By Mike Igaga Jr.
LAST Thursday and Friday the people of Edo State experienced yet another dimension of brutality as the government evolved crude resistance to the return of Pastor Osagie Ize Iyamu to the APC. The government issued all forms of threats to the citizenry who would dare attend the rally put together by Pastor Osagie Ize Iyamu’s supporters to honour his movement to the APC. The government closed all private schools in the state. Citizens were threatened with losing their Certificate of Occupancy if they allowed any rally in their premises.
The governor summoned an emergency security meeting and raised an alarm on security breakdown in the state. This indulgence in subterfuge was intended to ensure that social life in Benin City was officially restricted on Friday, December 13, 2023. The rally was stopped by the order of the Inspector General of Police. On the morning of the rally, policemen had taken over the premises. All these are indicative of the state of anomy in Edo State. The bother is: what could have been the cause of this bellicose indulgence by the governor and his allies?
No doubt, the governor wants to come back for another four years. It could be assumed that he intends to seize control of his party to serve that purpose. The justification of this view find root in the hostile air which drives the governor in his relationship with Adams Oshiomhole. No doubt, both the governor and his deputy cannot deny the role that Oshiomhole played in bringing them to political limelight. The attempt to bleed Oshiomhole which began with the alienation of his foot soldiers soon assumed a dimension of threat to life as claimed by the National Chairman of APC. There are claims that his Benin residence was attacked by thugs and during the inaugural convocation ceremony at Edo State University Iyamoh, hired thugs who were supposed to disrupt the ceremony and rough handle Comrade Adams were repelled by the community youths.
The question remains why is Obaseki fighting Adams? Why is he resisting the coming of Osagie Ize Iyamu into the APC? The truth is that Edo State is in serious lack of governance delivery currently. It is a fact that Edo State is sunk in a dangerous debt profile. The governor has borrowed about N38.150bn ($109m) in the last three years thereby moving the external debts of the state from $168m to $277m. The domestic debt record of the state has jumped from N45bn to N84bn in the last three years. The worry is that nothing in physical infrastructure justifies these added loans taken by the government.
Government is not about what is available to be spent. Good governance delivers on the capacity to generate resources that is used to provide physical infrastructure for the state and fiscal capacity that guarantee the welfare of the people. Perhaps, Obaseki, in the face of apparent incapacity, is afraid of the wrath of Oshiomhole who danced everywhere to make him governor. To pre-empt that reaction, he took the critical initiative by attacking first.
Obaseki is skilled in subterfuge. He had placed Oshiomhole in bad light before the Benins already. The only saving grace that came for Adams is his performance record as governor of Edo state. This include the construction and rehabilitation of supposed federal roads that have been neglected and served to deface Benin City over the years. Also of significance is the improvement of the educational sector among others. It is this that saved Oshiomhole from the governor’s antics of blackmail and arm twisting.
The measure of this positive spirit of the Binis was practically expressed when thugs alleged to have been sponsored by allies of the governor came to attack the house of Adams Oshiomhole. Bini youths mobilised themselves to dislodge the attackers. The point at issue among the Binis is that Obaseki has not been able to replicate the achievements of Oshiomhole in the turnaround of Benin city not to talk of transcending it. Many of the natives appreciate Adams Oshiomhole and cannot be ungrateful to him.
The closing of all private schools in Benin as well as the threat to revoke the Certificate of Occupancy of any person who allows the reception rally of Osagie Ize Iyamu to hold in his compound begs for clarification. It has become the norm in Edo Sate that government armtwists any person who stands on its path as it patronises the alter of perfidy. People are being threatened with the demolition of their houses for holding opinions that are contrary to what the government is doing or intends to do.
There is no doubt that Osagie Ize Iyamu poses serious threat to Obaseki’s second tenure. Even if Osagie Ize Iyamu did not decamp, Obaseki has so terribly mismanaged the APC to that extent that most members of the party would have voted for Osagie Ize Iyamu as a PDP candidate. Obaseki is a threat to the sustenance of the APC control of Edo State. It is a bitter pill too dangerous for the APC. He is a terrible infraction on our democratic gains. He did not share in the barricade years of our democratic struggles. Therefore, he does not understand the primordial basis of the APC as a party.
Obaseki needs a reorientation on the core values of the democratic ethos and the basis for community in the context of the present trend of cosmopolitanism in social engagement. He must understand that democracy thrives on the contest of ideas. Its delivery is enriched by the synthesis of ideas that, at the beginning, stand as antagonistic. He needs elevated minds around him. You cannot run government with thugs on suits or agbada. At the heart of power and its application, is the people who we ought to be serving; the electorate who gave us the mandate.
The Nigerian police are not spared in this regretful experience of the people of Edo State. The thugs that unleashed mayhem on the Benin social space on Thursday did not act with any fear of police intervention. In fact, they were sure that whoever gave them the assignment had effectively transacted with the police. So, there was nothing to fear. The police, perhaps, were on leave for that long period. The thugs hired to intimidate, and assault people over time in the state, are never arrested.
The import of this decay in moral worth is that public perception of the state is at a very low ebb.
Furthermore, at this time of multilateral cooperation, it is doubtful if corporations of the appropriate standing will do business in an environment of political uncertainty and rancour. To that effect, it continuously deepens the poverty scale of Edo State. The people of Edo State must evolve the necessary political will and sagacity to save the state and regenerate the developmental trend of the state which has been lost since this government came to power. Nobody will do it for us.