Politics

Why I Want To Succeed Gov Obaseki – Shaibu

Published

2 years ago

November 19, 2023

Edo State Deputy Governor, Philip Shaibu, has said that the need to implement practical governance to address the developmental challenges of the state informed his decision to vie for the governorship election slated for 2024.

Shaibu stated this on Saturday at a media parley with the Edo State Journalists Forum in Abuja.

According to him, experience, capacity, and knowledge are some of the factors that separate him from anyone desirous of succeeding Governor Godwin Obaseki, whose second tenure in office comes to an end next year.

Despite clamour for power to return to Edo Central Senatorial District after almost 16 years after it rotated between Adams Oshiomhole and Godwin Obaseki, Shaibu said there is no convention or agreement that speaks on zoning, adding that since the return to democracy in 1999, the Peoples Democratic Party was yet to give its governorship ticket to any aspirant from Edo North.

He said, “Edo people are in dire need of practical governance, and we cannot afford to experiment again with someone who does not understand the politics and needs of Edo State.

“Everywhere, including the international scene, people are clamouring that governments should not be pushing projects that are not needed. So, we need to do Needs Assessment. You cannot know the needs of the people when you don’t live with them. For me, competence and experience should be the watchword. Who is competent, more experienced and who will hit the ground running from day one if he becomes Governor? Are we going to experiment with a new person again and the person will spend the first four years learning on the job and the next four years trying to embezzle and set up businesses in the name of consolidating on his first term?

“I have been in the system. I understand the debt profile of Edo State and I know where I can get funding to put up structures in the State. I am not coming to learn on the job. I am not coming to experiment. The problem we have had in the system is that we have had too many seminars, workshops but there is no time to implement the outcome of these seminars.”

Dismissing the notion that he is bent on succeeding Governor Obaseki at all cost, the Deputy Governor said, “I am not insisting on contesting. The ambition of becoming Deputy Governor was not mine but I made myself available. The ambition to be Governor is still not mine but I am only making myself available. Don’t forget that the destinies of the people are connected and interwoven.

“There is no convention in Edo State on the issue of zoning, politically, traditionally or at conferences where we met to say this is how we want to have our politics zoned.”

On whether it is the turn of Edo Central which last produced a Governor in 2007, Mr Shaibu said, “If you check out those that have been Governors in Edo State, there is nowhere you will see the issue of zoning. We had four Governors from Edo South, two from Edo Central and only one from Edo North. When you look at the PDP, the party has never given its Governorship ticket to any candidate from Edo North. If I get the ticket of the PDP, I will be the first candidate of the PDP from Edo North since 1999.

“Anyhow you look at it, equity and fairness show that Edo North should produce the next Governor. When people want to whip up sentiments out of ignorance and perceived incompetence, they come up with ethnic and religious sentiments. If I become governor, I won’t be governor of Afenmai. I will be Governor of Edo State.

“I saw when Oserheimen Osunbor was Governor, I saw when Adams Oshiomhole was Governor and I work with Obaseki as Governor. I know the mistakes of them all. I also know the things that were beneficial to Edo State that Osunbor, Oshiomhole and Obaseki did. We will amplify the good things and not repeat the mistakes. You can only do this if you are a part of the system.”

Although, the rift between Obaseki and Shaibu is far from over with the Governor reportedly rooting for an aspirant of Edo Central extraction, Shaibu said the PDP is the party on which platform he hopes to realize his ambition.

His words, “I am still consulting and in the coming days, the outcome of my consultation will be made public. My first option is PDP, second option is PDP and the third is PDP. PDP wants to win the election and if it must win the election, the party must listen to the voice of the people. I have told them that I am a PDP member and am sure I will get the PDP ticket. They are mobilizing for me to get the ticket. They have told me some parties I should not go to, but I won’t reveal that to you now. They have told me a particular party I must not go to.

“I am a street man and even the Governor will attest to the fact that I always preach the street message. I bring the street perspective to all our conversations. If I get the PDP ticket, the people will see my street credibility. I am not going into governorship to build estates. The only estate I owe my children is their education.”

In what appeared a shot fired in the direction of Obaseki whose background in banking is an open secret, the Deputy Governor added, “Those who know me know that I am not a friend to bankers. I have sunk boreholes, renovated many schools with private monies as Deputy Governor. I have built churches and mosques. I am not an advocate of keeping money in the banks. I have conscience, I am a Catholic.”

Politics

Why I left Tinubu’s Govt — Former Aide Aliyu Audu Declares

Published

4 days ago

June 16, 2025

Editor

A former Senior Special Adviser to President Bola Tinubu on Public Affairs, Aliyu Audu, has revealed that he resigned from the administration in order to actively campaign against Tinubu’s re-election bid in 2027.

Speaking on Monday during an interview on Channels Television’s Sunrise Daily, Audu said his decision was driven by a matter of “principle and conscience,” as he accused the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) of attempting to turn Nigeria into a one-party state.

“It confirmed it on one hand, and on the other hand, it strengthened my resolve to not work for him in 2027,” Audu said, referring to Tinubu’s Democracy Day speech where the president claimed to enjoy seeing the opposition in disarray.

“I couldn’t in all honesty and in my conscience be in his government knowing I’m plotting against removal in 2027, because I will, and by God, we will remove him. Collectively, Nigerians will install a leader that will be our chosen, not his chosen. Not emilokan (my turn), but awa lokan (our turn), in fact, gbogbo wa lokan (all of us).”

He also criticised the inclusion of Nyesom Wike, a PDP member and current Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, in the APC-led government, questioning his loyalty and the legitimacy of such a move.

