From Femi Folaranmi, Yenagoa
Immediate past Minister of State, Petroleum and former governor of Bayelsa State, Chief Timipre Sylva has said that he has done nothing wrong in changing his mind to contest again for the governorship of Bayelsa State.
Sylva, now the governorship candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in an interview explained that he changed his mind because of the gaps that need to be filled in the development process in Bayelsa State.
According to him, the present administration is not equal to the task in putting Bayelsa on the path of genuine prosperity.
You have emerged as the standard bearer of your party but there are lots of internal grumblings especially from other aspirants. How do you intend to pacify aggrieved members before the governorship election?
I don’t think there are internal contradictions. If you watch carefully, those who contested against him are with me. Festus Daunmiebi, who was one of those who expressed certain views after the primary election, is with me. We have looked at things together and we now are on the same page. Every other person frankly I believe is on the same page. The love for APC as a party is paramount to all of us. It is not personal. I am not contesting to be governor of Bayelsa State for personal reasons. I believe every other person that contested did not do so for personal reasons. We contested to improve the situation of Bayelsans. And I think that is paramount. At the end, we have a basis to come together and that is what we are doing. Of course, we are reaching out to ourselves and I can assure you that we are together. There is nobody challenging the primaries in court to the best of my knowledge.
How is your relationship with Chief David Lyon?
I don’t have any problem with him. I don’t have any personal problem with David Lyon. Of course, we contested the elections but we don’t have any personal issues. That doesn’t have anything to do with our relationship at all.
In 2019, your party won three national assembly seats, Senator Degi- Eremieny (Bayelsa East), Hon Preye Oseke (Southern Ijaw Federal Constituency) and Hon Israel Sunny- Goli(Brass/ Nembe Federal constituency) but in 2023 , your party did not win any seat, so what gives you hope that your party is still relevant in Bayelsa.
This matter is sub-judice and I would not want to comment much. It is a very sad situation because we were a party ready to contest elections freely and fairly but unfortunately, some other desperate elements had other plans and rigged the election. Most of those elections are being challenged and I would not want to go into the details but I believe at the end of the day, justice would be served. We are aiming to reclaim our seats. We have every evidence that would enable us to reclaim our seats.
You said before that you were not going to contest as governor again, so why are you contesting now
Yes, I said so. And frankly if you left it to me today, I will still say that. But it is not about me alone. At this stage of my life, I must consider my life as belonging to the people of Bayelsa State. Even against my wish, if it is the yearning of the people, then I would answer their call.
Frankly speaking you must agree that this cannot be an ambition for me. Becoming governor of Bayelsa State cannot be an ambition for me. I ask everybody, if I become governor for the next four years after the governorship, what would I be known as.? I would be known as a former governor. I am already known as a former governor. So, there is nothing new in this for me. But when you look around the state, you see all the problems of the state, problems of development, the bungling that is going on in the name of governing , then there is a need for a steady hand, there is a need for an experienced hand to take over Bayelsa and put this state on the path of development. That is where we are. A lot of people came to me and I said no I couldn’t be that selfish not to accept. If I don’t contest, there are other ways I can keep myself busy, there are other roles for me, not only in Bayelsa, but at the Federal Government, even at the community level.
But unfortunately, I feel that the government of the day is not doing well. There is no clear path way that I can see to progress and develop. Where are they taking us to, I can’t see. Yes, there are patches of things being done here and there but that really is not the solution. We must see a clear pathway. Everything you are doing must be geared towards a journey to development. Where is the current administration in Bayelsa taking us to.
They talk about prosperity but can you believe this government is about prosperity. There is nothing prosperous about the situation in Bayelsa. Sometimes you wonder if they really understand the meaning of the word prosperity. You want to create jobs, then you give voodoo jobs, by voodoo jobs I mean appointments, is that a sustainable way to create employment. Giving appointments to people and keeping them on salaries is not a sustainable way to create employment. I hear there is a slang in Bayelsa ‘Madam must go market salaries. That is not where Bayelsa should be. We want to bring things together to build an economy that would attract people all over the world to come and invest here. Investments that would create jobs and opportunities for Bayelsans is what we need. So, everything we are going to do is going to tend and lead to the direction of economic sustainable prosperity. But when you have a government that has no understanding of how things are in the world and they think about building short roads here and there, people are suffering. Look at Yenagoa, does it look like a state capital?
