Okowa: Politician with a Good Heart
Love him or dislike him, few would dispute Ifeanyi Arthur Okowa’s achievements, skill and triumphs as a politician. He shot through the national limelight as the secretary to the Delta State government. Hitherto to that stint as SSG, he was the pioneering chairman of Ika North-East Local Government Council, with headquarters in OwaOyibo. He turned the rustic towns and hamlets into burgeoning business hubs through rare political astuteness and the collaborative efforts of the Ika people. During his tenure from 1991 to 1993 places like Owa, Ute-Ogbeje, Ute-Okpu, Umunede, Idumuesah, Igbodo, Otolokpo and Mbiri became a beehive of commercial activities and attracted economic exodus of Ika indigenes from Lagos and towns that joined in developing cottage industries to uplift the fortunes of the new LGA. There was a boom in agriculture, because of the farming proficiency of Ika North-East in producing yam, cassava, melon, maize, tomatoes and plantain.
Ifeanyi Okowa honed his political skills by not playing dirty politics, but using his positional power to empower his people and stand a resolute course with rare deftness. He was Delta Commissioner for Agriculture and Natural Resources between July 1999 to April 2001, Commissioner for Water Resources Development from April 2001 to May 2003 and Commissioner for Health from September 2003 to October 2006. He deployed his administrative acumen and medical profession kindheartedness in all these tour of duties. He left unblemished records and superlative report cards in these ministries where he held sway as the helmsman. After a failed attempt to become a Governor 2007, he was appointed the SSG of the State and yet again replicated his innate expertise of strategic cooperation, socio-economic empowerment through people, building alignment and alliances with Deltans. He became a toast to technocrats and civil servants because of his firm but humble disposition towards people, his interpersonal skills and urbane quality helped him navigate the different interpretations of high-heeled ‘politics-in-governance’. He was able to understand and act with recognition of diverse interests, without being partial or partisan in all his assignment.
I tenaciously followed the checkered but successful career of this medical doctor-politician and had a clairvoyant prediction that he would become a major force in Nigeria’s political azure. He contested the Delta North Senatorial election primaries with a PDP Chieftain’s spouse and won the election, not without ruffling feathers of factions who felt that he did not deserve the victory, in a re-run election, the ineluctable hands of fate gave Okowa another victory with 1,446 votes, against 108 votes of his opponent. He clinched the Delta North senatorial seat with 98,140 votes. This self-effacing medical doctor turned politician was born on the 8 of July 1959. He is youthful and committed to the progress of Delta State, this he has shown with uncanny resoluteness.
Recently, he re-enacted his winning streak, like the cat with nine lives Okowa always rebound and demystified the norms, he was seen and rated by political pundits as not ‘’anointed’’ to be Governor of Delta, in a fiercely contested PDP primaries, where the Urhobos, the Aniomas and other political pretenders vied for the gubernatorial primaries of PDP, he defeated all the candidates with 406 votes. The delegates believed this uncommon politician would bring progress to Delta State. A State that have seen disproportionate infrastructural development in all the major cities, an oil-producing State yet replete with moribund and abandoned projects. Deltans have become weary of leaders who engage in pep talks and rhetorics, without rolling up their sleeves to create sustainable development.
From his recent electioneering campaigns and memorable thanksgiving service, Okowa has a vision to enlarge business centres in the State and create more agricultural wealth. He has a well-articulated plan, but he must bring it down, by focusing on actionable, practicable and sustainable projects. The adrenaline-pumping strategies, which would resonate with the people of the State and pave the way to building the Delta State that is indeed the dreams of its forebears. His past experience has equipped him with the cognate adroitness and this is illustrated in the metaphor of dancing on a slippery surface, which evokes the delicate, symbiotic and sometimes precarious process of working together which elected or appointed politicians, senior public servants and political hawks, who have lost their exalted “godfatherism” status. If elected he must undertake a bridge-building efforts to bring Deltan out of the chicanery of Urhobos, Isokos, Ijaws, Itsekiris or Aniomas in the allocation of resources, which has even affected the infrastructural development of Asaba, which is seen as a ceremonial State Capital.
The sense of moving together as a highly polarized State, giving each other space and equal opportunity matters, sometimes one in the spotlight, sometimes the other, where sometimes the partnership may stumble and occasionally fall, encapsulates this dual leadership relationship of a Governor as it operates in saner environment. English or pidgin should be the official language in the government house and state ministries. It is pathetic the State of anomie I witnessed when you cannot speak any the language of the ‘Men in power” in Delta State. You are treated as a pariah and often times; you would not get anyone’s attention. The politically astute professional like Ifeanyi Okowa must be seen as a divine child of destiny that must bring sanctity and fairness to governance if elected Governor of the State. Despite his political vicissitudes he maintained an enigmatic persona. You cannot say he is a political ‘Son’ to any of the marauding self-styled “godfathers”
There has been less description and analysis of the kinds of skillset, achievements and pedigree which elected politicians should have as they work closely and on a daily basis with the people they are meant to serve. Nigerians since this elections season have not only been bombarded with hackneyed manifestoes, churned out by neophytes or nouveau riche who sees elective position as an opportunity to amass wealth, this over the years has become a predictable ritual, which has thrown up weird characters and roguespoliticians and made a caricature of public service.
We have lost sight of what public servant should be; no democratic norms can survive in a cocooned avarice and regimented inertia, as I witnessed recently in my visits to some Delta State parastatals and ministry. Public servants must respect the role and function of politicians in a democracy, and the constitution is very clear that their role is to do everything they could within the precinct of the law to achieve the elected politician’s objectives to the electorates, not subverting the efforts of the government through taking on roles that are the statutory rights of the elected politicians. Some civil servants have become demi-gods in the ministry, where they lord it over the citizens and relevant stakeholders. They dress like politicians, drive cars that their salary cannot purchase or maintain. They now live in houses that CEOs of multinational cannot afford. They speak with the sartorial airs of politicians and commandeered all government contracts to their private companies or their cronies.
If elected Okowa must do everything possible to change, re-orient and restructure the current state of Delta State ministries and parastatals. The institutional knowledge required of senior public servants who work closely with elected politicians is made up of varieties of knowledge which range from formal and informal aspects of their own constitutional context, through to tacit knowledge and insights about political and stakeholder relationships management.
For Delta State electorates, vote for individual who can change the fortunes of our State around. Some electorates must seek to demonstrate the extent to which changes in the relative influence of the various determinants of voting behavior, have made elections in our State inherently less unstable and unpredictable. This may involve discussion of the decline in strong political party affiliation as seen in past decades and/or the rise of the so-called floating voters. Politicians leverage on our apathy and indifference to elections to rig elections results, you must come out to vote and vote your conscience. As citizens of our State, you might have noticed that the predominant issues that have pitched the politicians against each other, have thrown up vagaries of disputation, this would tell you know who is ready to build our State and those who are pretenders, also note that the ethnic division would not dwarf the considerable volatility in our electoral processes. Do not let any circumstances or intimidation disenfranchise you on Election Day.
–– Dr. Osahenye is a Creative Writer