievements of APC today in Edo have made us rise
above twelve feet tall and driven by Mr Governor.
We must all be conscious of the fact that Mr
Governor is the face of APC in Edo..We must all be
conscious of the fact that Mr Governor will be leading
the campaign in 2016 and would provide himself as
APCs political battle axe.We must all be conscious of
the fact that Mr Governor shall both be the political
mine layer and mine sweeper for the election.I think
the Comrade Governor will consult with the National
Chairman of our party who is an eminent son of Edo
and in whom we are all proud and thereafter consult
with other stakeholders from the state and, that is
because whoever will wear the crown is going to be
Governor of Edo state and not governor of Edo South
assuming the gubernatorial cap tilts along the
senatorial trajectory of Edo South.
But there is this fear that the party may be engulfed
in crisis if some aspirants feel cheated?
I don’t foresee any crisis arising from our primary.
Some of us have lost out in party primaries and we
have remained in the party and worked for the
candidates that emerged and the party realizing that,
in a political contestation, only one aspirant will
emerge. I have looked at all my brothers across the
state who are gubernatorial aspirants and they are all
men of integrity, rectitude and honour.I would be
surprised and shocked if anyone of them turns his
back at the electoral fortunes of the party simply
because he did not get the gubernatorial ticket of the
APC. None of them strikes me and comes across as
capable of that kind of a decision.
No comments:
Post a Comment