I keep talking about the flooding situation. Nobody is talking about it yet because it has not happened. There is no preparation for something that is impending. Then when it happens, we start running helter- skelter what sort of fire brigade governance is that.
We think that it is time for us to come in and bring everything together. There dots everywhere that we need to connect to be able to create a pathway for a sustainable future for Bayelsans. That’s really what we are going to do. Look at that power situation in Bayelsa, we have been taken 20 years back since I was there. We were really working towards stabilizing power in Bayelsa. That was my goal. I wanted to be the first state to achieve one year of uninterrupted power supply in Bayelsa. We were almost there. The gas turbines were here, we had installed the second one. Today where we are in power in Bayelsa, we have been taken back 20 years. One step forward, 20 steps backward.
Yes, I didn’t want to contest. I agreed I said so but it wasn’t time to decide; in the end it was about Bayelsans. And Bayelsans prevailed on me to change my mind. And for the love of my people, for the love of Bayelsans, for the love of development and progress, I changed my mind. And it is not just me that has changed my mind, others have also changed their mind. Even you asking the question have had instances that you have changed your mind when you have other aspects of the issue shown to you. Of course, I have the right to change my mind because my people wanted me to and they prevail on me and I have thrown my hat into the ring.
You said you are more experienced now than before, what could you have done differently as governor
There are plenty of things I could have done. When you are doing something, you want to see the purpose of it all. You can’t just walk without going somewhere. The destination where governance is going in Bayelsa is not clear. You are talking about prosperity but we must agree there is no prosperity in the state. Prosperity where the majority of our people are earning minimum wage is no prosperity and the majority are not working; there is no job, so where is the prosperity. The prosperity is among the few people in government that are feeding themselves fat. So how do you create sustainable prosperity? So, we need to ask where the industries, human capital development are that would create jobs for us.
During my time as governor, I was trying to create sustainable prosperity in the state. This is why I sent over 200 Bayelsans to India to study ICT. Today a lot of those young men are doing very well. The other day I was in NNPC and one of the young men came to meet me. He is working in the ICT department. Today what the world is talking about is knowledge economy, oil is drying up but what is in the head cannot dry up. Those I sent to Russia to study medicine are some of the best doctors you have around. We need to grow the economy and the state.
Bayelsa has one of the largest coastlines in Nigeria, 185km but what have we done with it? There is no trawling company in Bayelsa. The fishing ground is off Bayelsa. But there is no fish company. I tried to set up one, I bought three trawlers, but they can’t be found.
From day one you would see what we are doing and the number of jobs we are creating. Government is about the people. When you develop the people, the people in turn develop the state.
Your critics have accused you of playing Nembe politics in APC
I don’t know what you mean by Nembe politics. The last time I checked, Samuel Ogbuku, the MD of NDDC is not from Nembe. The last time I checked, Alfred Egba, who is also representing Bayelsa State in the Revenue and Fiscal Mobilization Commission, is from Yenagoa. I don’t know why they say this. It must be the naysayers who would never see anything good in what you do. In fact, the Nembe people accuse me of favouring other people, that is what I am accused of by the Nembe people.
When I was governor, you would agree with me that I was a lot more inclusive in my government than any government after me. Definitely that accusation is not true, I am one of the most detribalized Bayelsans and I have a lot of other people working with me and I have never been accused of being parochial.
What exactly was the problem that prevented Bayelsa from making money from the Atala Oil field. When you were Minister, the license was revoked from Bayelsa State, what really transpired?
I have asked this question many times. Atala Oil field was allocated to the Bayelsa State Government in 2003. Successive governments including mine attempted to produce from Atala. I made a lot of progress and of course you know how I left. But to fast forward, 17 years after, Atala marginal oil field has been abandoned. Today we are talking about Atala, but I am sure before it was revoked, many Bayelsans did not know about Atala. It was moribund. In fact, at one point, it became a place for bunkering. Crude oil thieves just go there to suck oil. It was a problem because the state government had abandoned it. 17 years later, marginal fields were given for 10 years, after 10 years you go for renewal. So if you have not done anything, then it becomes a candidate for revocation. Atala filed for the first 10 years, no oil, then they pleaded and a renewal for five years was given, still no production. Two years after and the government itself knows the marginal oil field cannot just be lying fallow. As of the time it was revoked, nobody was there, it has been abandoned. I kept asking when Atala was revoked, how many Bayelsans lost their jobs because of the revocation, none.
