INDEPENDENT
Comrade Igbini Emmanuel is the National President, Vanguard for Transparent Leadership and Democracy (VATLAD). In this interview with ISAAC ASABOR, the former Governorship candidate talked on Delta ministerial appointees and Delta politics.
You have followed the process of nominations of persons for ministerial appointments by President Tinubu and the eventual confirmation of 45 out of 48 of them by the Senate. What was your initial reaction when you heard the names and the backgrounds of all the nominees?
My reaction was, and remains a mixed feeling because on the one hand I was, and still, so excited hearing the names of some nominees who I know are qualified, competent and patriotic in their services to our beloved Nigerians at federal, state, local council, and, or even at local community level. On the other hand, there are some nominees I didn’t expect to make the ministerial nominees because of their poor records of performances when they had the opportunities to serve at various levels across our country. This is what saddens and breaks my heart. But I am very hopeful that with President Tinubu leading this team of the other great ministers, my decades-held conviction that our Nigeria shall overcome and rise again will come to reality sooner than later. This is however not to pretend that the journey will be smooth and without challenges.
Can you disclose to Nigerians the names of some of these ministers who excite you?
Some of them are former Governors NyesomWike, Nasir El-Rufai and David Umahi. Others are men and women who formed the great team of then Governor Tinubu who helped him transform the seemingly collapsed Lagos state to become the sixth most economically prosperous city in Africa. I am talking of people like Dr. Wale Edun and few others. I am also very excited hearing the names of some very highly respected legal luminaries and medical experts, some of them have international working experiences
But Mallam Nasir El-Rufai was rejected by the Senate and he has withdrawn from being a minister as a result. Are you not aware of this latest development?
What latest development, and by whom? Reject an excellent performer and goals-getter like El-Rufai? Have Nigerians had an FCT minister so good in performance as Mallam El-Rufai since the creation of FCTand till date? Are we not seeing the almost total collapse of public Infrastructures and public order in FCT after the end of El-Rufai as Minister? Are Nigerians still proud of FCT today? I insist that former Governor Nasir El-Rufai must be in the hope renewed cabinet of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu for this hope to be actualised. Many of those opposing his inclusion in this cabinet are part of those who plotted or supported the plotting of economic coup against the emergence of Sen. Bola Ahmed Tinubu as President of Nigeria using the so-called naira redesign and swap which caused unprecedented level of anger of Nigerians against the APC ticket of Tinubu. But it took this same Mallam El-Rufai to patriotically move to foil this coup by rejecting the new naira redesign and swap.
He also mobilised some APC Governors to institute legal action against this coup executed by then Governor of CBN. Have Nigerians also forgotten the fact of how El-Rufai resisted former national chairman of APC, Sen. AbdullahiAdamu, who came publicly to deceive Nigerians that former President Buhari and the leadership of APC have adopted then President of the Senate, Senator Ahmed Lawal, as the Presidential candidate of APC? Secondly, Mallam El-Rufai under his constitutional duty to Nigeria as a citizen by virtue of section 24 of the 1999 Nigerian constitution, as amended, must be in this cabinet to contribute to the progress and development of Nigeria. He therefore can’t run away from this duty simply because some Nigerians are opposed to him as minister. He must serve and this he must do now.
Thirdly, President Tinubu must realise now and urgently that this opposition to El-Rufai is actually targeted at him to make him fail. I say this because this is exactly how my appointment on August 9, 2011 as Director General of Delta State Direct Labour Agency, (DLA) by former governor Emmanuel Uduaghan of Delta state was fiercely opposed by some top chieftains of his PDP but he ignored them and went ahead to have me appointed. He knew as a fact that their target was not me but him because they wanted him to fail woefully at a time that almost all roads across major cities and towns of Delta state had collapsed and became death traps to Deltans and Nigerians using the roads. This collapsed roads of course led to heightened anger against him by Deltans and Nigerians. So he needed someone like me to help him fix these roads. I never begged him for this appointment. As a matter of fact, I rejected his first move in 2007 to appoint me into his cabinet. So, all attempts by these PDP chieftains to blackmail and deceive him to believing that it would amount to anti-party for him to appoint me since I am not a member of PDP and the fact that I am the leading and most vocal opposition leader to Delta state PDP government for many years, fell on deaf ears. Governor Uduaghan knew better. My record at DLA is still unrivalled from the day of its establishment in year 2000 till today.
Now that you shared your experience serving under a PDP government even when you were not a member of the party and as a matter of fact, you were of Peoples Redemption Party, (PRP), and you contested the governorship of Delta state on three occasions against Governor Uduaghan. Are you now justifying the inclusion of former governor NyesomWike into this Tinubu’s cabinet despite Wike’s very vocal condemnations of APC and even vowing never to be part of the APC he described as stage 4 cancer?
