As we approach the 2019 general elections, the Edo State Chapter of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) is at their game again. In the past few weeks, they have launched a massive campaign of calumny against the All Progressives Congress (APC) government led by Mr Godwin Obaseki. Every passing day, they ooze out one tissue of lie against the government.
The PDP leadership in the state appears to have settled for the maxim that “if you continue to tell a lie repeatedly, it will be mistaken for truth. They woke up one morning and misrepresented the report of the Debt Management Office (DMO) that Edo State owedhuge debt that has mortgaged the future of generations unborn.
But while they went to town with that wild allegation coated with half truths and obvious lies, they failed to tell Edo State the truth and origin of the debts they were talking about. They hid the facts and stood truth on its head.
They did not tell the public that of the debt recorded against Edo State by the DMO, the ignoble PDP government incurred over N100bn which was practically looted and not spent on any meaningful project in the state. The facts are there for all to see. The records are available and nobody should deceive anyone in Edo.
Not done, the Edo PDP woke up another morning and in a statement issued by its Publicity Secretary, Chris Osa Nehikhare, alleged that the Governor Godwin Obaseki-led administration has concluded plans to fraudulently sell the Nigerian Observer and Edo Broadcasting Service to an individual. They even gave the name of the person who was to buy the properties and said he was the Communication Officer during his campaigns. How on earth can Edo PDP believe that such a deliberate falsehood peddled against the governor will get anywhere?
Good enough the Media aide to Governor Godwin Obaseki, Mr. Crusoe Osagie was quick to dispel the blatant lie. In a statement Crusoe said; “There is no plan to sell the state-owned radio and television station, Edo Broadcasting Service (EBS) and the Nigerian Observer Newspaper to an individual…There is no plan, whether now or in the future to sell government enterprises to any individual.”
I happen to have served as the Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Bendel Newspapers Company Limited, publishers of the Observer titles. What we met there were relics of what the then Governor Samuel Ogbemudia put there when he established the organisation in 1964 as Governor of Mid-West region and later Bendel State. The PDP government killed the Observer and left it prostrate.
Everyone in Edo would recall that Governor Obaseki visited the two media houses sometimes last year and was horror-struck by what he saw at the media houses. There and then he promised that he was going to reposition the media outfits to meet the needs of government and Edo people.
So, one will not be surprised if tomorrow you wake up and the Edo PDP has another lie handy again. Edo people must shine their eyes and never allow themselves to be deceived or fooled by the never-do-well PDP.
They shamelessly go about peddling lies and unfounded rumours. Unfortunately for Edo PDP, Edo People are great people who understand politics more than the deceivers who converged under the tattered umbrella. PDP cannot fool anybody in Edo land as we approach 2019.
They claimed that the All Progressives Congress has not done anything for Edo people.Yet, massive developments are going on across the state since APC government came on board. This is an incontrovertible fact and the projects are all on the ground for Edo people to behold.
This explains why the PDP believe in crowd-renting as a tactics for swaying public opinion, but that just cant work in any part of Edo State because the same faces you see in their campaigns in Benin are the ones they move to Sabongida-Ora, the same faces you see in Auchi, Okada and everywhere they go.
As we approach next general elections, the nation’s political landscape is daily becoming interesting with increasing dumping of the Peoples Democratic Party by its erstwhile loyalists. In the PDP of today, there is apathy, distrust, hatred, oppression, favouritism, impunity, back biting, and several other negative attributes. That is why those who know what is in the offing for them are already having a rethink in Edo and are daily moving in droves into the APC. Even though their name suggest that they are democratic party, the reverse is the case in their operations. All those who risk their thoughts for the PDP know too well that they took the biggest risk of their lives. They would soon discover the truth that intrigues and godfatherism rule the PDP. They would all be shocked how candidates would emerge and that is when they would know that the APC they know, is better than the PDP that have never known.
That is a party where one man, Dan Orbihhave remained a Life Chairman in Edo. Nobody can stand up against him let alone contest against him. He has been the chairman of the party in Edo State since God knows when and he does not want to relinquish that position, yet they say they are a democratic party. Are there no better qualified people in the sinking party than OsiOrbih? Also, events of the last six months have seen the PDP high and mighty already jittery as we approach 2019 general election where the APC hopes to consolidate its leadership of the nation. There is no party that can challenge APC in 2019. In the next few months, it will be clearer to all doubting Thomases.
It is important to sound it to the deaf ears of Dan Orbih and his co-travellers that theAPC own Edo State and other parties, including the PDP are spectators. I say this because of the Obaseki/Phillip Shaibu political machine will crush the remnants of the PDP come 2019 general elections. It will be unprecedented in the history of Edo State and Edo citizens would not want to risk their fate in the hands of the lily-livered PDP led by garrulous gangsters who would stop at nothing in pillorying the state. This is why the APC will sweep the 2019 polls in Edo. We have done it before and we would repeat our winning streak again. Edo people would turn out again to give APC massive votes as usual because the party under Adams Oshiomhole and now under Godwin Nogheghase Obaseki has established confidence in their hearts over the years. Edo people cannot also forget in a hurry their bitter experiences in the hands of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP. Some say it is People Deceive People. As a party, the APC has kept its own side of the contract with Edo people.
Edo people must be on their guard against any more lies and hate messages that would be oozing out of the PDP secretariat as we get close to the next polls and do the needful–discard them as rubbish from the pit of hell!
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Mr. Dan Owegie is a chieftain of the All Progressives Congress, APC, Edo State.