“What is Wike doing in our government? If he’s going to leave the PDP, he should leave. If we’re doing a government of national unity, you deal with the party, not individuals. The party is what we vote for — not Bola Tinubu but APC; not Atiku but PDP; not Peter Obi but Labour Party.”

Audu’s resignation letter, dated June 8, criticised the APC’s political trajectory and warned against what he described as a deliberate silencing of opposition voices. In a follow-up statement, he clarified that while he does not support the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), he would not lend himself “as an instrument to reduce Nigeria to a one-party state.”

“If we now begin to silence or crush opposition simply because we have the upper hand, then we are no different from the very system we once criticised under Obasanjo in 2003,” he said.

Politics

VIDEO: How Peter Obi Betrayed Me – Kenneth Okonkwo In New Interview

Published

6 days ago

June 14, 2025

Editor

Veteran actor and ex-spokesperson of the Labour Party Presidential Campaign Council, Kenneth Okonkwo, has accused former presidential candidate, Peter Obi, of betrayal in the wake of internal party disputes.

In a viral interview with Symfoni which started trending on Saturday, Okonkwo, who officially exited the Labour Party in February 2025, revealed that Obi went against his advice and returned to support the embattled Julius Abure-led faction of the party, despite alleged warnings.

According to him, Obi was misled by LP executives who claimed that the Independent National Electoral Commission had recognised them.

He said, “Any politician that knows what he’s doing cannot be betrayed by another. If there is anybody that betrayed the other, I can say it emphatically that Peter Obi betrayed me.

“The Julius Abure-led LP members lied to Obi that the Independent National Electoral Commission had accepted them and Obi surreptitiously went back to them but I told him: ‘Sir, you have made a public statement on integrity and even if INEC has accepted them, that is not a criterion for you to go back and start dealing with them because they have shown that they are not democratic. If you go back to them, they will destroy your political career and everything you have said about integrity will die.’”

He said that despite privately urging Obi not to align with a group he described as “undemocratic” and “agents of the government,” Okonkwo said Obi went ahead to publicly endorse them.

“I told Obi that these people had become agents in the hands of the government to destabilise him. What they did was absolutely illegal and unconstitutional, I told him that if he went back to them, I wouldn’t join him in doing so.

“Thereafter, I called all the people that were in the inner circle and told them the same thing about what Obi was trying to do. I told them he wanted to go back with the Abure people and if he did, I wouldn’t go back with him because I do not swallow back my words.

“And after saying all those things, within like 72 hours, Obi went back to Abure’s office to publicly endorse them and while he was there talking to them, one of the leaders in that executive sent me the video to mock me that the person I was fighting for against them has come to their office to endorse them.

“It was when INEC dissociated itself from Abure that Obi came out to start acting neutral but I told him he could not be neutral and something had to be done,” he added.

The Labour Party has been embroiled in a prolonged leadership crisis, with opposing factions laying claim to the party’s national structure.

The Abure-led faction has faced allegations of financial mismanagement and anti-democratic practices, which critics say contradict the party’s reformist image.

Okonkwo, a known loyalist of Obi’s political ideology, cited these irregularities as his reason for quitting the party earlier in the year.

Watch video below:

https://twitter.com/i/status/1933867577651925202https://twitter.com/i/status/1933867577651925202

Politics

Amaechi Slams Tinubu’s Policies In Fresh Outburst

Published

1 week ago

June 12, 2025

Editor

Former Minister of Transportation and two-time governor of Rivers State, Rotimi Amaechi, has asked the coalition opposition to kick President Bola Tinubu out of office if Nigeria is to escape its deepening economic crisis.

In a no-holds-barred interview with the BBC, Amaechi, a founding member and chieftain of the All Progressives Congress, lamented the country’s deteriorating condition and signalled his willingness to help forge a new opposition coalition to rescue the nation.

“People are dying. People are starving. I myself am feeling the effects of hunger,” he said, painting a grim picture of life under the current administration.

Amaechi’s statement comes in the wake of the APC’s recent endorsement of Tinubu as its sole presidential candidate for 2027, a move Amaechi openly questioned.

While reiterating his loyalty to the party, he warned that fidelity to a political platform should never come at the cost of national conscience.

“If the government is failing the country, you don’t just go along because you’re in the same party. You know that’s not right,” he stated emphatically.

Though he stopped short of confirming a 2027 presidential bid, the former minister said the option remained on the table.

“Certainly, I believe I can make a meaningful contribution,” he added, hinting that his political journey may not yet be over.

He spoke of widespread poverty, spiralling food insecurity, and daily tragedies that now dot the national landscape.

Reflecting on his years as Chairman of the Nigeria Governors’ Forum, Amaechi lamented that the number of out-of-school children then pegged at 10 million, had since ballooned.

The economic hardship, he said, had also deepened insecurity.

“The Boko Haram insurgency is not just a religious crisis. Many of those involved are driven by desperation and hunger,” he asserted, linking terrorism, banditry, and kidnapping to a broader socioeconomic collapse.

Amaechi’s declaration added momentum to an emerging political realignment.

Talks were already underway among key opposition figures, including Atiku Abubakar of the Peoples Democratic Party and Peter Obi of the Labour Party, as they explored the possibility of a unified front against Tinubu in 2027.

Even ex-Governor Nasir El-Rufai of Kaduna State and once a key Tinubu ally had signalled interest in backing an opposition alliance.

But as opposition forces stir, the ruling party continues to absorb defectors, prompting fears of Nigeria drifting toward a one-party state, a scenario Amaechi warned could undermine democracy and silence dissent.

“We’re thinking that if we come together and win the election, the country will certainly witness change,” he said, suggesting an urgent need for a credible alternative.