Sometime in February 2014, as we finalised plans to move the APC into Bayelsa state, a brief meeting was held among former Governor Timipre Sylva, Chief Tiwei Orunimighe (the APC interim chairman as he then was ) and myself in a location in Port Harcourt. The timetable for the Ward registration of new members was out, but we had no secretatiat. So we agreed to do something to change this situation by giving the party an edifice that will serve both as its Bayelsa administrative headquarters and a concrete symbol of its presence in the state.
To this effect, Chief Sylva provided a property for us to site the office in; but it was sealed by the the PDP led Bayelsa state government which claimed ownership of the said property. It must be recalled that the same building was previously used as a campaign office for the Goodluck Jonathan campaign in 2011 under then Gov Sylva.
We got another property - a one time secretariat of the PDP in 2003 - which I personally paid for. Still it was also raided and eventually sealed by the state Governor through his then Chief of Staff, chief Diekivie Ikiogha ( who incidentally, has just joined our party, which is now the new bride in Bayelsa State. He is most welcome) with a warning that " Boko Haram's Political party or Islamic party is not welcomed in Bayelsa State, the home of Mr President Jonathan, leader of the PDP and "leader" of the ijaw nation.
In both cases, the Raiders of our Secretariat were aided by the Bayelsa State Police command. Thus even when the Estate agent that rented the Property to us contacted the Commissioner of Police, she was rudely told it was an "orders from above".
Like a choir singing from the same well rehearsed hymn book, that same week, the Ijaw Youth Council (IYC) issued a statement proclaiming Bayelsa state a PDP state and asking APC members to limit their activities to the North. This was followed by similar press statements from a plethora of government funded and aided groups from the region and state. As if in a competition to be the most vocal Anti-APC folks around, elements from various ex-militant groups, the Ijaw National Congress etc all joined the fray and issued statements declaring their unalloyed support for the PDP and reinforcing the persona non grata status of the APC in the state and region.
Against this backdrop, on the eve of our ward registration we were faced with the daunting and distracting task of searching for a yet another Secretariat. But I had an ace up my sleeves. Unknown to both our detractors and friends, I had also rented a third property as a backup plan. So, at this point, I eventually revealed its existence and location which we finally settled for.
Having secured a secretariat against stiff opposition, we were still faced with the challenge of security. The Bayelsa State police command, as I have already pointed out above claimed to be working with a mandate “from above ” to frustrate our lawful efforts aimed at planting our party, the APC, in the state. So they were not an option to trust our security with. They had in fact been harassing our interim chairman incessantly in the weeks leading to that time.
The morning after I disclosed the new Office space I had secured, the party chairman, Chief Tiwei and I conferred; and were able to raise 5 police troopers/trucks totalling 20 mobile policemen from outside the state whom we brought into the state with trepidation. By a stroke of luck, the Bayelsa state police command upon seeing our security thought that we had some form of approval from "Abuja" and supported us with an extra trooper/truck less than an hour after we opened the secretariat with our supporters watching with apprehension and cautious optimism at the sudden twist. I will return to this later on this piece.
The kaiama declaration gave birth to the Ijaw Youth Council (IYC) and other affiliate groups like Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger-Delta (MEND) down the line. These groups were supposed to be non- partisan. In fairness to them, most were non-partisan until the emergence of Dr Goodluck Jonathan as acting President and later President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
It must be pointed out that in their derailed state, they missed some very vital lessons in the history of the political development of the Ijaws and the Niger Delta.
The first civilian governor of the old Rivers State, chief Melford Okilo, of blessed memory, founded the National Solidarity Movement (NSM) in 1998 as a political party of choice within the state and region instead of joining the PDP. Okilo was to later move into the PDP to actualise his senatorial ambition in 1999. Even in the First Republic, the Ijaw elites formed the Niger Delta Congress (NDC) through which the young Okilo won and gained a seat in the National Parliament. It must be noted specially that although formed by prominent Ijaws and with the avowed objective of promoting Ijaw interest, none of the aformentioned political parties attempted to forcefully impose their will on and claimed to have a monopoly of control over all Ijaws. So I have always wondered the basis on which some people have been pursuing the claim that PDP was an "Ijaw" party. The brutal truth is that the PDP was not and will never be an Ijaw party. In the same vein, no other political party can successfully sustain the same claim.
Giving the foregoing, it was wrong for the leadership of the IYC, INC, a faction of MEND, ELDERS and opinion leaders in the state to mortgage the destiny of our people at the altar of political expediency by tying our collective future to the apron string of a political party or Politician. I hold that this was wrong then, and it still remains wrong today.
I find it even harder to believe that today, after committing such atrocious blunder, that this same leadership has made available its platforms to the losing party in the general elections in an attempt to surreptitiously set agenda for the new ruling party and government. Where else in the world can this happen? How do people eat their cake and still hope and want to have same which has been eaten?
How do you lose a national election out of your sheer ineptitude and still want to control the system by seeking undue "relevance " through the backdoor using platforms provided by socio cultural and pressure groups which have no political affiliation, but made the mistake of dabbling into partisan politics in the last elections.
After such a major faux pas, what we expect from these people is deep sober reflection and stock taking. This should be a period of soul searching in order to reinvent, restrategise and acquire new engagement tools required to chart a new course for our people. Rather they have continued to strut the horizon as if an election didn't take place only a few months ago. A wiser set of people should have leant valuable lessons from that election in which Nigerians clearly rejected a previously existing order and asked for CHANGE. The same change which has seen the Niger Delta Development Commission(NDDC) consistently received much more monthly allocation (its full constitutional monthly allocation) in the last 2 months than at any other time during the last government as available records show. If this government can show such fidelity to the NDDC, then I wonder why anyone would think that the government is not moving as fast as it can to resolve the impasse at the Amnesty office. Make no mistake, I empathise with the Niger Delta Amnesty Programme beneficiaries whose studies have been affected by the regrettable delays of payments. Nonetheless, the point must be made that no one should play divisive politics with such a sensitive issue. In other words, the plight of our students should not be politicised and used as a tool for political mobilisation against a government that means well for the Niger Delta. This is where I have a problem with the meeting called by the Ex-MEND leadership.
