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From Paul Osuyi, Asaba
The outcome of the just concluded Delta State Governorship election aptly lay credence to the maxim that ‘all politics is local’.
Incumbent Speaker of the state House of Assembly and candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) secured majority of the lawful votes cast of 360,234 in the election.
His closest rival and candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Ovie Omo-Agege who is the current Deputy Senate President, scored 240,229 votes while Ken Pela of Labour Party polled 48,047 votes.
Oborevwori’s victory is coming against the backdrop of the unexpected poor performance of the PDP in the state during the February 25 Presidential and National Assembly elections.
Peter Obi’s Labour Party, powered by the amorphous ‘Obidient Movement’ resoundingly won the state in the presidential election, and also clinched two seats at the House of Representatives.
Though APC came a distant third in the presidential election, the party won two senatorial seats and one House of Representatives, leaving the PDP with one senatorial seat and seven House of Representatives seats.
Meanwhile, Oborevwori’s chief backer and outgoing governor, Dr. Ifeanyi Okowa, was the biggest loser in the presidential election as the vice presidential candidate of the main opposition party at the centre.
The defeat of the PDP in the presidential election was a tsunami. It was a startling defeat not known to the state since 1999, leaving Okowa as the state leader of the party with an abysmally low confidence.
The development made the once impregnable party structure suddenly become vulnerable as bigwigs defected to APC on the ground that Delta PDP was already a sinking ship.
Even before the last ditch defectors who waited for the outcome of the presidential election, a number of defectors loyal to former governor James Ibori, a power broker, had defected under the umbrella of Delta Unity Group (DUG).
Although Ibori did not defect as his daughter, Erhiatake, won the House of Representatives seat for Ethiope constituency on the platform of PDP, his body language days before the governorship election indicated that he was out of favour with Okowa and Oborevwori.
Ibori who had preferred another candidate, David Edevbie as PDP governorship flag bearer, remained indifferent during the campaigns whether at the national, state or local government level.
His attitude apparently inspired his numerous loyalists including former Speakers of the state House of Assembly, Monday Igbuya and Olise Imegwu, former commissioners and House of Representatives members to take the step of defection out of PDP.
But a couple of stakeholder engagement and the low enthusiasm displayed by the adherents of ‘Obidient Movement’ who seemingly found it difficult to put the disappointment of the outcome of the presidential poll behind might have swung the pendulum back to the PDP’s favour.
This was even as the aura of the office of the Deputy Senate President and defected bigwigs did not make the maximum impact as the ‘local political champions’ appeared to have tamed the national clout.
Out of the 25 local government areas of the state, Omo-Agege won in four which are in his Delta central senatorial district, losing out in the other four councils in the district.
He lost the entire councils in both North and South senatorial districts, although the APC candidate is contesting the 21 local government areas where he lost the election.
Omo-Agege and the APC, in rejecting the outcome of the poll, vowed to challenge the result using all legal means, insisting that the result of the February 25 elections in the state indicated an unequivocal rejection of the PDP by Deltans.
In a statement by his Chief Press Secretary, Sunny Areh, the Deputy Senate President said Oborevwori was declared by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) “despite a myriad of infractions and acts of impunity on the part of the PDP in the course of the election. These were brought to the attention of INEC with incontrovertible proof.
“The March 18 election was characterized by massive fraud, unprecedented vote buying and voter suppression perpetrated by the PDP in the course of the election.
“The fraudulent nature of PDP’s so-called victory is just too damning and daring for it to be acceptable in any decent society.
“Most of those infractions are in the public domain and known to INEC officials and the security agencies involved in superintending the election.”
But basking in the euphoria of the victory of the PDP, the state Commissioner for Information, Charles Aniagwu, urged Omo-Agege not to waste his resources in prosecuting court cases on the result of the election, insisting that the outcome cannot be overturned.
Aniagwu told journalists that the performance of successive PDP-led administrations in the state, Oborevwori’s acclaimed street credibility and that fact that PDP is in the DNA of Deltans accounted for the victory.
“What has happened in this election is that Deltans have been able to repel surgically, the incursion into our political DNA. As an administration, the incoming administration will not take this for granted.
“We are happy that we won fair and square in all the senatorial districts and that we got overwhelming support of Deltans and those who live here with us in the northern, southern and central senatorial districts.
“This victory will spur the PDP to not only sustain the development trajectory that has characterised the Okowa-led administration but to embark on a process that will indeed bring more development just like the agenda of Sheriff Oborevwori,” he said.
Aniagwu advised Omo-Agege to join hands with the governor-elect to develop the state, saying that the infractions he complained about mainly occurred in his (Omo-Agege) area of strength.
“We urge our brother to save the money that he would want to use to hire lawyers and use it to either begin to rebuild his party that was seriously battered on account of the election or use it to make more impact in the various localities.
“We plead with Omo-Agege to join hands with Oborevwori because we don’t see how he is going to upturn this overwhelming victory that Deltans have given to us.
“We are saying we will work with him and other members of APC. And those who decamped, we do hope that in the course of time, they realise that integrity pays and they would purge themselves of that integrity deficit.
“You recall that some electoral officers were held hostage in Orogun II; you also recall that we have to shout that some other persons were trying to tamper with the result of Ethiope West. In other places, the election flowed much more peacefully,” he added.
In his congratulatory message to the governor-elect, Governor Okowa said the PDP learnt lessons in the course of the electioneering campaign and the election proper, and promised to make amends.
“In these last two weeks, God has taught me a lot of lessons and it is my prayer that you (the governor-elect) will not make some of the mistakes that we made,” Okowa said.
Meanwhile, a public affairs analyst, Lucky Futughe, attributed the loss of the APC candidate to his lack of pan-Deltan qualities, adding that the Deputy Senate President also undermined his political allies.
“He burnt a lot of bridges on his political sojourn to his current Deputy Senate President position. These bridges were burnt across the three senatorial districts, placing him in a very perilous position to win the gubernatorial election.
“He burnt most of the Anioma, Itsekiri, Ijaw and Urhobo bridges in his quest to intimidate everybody in his party and the state.
“Consequently, the chances of DSP Ovie Omo-Agege emerging as Governor of Delta State was infinitesimal because of his antecedents.
“Those who defected from the PDP only did that based on emotions/leader said and not on the basis of strategic thinking,” he submitted.
