Edo state – Living in glass houses

As the tenure of Edo State Governor “Comrade” Adams Oshiomholes winds down and the spectre of elections loom, he has resorted to what he knows best – rabble rousing.  His public battle with the Igbinedion family and People’s Democratic Party (PDP) smacks of desperation to begin political witch-hunting seven years after coming into office. In […]

As the tenure of Edo State Governor “Comrade” Adams Oshiomholes winds down and the spectre of elections loom, he has resorted to what he knows best – rabble rousing.  His public battle with the Igbinedion family and People’s Democratic Party (PDP) smacks of desperation to begin political witch-hunting seven years after coming into office. In his defence Oshiomhole illogically claims it took so long for the APC State Government to probe former governor Lucky Igbinedion because the past PDP led Federal government lacked the moral courage to fight corruption!  The drama has been heightened by the well-publicized spectacle of women protesting in support of both parties. However such protests should be discountenanced as a simple matter of “Women’s Leaders” collecting money and mobilizing those who have no real interest in the issue at stake, to dance at political rallies or protest in public, as the case may be.
Countering Comrade’s rabble-rousing showmanship, the Igbinedions use their Independent Television (ITV) station to defame him at every opportunity. Claiming that the masses haven’t actually benefitted from all of Comrade’s antics either in the labour movement or in politics, they say that despite riding to power on the backs of the underprivileged, he heaped hardships on them by banning Okada motorcycles, closing government businesses, banning street trading, and demolishing kiosks.
In reality Comrade’s only solution to poverty has been to simply keep poor people out of sight! Constantly reminding everyone that when he caught a poor widow street trading he told her to “go and die”, the PDP point out that Comrade instituted the most painful tax regime ever experienced without any commensurate improvement in government services.  Worse still the arbitrary multiple taxation was enforced using “garage boy” contractors who illegally seize private property and extort money from hapless citizens who have no recourse to appeal.
In truth Edo State citizens are fed up with the “agbero” anti-masses nature of APC governance and without Oshiomhole’s personal charisma as a candidate, the party will be hard pressed to defeat PDP in the upcoming elections. Respect for elders is still an integral part of our culture and in seeking to pre-empt PDP from staging a comeback, Comrade’s daily abuse of Chief Gabriel Igbinedion the Esama of Benin Kingdom is becoming unbecoming. That Lucky is a thief who misappropriated government assets for the benefit of his family isn’t news, its history.
It should be recalled that he plea-bargained his way out of prison, and in the shameful manner of such dealings, returned a relatively insignificant amount of loot and kept the rest. In addition to embezzlement Lucky used Edo State money to develop his father’s University in Okada; awarded his brother the failed contract for the dual carriageway to the campus; and permitted the University free use of State Government facilities. Edo State citizens are not unaware that the Igbinedions thrived on looting the public purse. As well as Lucky, another of Chief Igbinedion’s children, former Okada Local Government Chairman Fred, was convicted for financial irregularities.
Another son Bright was fingered as the beneficiary of overpriced failed contracts, while yet another son Peter was indicted over irregular contract awards while in charge of the Federal Aviation Authority of Nigeria (FAAN). In spite of the Igbinedion family’s abysmal record of public service another child Omosede is currently in the House of Representatives hopefully not carrying on the family tradition.
All Comrade’s hullabaloo is really about the political fortunes of the APC.  In the recent national elections the PDP won two out of the three Senatorial districts in the State, and four of the seven seats in the House of Representative, also their presidential candidate scored the highest votes. This was followed by decamping of many leading lights of the APC back to the PDP.  The easiest way to floor PDP is to remind everyone of Lucky’s failures and point out that hardly any senior PDP member in the state can be exempted from the sleaze of those days.
Ironically Comrade owes a debt of gratitude to the Igbinedions because his tenure can only be judged a success when compared to Lucky’s abysmal showing. If there had been any half decent government prior to Comrade, his own mediocre performance would be put in true perspective. Many former APC leaders are opening up a can of worms about skeletons in Comrade’s cupboard. Lucky has warned Comrade not to take his silence as cowardice and threatened to expose all the Governor’s atrocities, claiming that apart from the Airport Road Benin failed contract, all the wonderful new structures in the exclusive old Government Reservation Area (GRA) of Benin are tied to Comrade’s associates or political appointees. It is trite that those who live in glass houses should not throw stones. One thing is certain more the abuse will be heaped and more skeletons revealed before the election takes place.