We have 80% of Edo electorate behind us – Obaseki
Godwin Obaseki is the Governor of Edo State and candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in the forthcoming governorship election in the state. In this interview, he speaks on his achievements in his first term, squabbles with a former governor of
Why do you think the people of Edo State should re-elect you as governor? When I came into office, I had a social contract with my people, and the underlying principle of that contract is to work for them and protect their interests. For the past three years and nine months, I have, by the grace of Almighty God and the support of my people, done my best to uphold their interests.
It is consequent on these that I believe that my people have rallied in large numbers to support me; giving me the assurance that they would troop out en-masse to re-elect me on September 19, 2020.
When and why did you fall out with Comrade Adams Oshiomhole?
When I became a governor, we had an understanding on how we were going to run the state. We had agreed to put an end to the use of non-state actors in revenue collection. These persons had been harassing women in markets. We had young men who didn’t respect the enigies and onogies; they took over land assets and sold a plot to three to five people. They went about with guns and constituted nuisance. Some people also came and promised young people jobs abroad, only for the young people to make journeys to Europe through Libya and the Mediterranean Sea. The whole place was crises-ridden. Nobody wanted to come down to Edo to invest.
I said we couldn’t continue this way. We needed to change the status quo. I barred thugs (agberos) from the roads and markets and ensured that they stopped harassing market women and other persons in the state. But some of the leaders said they would have none of that because, according to them, they helped me into office. They didn’t help me. The people voted for me and God helped me.
As for sharing of the state’s money, I insisted that we must use the money for the people and change their lives with it. Debts had piled up. There was work on ground and if we used the available funds to entertain the politicians, there would be nothing left to work for the people. I told them I came to serve God and my people.
Today many of our people are happy. Pensioners get their pay at the end of every month.
I came to work pro bono for government for seven years. Oshiomhole said this by himself.
I don’t see him as my godfather. He helped me just as I helped him even before he became a governor. I called people, raised money and helped him to become governor. That relationship is not godfather-godson relationship. When I said I wanted to run for office, he reciprocated and helped me. He didn’t pick me up from the roadside.
From what he did from the point he became the National Chairman of the All Progressives Congress (APC), he doesn’t seem to be the same person I worked with. He became worse than a godfather; he became a political bully.
You worked with Oshiomhole for eight years. Why are you trying so hard now to extricate yourself from his government and portray it as a failed administration?
I did so pro bono in service to Edo people. It is consequent upon this that I have taken steps to emplace reforms in various aspects of our society to ensure that the mistakes of that administration are not continued or repeated. For these, we have no apologies to anyone.
Your proclamation at night and the subsequent inauguration of nine members of the House of Assembly out of the 24 members set off the crisis in the state, why was it necessary to exclude others?
A proclamation is a document issued by the governor that provides the legal basis for the inaugural sitting of a legislative house. So the talk of proclamation at night really does not arise. The facts are that a proclamation was issued by me and the house sat and elected its principal officers and all other members-elect were subsequently invited by their colleagues to be sworn in. They stayed away from office on the instruction of their godfather, who relocated them to Abuja. They refused to come to represent their constituents who voted them to provide legislative representation.
Though I issued the proclamation according to the provisions of our constitution, the decision to hold the inaugural sitting was independently taken by the House of Assembly.
It may also be worthy of mention here that the proclamation I issued has been validated by a court in suit PHC/PH/CS/159/19 - Hon. Yekini O. Idiaye and Anor vs the Clerk of the National Assembly and Five Others - where the Federal High Court sitting in Port Harcourt gave a final judgement on September 12, 2019, and held that the Edo State House of Assembly was properly inaugurated on June 17, 2019.
One of the allegations against you is that you did not complete some of the projects started by your predecessor in office. Is this true?
This is absolutely false. Most of the projects of the previous administration are the outcome of my work as Chairman of the Economic Team of the previous administration, and we continued many of them.
What is your reaction to some people’s accusation that you rule with an iron fist and that you are intolerant of other people’s views?
We believe that the people should be allowed to be the judge of the character of the person they employed. I serve over four million Edo people. I care more about how they feel and not by the judgement of a few people who are saying this because we have refused to open the people’s treasury to them.
I know your paper has an intelligence team. You can send them to the field to collect data on how the people feel about me and my team. I am certain you will get the verdict that the people love all we have done for them. We have a 70 per cent positive rating.
The people know that we are serving them. We are humane and have a human face. We have liberated them from thugs, oppressive extortionists and others who used to prey on them. It is these few people, these oppressors, who we have freed our people from that are complaining.
Your opponents have said that while you are good at signing MoUs, your government does not always turn them into concrete projects; is this so?
There are numerous projects which we have delivered in the last three years and nine months with our MoUs, which is the initial step which any serious government uses to engage the private investor and development partners.
Some of the projects we have executed through MoUs include the state’s broadband network infrastructure, for which an MoU was signed with MainOne, Nigeria’s leading cable company, for laying of 400km fibre-optic cables to drive internet connectivity.
We also have the MoU between Mixta Africa and the Edo Development and Property Agency (EDPA) for the development of the 1,451-unit Emotan Garden Estate, which sits on 70 hectares in the Upper Sokponba axis of Benin City. The first phase of the estate has been completed and home owners have moved into their properties. Work is progressing on the second phase. There are other MoU projects that are still in the works.
We do MoUs because we understand the language of PublicPrivate Partnership (PPP) and that has made all the difference in the way we deliver our legacy projects.
What is your reaction to the allegation that your government is planning violence ahead of the election?
This is absolutely false. Like I always say, you don’t have to take my word for it. If your paper should send men for an independent and unbiased survey, you will find that we have 80 per cent of the voters and the people committed to my re-election. We also have a groundswell of support from Edo people in the diaspora. Therefore, it is in my best interest that the process is peaceful and calm so that the people can go out, exercise their franchise and re-elect me.
In fact, it is the APC who know for a fact that they don’t control up to 20 per cent of the electorate in the state and are heading for certain defeat that are stoking violence, causing chaos, attacking innocent citizens, residents and members of the PDP.
They are also planning other underhand, illegal, criminal and undemocratic tactics to derail the process.
We are, however, convinced that the president is committed to a peaceful poll in Edo State. INEC has, so far, rebuffed pressures from the APC in Edo and the police have indicated commitment to be impartial. With all of these, we are certain of a peaceful election. We urge the public to disregard all the fear mongering and come out on election day to perform their civic responsibility.
Why did you not continue with the projects left behind by your predecessor?
The projects are ongoing. It is completely false that we abandoned them. Though some of the projects had some structural defects, we have amended these and continued work on them.
Some top officials left your government in curious circumstances which some people have used to fault your style of leadership. Can you react to this?
This is politics and different people seek different alliances. There is nothing strange about that. In all, the number of people who resigned from the government is not up to five per cent of the total number of appointees.