Kenny Ashaka
Can you avail us of the facts about the possibility of your man, Alhaji Yahaya Bello winning the election having regards to the permutations on ground?
The permutation on ground in the state is that it is in our favour.
Can you then give me a comparative analysis of the permutation to justify this claim? What do you also think is working in your favour?
You can see what is working for us which is the campaign in Kogi East which is the traditional stronghold of the PDP and which they intend to elicit the sympathy of the people in order to prosecute their cause. You know Kogi East since the creation of Kogi State has the pre-eminent position to determine who becomes the governor of Kogi State; but right now you can see what Yahaya Bello from the Kogi Central, ably supported by Chief Edward Onoja are doing. If you look at our campaign rally, you will notice the acceptability. You saw the campaigns in Kwararafa, Idah and other places. You have also seen the defections from the other parties, including the PDP. You can see the support from traditional rulers. The people are solidly in support of the re-election bid of the governor. The people are tired of the old names and the dynastic policies of the past. The PDP is unreformed and you know the PDP in Kogi State is like an inner house party. Right now, it has gone beyond that. But the APC is forward looking and the freshness is inviting. The people of Kogi State are now subscribing to that message of hope. You can see the PDP members are divided. They are here and there with their disputations.
Mr. Ohikere, people at a campaign ground do not reflect the true strength of a candidate in a contest of this nature because the PDP has also made reference to the same Idah where they claimed they had it nice because of the crowd. What concrete evidence have you on ground to pin your hope on because the truth of the matter is that your challenger, Wada is from Igala land, an area with a population of about 56 percent of the entire population of the state while your candidate is from Ebirra land, Kogi Central zone. How do you hope to surmount this challenge and ensure victory for your candidate?
Let me tell you that Kogi East is now divided while Kogi Central is united.
How divided are they in Kogi East?
The people are divided. You can see their traditional ruler bestowing titles on Edward Onoja and the Governor of the state. You can see the defections in Kogi East. Just the day before yesterday, last Sunday, the former chairman of Dekina local government defected to the APC. This has been happening before now. So Musa Wada may think he has their support, but right now, their traditional base has been broken while the people of Kogi Central are united and the people of Kogi West are in support of this new direction administration. The Igala people may come out and say we support him (Wada) while what is truly going on is different. In the heart of their hearts, they are tired with the traditional type of politics being played by the PDP.
You talked about Kogi West and claimed that is one of your support bases…
(Cuts in) Yes, Kogi West. The Speaker of the House of Assembly is from Kogi West. Mr. Smart Adeyemi, the DG of the APC Campaign Council is from Kogi West. There are a host of others. The Governor was given a title last Monday in Kogi West. The people of Kogi West love the idea of power shift and the government has pushed most of them to key positions as well as in the distribution of developmental projects and the rest. So, the people of Kogi West are solidly behind the governor.
Who are these supporters from the Kogi West axis apart from Smart Adeyemi and General Oshalopin and the Speaker? Are you also aware that two retired Generals are also backing Wada from this same axis? In fact, when it was published that the elders of Kogi West endorsed Yahaya Bello, it was General David Jemibewon who refuted the claim.
Are you aware that the Kogi West Elders Forum endorsed Governor Yahaya Bello?
That is what I have just said. General David Jemibewon has refuted that. He is a member of the Kogi West Elders Forum.
He is just one man. He was supposed to be part of it but he left at the last minute. But he is just one man.
General Ogbeha is also said to be in support of Wada. He is also from Kogi West.
These men do not have electoral value right now in Kogi State.
Your opponent believes that Kogi Central is for them. How factual is that?
That Kogi Central is for PDP? Kogi Central is for Yahaya Bello. Even if PDP gets any vote there, it would be 0.001 percent. So, as it is right now, the APC will have 70 percent and the PDP 30 percent in Kogi Central.
The saying in Kogi is that people in the state have never had it so bad under any government than that of your principal. I will give you the opportunity of answering to allegations of sacked workers, non-payment of salaries which they claimed would be 44 months arrears for about 73 percent of the workers who were neither sacked nor terminated and the remaining ones that were cleared after four months of screening who are also being owed four months. They talked about human capital development that is lacking in a state which economy runs only on government patronage and which they said has further pauperized the people.
Let me tell you. This 44 months they are talking about is part of the PDP propaganda. The people they were owing 44 months are the ghost workers. These are the victims of the staff audit in the state. I want you to know that Governor Yahaya Bello is the only governor that is tackling this issue headlong. Those people were employed on the basis of political patronage. What they did was to increase the recurrent expenditure for government, leaving very little to develop private projects and the economy. So, it is the new direction government that is tackling this issue headlong because of the governor’s vision of recreating Kogi State. So, you must know that this is PDP propaganda. As at the end of each month, workers get their salaries and pensioners are paid. The NLC has given the governor clean bill of health and has as a matter of fact come out to say that the bailout given to the government was effectively utilised.
How strong are you to ward-off the onslaught of Wada from the Igala people of Kogi East when members of the late Abubakar Audu’s faction are not supportive of Bello’s re-election bid? You also have the former Chief of Naval Staff, Usman Jibrin and others who contested the APC primary election not supporting your principal. As a matter of fact, some of them are in court. The APC Patron in the state, Alhaji Isiaka is openly supporting Wada. How far can you go with these negative factors against Bello?
I believe we are doing our best and the fact that they are strong does not mean that they have substantive power on ground. Some of them are back. So, APC is stronger than ever. The APC is more solid than ever. It is now more solid than it was at the beginning of this administration because of the death of Audu and the rest. There are some people who are tacitly behind the governor; when I say tacitly, it means they are not openly showcasing it but they are doing underground campaigns for the governor. So, I think that is an added advantage to the governor. We don’t just want to sell out our plans. We have our calculations. So, the APC is solid. We know what we are doing. We have our soldiers and lieutenants in the right places and we have the support of the people.
What would you say to those who are making references to the performances of former PDP governors in the state in the areas of housing, schools, roads and other infrastructural projects some of which they said Bello abandoned? I will also want you to respond to claims by the PDP that Bello has so far collected about N540 billion, an amount not collected by previous governors put together.
But even in Wada’s government, if you look at the amount that the PDP under Wada collected, all of them have been mismanaged. The SURE-P fund, the flood money, the building of the Abuja House; there was misappropriation, massive mismanagement under those governments. I was part of the PDP government and I know part of the things they did.
There is also this claim by the PDP in Kogi State that your principal is training militia somewhere in Osara…
(Cuts in) Training militia?
Yes. That was the allegation raised by the Wada camp. So, I am giving you the privilege of addressing it.
But don’t you see that it is their members they are arresting on charges of stockpiling arms in Dekina to inflict harm on our people. You saw what happened in Ankpa. We even got intelligence reports that they were recruiting and amassing thugs and hoodlums from some of the neighbouring states.
Is that why you will be training militia? Are you training militia at Osara?
No, we are not. Why should we train militia? The APC has been trying to sanitise Kogi State from the havoc left behind by the PDP. You know how Kogi State used to be under Ibrahim Idris and Idris Wada. It used to be a hotbed of crime and violence. But there has been a change since the advent of Bello because of the change in policy. There are no more bank robberies because there is nothing to steal and this is official. So, those accusations are once again their tactics to elicit sympathy from the electorate.