That means that marginal field was not giving Bayelsa any value in terms of producing employment to our people and talk less of bringing value in terms of money. So the place has been effectively abandoned. There was a lot of bickering with some parties calling on the government to give it to them. The Federal Government in its wisdom said it cannot be lying fallow and decided to give it to an investor that would invest and produce. This is what normally happens to assets that have been abandoned. So Atala was revoked along with 11 others. It was not only Atala that was revoked. It was 11 assets including Atala that were revoked because they were considered as not performing. If Atala had been left, it would have still been lying fallow because in the Oil Industry, before you do anything you have to show a work plan, there was no work plan to show it has been abandoned effectively.
Today Atala is employing Bayelsans. Atala is producing. Atala is in a position to pay taxes and do community development. Go to the communities near Atala and ask them, they are much more better off now. Atala in the hands of government and Atala in the hands of Bayesla private sector is different. It is working. So, I don’t know the hullabaloo about revocation of Atala. And I keep saying that there is another asset that the state government has which many Bayesans did not even know. There is OPL 240 owed by the Bayelsa State government. People won’t hear about OPL 240 now because they are not doing anything about it, they have abandoned it. So, the day the government says it revokes it they would ask why the government revokes it. This is the fire Brigade governance that I am talking about that we must grow past. OPL 240 is there. The new PIA says you must convert from OPL to PPL and if you don’t convert, it is a basis for revocation. They have not done anything about converting it, nobody is even discussing it. This is a much bigger Oil field than Atala. It is not a marginal Oil field; it is a major oil field. Nobody is discussing OPL 240 today. Once you talk about Atala, they talk because they want to demonize me. If we really sit down and discuss OPL 240, it would bring much value to the state. As journalists you should ask them what plans they have for that Oil field. Fortunately, Atala went to Bayelsans too and it is bringing value to the people. Let us not cry over spilled milk because Atala was mismanaged and we lost it. I am hoping that we would not mismanage OPL 240 too. I hope OPL 240 won’t go the same route.
What happened to the N50 billion infrastructure bond your administration took?
The bulk of that money was used to service previous bank loans. When I came in as governor, I inherited loans taken from banks. The burden was passed to us and we thought the best way was to reduce the loan burden. We had to go for refinancing. So, we got money from the capital market to pay off the debts at lower interest rates. So, we were able to slash the interest rate with the bond to 18 percent and got a longer tenor to make it easy to pay.
In addition, the place now called Bayelsa Medical University, my administration brought it to the point it was. It was from the bond we were able to build that place. I tell you that there was another sad aspect, very sad that people did not know..There were lots of equipment worth billions of naira rotting away at the Port. They were bought for this hospital but after I left, I understood there were some disagreements, I don’t know the nature, the equipment was left to rot away; it was a sorry sight. All kinds of medical machines, MRI machines, CT scan, all the machines in medicine you can think of because we went for the best. They did all that because Timipre Sylva had to be demonised. If it was brought in, it would mean Timipre Sylva did something after all. They wanted to ensure the narrative that Timipre Sylva did nothing. They abandoned all my projects, sold off the turbines. It was sad.
This was the reason why when people talked to me about coming back, I had to reason with them because I really saw how a lot of things we had started and done were maliciously abandoned for no reason but just to demonise me. Even the Senatorial schools, everything was distorted.
Look at the Law School in Yenagoa. I went for Abuja and fought for the South- South Law School to be established in Bayelsa. We did everything and built the law school and it started. But look at the sorry state of the Law School today to the extent that Rivers State said the Yenagoa Law school is in a sorry state; they have built another one in Rivers State. I just hope the Law School in Rivers would not eclipse the one in Bayelsa. They refused to touch all what I did because they wanted to demonise me.
Anyway, we should put all those behind us and put the state on the path of progress. It is not about me. It is about Bayelsa being first. The people of Bayelsa first.