It is not the place of all those who prioritized their blind support for the failed Transformation Agenda of the last government over the survival and development of Bayelsa State and the Niger delta to set agenda for this new government others risked so much to put in place.
Our people need to calm down. You don't approach every issue with the same strategy. Not every problem needs a hammer as solution. This government is not the same as Mr Obasanjo's in 1999 or Yar’adua's in 2007 nor that of Jonathan in 2011 all under the PDP. There has been a tectonic shift in the political landscape of Nigeria that will continue to reverberate for many years to come. Something fundamental and previously unheard of happened in Nigeria. For the very first time in Nigeria, an opposition party won an election at the centre; effectively uprooting PDP the political party the Nigerian Military Oligarchy established to rule Nigeria forever out of government and power. The era of " carry-go" is effectively over.
With the above in mind, you don't approach the government formed by a party which won such an election the same way you approached the military inspired PDP government. Our approach must be different.
The fact that all our institutions like the IYC, INC, ELDERS FORUMS and ELDER STATESMEN etc openly took sides with a particular political party and even proclaimed our state and region as an exclusive preserve and property of that party prior to the elections should be an eye opener and a big lesson for all of us going forward.
And after losing such an election, you do not suddenly turn around to think that you can use the same outmoded methods employed under the PDP to set an agenda for the new government. Whether the APC succeeds with its objectives or not, this fact should not escape those who seek to engage the government from our state and region.
The only reason such a meeting was called despite the explanations offered after the meeting was called off is because some persons thought there’s a vacuum. A political vacuum that could be exploited to move back into a pole position to effectively call the shots in the region. But the point must also be made that there's no leadership vacuum in the region. People only need to come to terms with the concrete reality that there is a new Sheriff in Aso Rock. The time for "business as usual" is gone for good.
It is curious that the same political actors who encouraged the convocation of the ill fated meeting by the ex-MEND leader later realised the futility of such a meeting and tactically called for its cancellation even after the presidency in a statement from the SA Media, Femi Adesina had said the ex agitators were free to meet. The Bayelsa State government sent a combined security team to shut down the venue but said nothing when people blamed the Presidency for doing so. The next minute it issued another statement claiming a meeting with the ex leaders will soon hold to settle the issues and forward same to the presidency. It is high time we stopped playing politics with such issues within the region.
One surprising feature of President Buhari’s visit to the United States is the non inclusion of the Niger Delta Question in any of the public policy discussions. This was even more surprising especially at the event at The United States Institute for Peace (USIP). Despite the general success of the trip, reducing the Niger delta question even in the President’s speech to the issue of oil theft alone will not assuage the feelings of many in the region especially in a complex society like Nigeria.
Despite the abysmal failure of the Jonathan government in the development of the Niger Delta, Nigerians voted for change, and that change must be all-inclusive. From environmental pollution in the region to checking the excesses at the NDDC, where president Jonathan's appointees still hold sway in alleged misapplication of funds to meet political needs of the new opposition party the PDP. It is high time the new APC government organised a major summit on the Niger Delta. Even if her oil wells dry up, the Niger Delta region will still remain the beautiful bride of Nigeria and should be treated as a priority even though it was criminally neglected by its own under president Jonathan. At this juncture, let us return to the intrigues surrounding our efforts to sow the APC seed in Bayelsa state.
After the successful opening of our party secretariat, the police authorities started playing cat and mouse with most of us. On getting back to Port Harcourt, they withdrew all the police attached to me and my business. The reason given was that they were used for illegal activities (escorting me to open a party Secretariat). They also withdrew and (and later returned) those attached to our party chairman. The former Chief of Staff to Chief Sylva, Chief Samuel Ogboku was arrested a few days later and charged as an accomplice to murder with the murder suspect himself as the chief witness to government. The "murderer" himself was free while the person who he claimed sent him was kept in prison. Ogboku was in detention until the courts acquitted and discharged him in a judgement that was very harsh on the government and police just before the general elections where he was a candidate for the House of Representatives under the APC . Another was in prison awaiting trial for posting comments on Facebook. Somehow, most of us managed to send our families outside the country on "exile" before embarking on such a "suicide" venture.
If we had lost the presidency, I would have left this country. And sure others had the same plans. That was the only alternative. So it was not just another political thing for me and I believe for most of us who rode on the change train. It took me several months to reinstate my security to continue doing business. At a campaign stop at Amassoma (hometown of former Governor Alamieseigha) in February, the police withdrew all the security men within a minute and we were mobbed and attacked until a detachment of JTF soldiers who were passing by came to our rescue.
I cannot catalogue all the trials and tribulations we faced in our decision to support Buhari and our party. Yet, I hanged on because I strongly believe that the APC as a ruling party and President Buhari will be able to bring the needed change to a vast majority of our people.
POSTSCRIPT
While I was still writing, President Muhammadu Buhari appointed General Paul Tarila Boroh as the Coordinator of the Presidential Amnesty Programme. I'm glad the choice was a seasoned administrator with a background for peacekeeping.
Preye Aganaba is a social commentator, a member of the 2014 APC presidential primaries and convention committee and APC candidate for bayelsa central senatorial zone in the 2015 elections, which he hopes will be cancelled by the election petition tribunal in yenagoa
|
0 comments:
Post a Comment