Hahahahaha! At a time I also vowed never to have anything to do with PDP. Yes. I did! So, I laugh each time I hear some Nigerians using this as basis for opposing Wike’s inclusion as minister. For me, I am only concerned about the peace, progress and economic prosperity for our beloved 200 million Nigerians irrespective of whatever dichotomy created by nature or artificially by the privileged elite class who are ruling over us. It should be service to our nation, not self or political parties that are nothing but mere vehicles for majority of Nigerian elites to actualise their selfish interests. How do we justify a capitalist candidate dumping his or her capitalist political party few weeks to the date of election to join an opposing socialist Political Party simply because he or she did not get the ticket of his political party to vie for election? Similarly, how do we justify a socialist candidate dumping his or her socialist political party to join a capitalist party simply because he or she needs the deep pockets of members of the capitalist political party to win election?
Now, given the very outstanding performances of former Governors Wike and David Umahi particularly in areas of massive infrastructural revolution and development, will it be fair and patriotic for any Nigerian not to be happy with their appointments as ministers? Don’t we want to see our roads and public infrastructures urgently witness same revolution and development as we saw in Rivers and Ebonyi States under Wike and Umahi, respectively?
Now, let us return to your Delta state. We hear that Delta state is now in chaos following the last minute inclusion of Festus Keyamo, (SAN), as ministerial nominee in addition to Ms Stella Okotete who was in the first batch list and already screened by the senate and just awaiting confirmation like all other nominees. The reported anger is coming from some sections of Delta state who accuse your people of Urhobo ethnic group of Delta Central Senatorial district of marginalising them by collecting these two slots. In fact, some leaders of Delta state APC have been on some national television stations and newspapers demanding that President Tinubu drops one of these two Urhobo nominees. This appears to be the reason the confirmation of Ms. Stella Okotete was suddenly rejected by the Senate while that of Keyamo who came last, was confirmed. Do you agree with them that it is unfair to have the two ministerial slots taken by your people of Delta central senatorial district?
Chaos, where and in which Delta state? Certainly not the Delta State of Nigeria where peace and love reign among Deltans. Now, let me restate what I said on AIT’s Democracy Today programme on Tuesday, August 8, 2023 where I made it very clear that we must make a clear distinction between millions of our united beloved people of Delta state from across the state and the very few of us, the privilege elites in politics. These millions of Deltans are going about their daily small small and macro businesses and struggling for survival particularly at this moment that they can’t afford the very negative consequences of the unjustified hike in the pump price of petrol which stands now at over N600 per liter and still rising. The economy of Delta state is almost grounded as we speak. Our once oil cities of Warri, Effurun and Ughelli that host the rich multinational oil companies, NNPC Petroleum Refinery and Owvian-Aladja which hosts Delta Steel Company, (DSC), have all collapsed due to the unjust and unreasonable relocation of the administrative and operational offices to Lagos and Abuja that bear no single crude oil well. Our people are more interested in pleading and asking President Tinubu to direct these companies to come back since they are still exploring and exploiting crude oil and gas from these parts of our Delta State
But is it not a fact that two slots were taken up by an urhobo son and daughter of Delta central senatorial district even at a time that the governorship candidate, state chairman and other top political positions of Delta state APC are Urhobos of the same Delta state central senatorial district? Is this not clear marginalisation of other two senatorial districts and ethnic groups?
No. It is not marginalisation at all! It is only a coincidence that these two ministers appointed by President Tinubu and rightly so, hail from Agbarho and Uvwie Kingdoms of Urhobo nation of Delta central senatorial district. Their ethnic background has nothing to do primarily with their well-deserved appointments based on their qualifications, competence and the unrivalled commitment to campaigning for the election of Tinubu as President of Nigeria. In Delta state APC, I know as fact that are three persons who worked their hearts out for Bola Ahmed Tinubu during the Campaign. These persons are Stella Okotete, Festus Keyamo and another whose name I don’t want to mention here. So even if they are not from Urhobo nation of Delta central senatorial district, President Tinubu would still have appointed them as Ministers. My request is to ask that President Tinubu appoints this third person after all, he appointed three ministers from Ogun and Lagos states and in Ogun state, two of the three Ministers are said to be from the same senatorial district. Let me remind us that during the second tenure of Governor Uduaghan who is an itsekiri man, on his own volition he appointed me as Director General of Delta State Direct Labour Agency; Chief OloriMagege as Chairman of Delta State Waste Management Board and this same Stella Okotete as his Special Assistant on Millennium Development Goals. All three of us are from the same community, Agbarho Kingdom and Urhobos of Delta central senatorial district. He was fully aware of this fact. Then there were these same so-called anger and protests against our appointments by some politicians but he ignored all of them. Are we saying he did not know what he was doing then and the reason he insisted on us? At the end of our tenures, the records are there for all to see as they relate to our performances. Are there no same anger and protests by some politicians of Lagos State and South-West geopolitical zone against many of those President Tinubu has so far appointed as Ministers and Special Advisers who happened to be people he has so much trust and confidence in their commitment to service since his days as Governor of Lagos State? Has he now dropped them? No! He won’t! No good coach drops his or her first eleven.
