Minister of Niger Delta Affairs, Usani Uguru Usani, contested the governorship ticket of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in Cross River state. But his contest generated several issues as the party in Cross River state became factionalised. One of the faction is accusing the Minister of working against the party and causing its massive defeat during the 2019 general elections. In this interview with Tony Akowe, Usani states his own side of the story, dismissing the allegations against him as well as his suspension from the party.
STAKEHOLDERS of the APC in Cross River state led by the National Vice Chairman, South South, have accused you of working against the interest of the party during the recently concluded elections. How would you react to this?
These allegations are not strange to me. You can cross check everything I am going to say because they are verifiable. From 1999 to 2015, I have had reason to dine with the PDP. It was a political fallow season. You will probably be surprised to hear that when I contested for governorship in the opposition in 2003, there was an attempt in broad day light to assassinate me and I ran out of the country to return after two years. At that time I was asked to join the PDP and contest for the senate but I declined.
In 2012, when I contested against the PDP candidate, offers were made to me and I declined. If you talk to Cross Riverians, they know us by character. So, when I had a political fallow season, I did not accept overture from them, what will now attract me now as Minister? If for 16 years, I declined everything that tended to be offered to me, now that I am minister, what do I intend to gain? Is it that if I support them, I will become President? This is crafted blackmail intended to decimate my reputation. Thank God as journalists, you have the capacity to verify what you get or the information you receive.
The first person to suggest that if APC is to win election, Usani Usani has to contest is Senator John Owa-Enoh. The person he said that to did not tell me until we were together with him and he said, “Senator, I want to deliver that message you gave me before.” That person is Godwin Asam Efa who was Vice Chairman of Ikom local government council. Please, you can verify these details I am giving you. But something happened. When a former governor of Cross River state felt that it was too risky for them to allow Usani come in, he told Owa-Enoh to go and fight for the ticket so that whether it goes the way of PDP or APC, he will be in charge.
Meanwhile, that former governor was zonal coordinator for PDP presidential campaign. Suddenly, he started recruiting different interest. When the National Chairman came into office, they caused him to believe that I was supporting the former Chairman, Oyegun and I wonder what type of sense that made because Oyegun did not contest any election. So, even if somebody was supporting him, of what value would that support be?
What would you say is responsible for this?
Secondly, the National Vice Chairman, South South who is spreading these falsehood did same thing against me during Oyegun’s chairmanship and I wrote many letters to Oyegun, telling him about his character, but Oyegun decided to believe him. For more than two years, they peddled these falsehood against me before Oyegun and others realized, though too late, that these fellows were not the characters they thought they were. He continued the same thing with Oshiomhole. My silence for a while is because somebody worth occupying a public office should be able to recognise where rule and order should prevail.
I have always been quiet on this issue because the constitution of the party says we should not go to the press. But when the managers of a system violate their own rules, then it means anarchy will not allow the institution to run. Then, you can see what the APC is today. The President’s image is what keeps APC standing as a party today. Otherwise, by conduct, we have lost every s in the initial concept that brought honour to our party. Now, I have decided to speak out because further silence in the face of falsehood will suggest that I am guilty.
But why do you think they are accusing you of working for the PDP?
To suggest that I worked for the PDP can only be authenticated by the indices we lay across. Find out if the National Vice Chairman South south won one polling unit in his own ward for the President. There are two wards in my community and the PDP did not win any unit. I accumulated over 4000 votes while the PDP got about 1000. Assuming I was working for the PDP, will I produce results against them? Who is more believable? They have held several meeting and I will tell you that they are trying to do everything to make me politically irrelevant. They know that my continuous prevalence in the system will expose them.
These are people who mismanaged public funds and they have been scared abinitio that if the President comes back for a second term, and the anti corruption crusade goes on, they will be in the web. For them, instead of allowing sleeping dogs lie, they wants to shake the hornet’s nest. I can tell of contracts in my state they got and failed to accomplished. I can tell you company names they have forwarded even at the beehive of the dissolution of the NDDC board which they are still forwarding for payment. For them, the dissolution of the NDDC board is the foundation of their revengeful attitude towards me. You know how the place functioned for a while which is in public domain.
We don’t have factional leadership in APC. Before the current chairman came, congresses had been concluded. He decided that they will dissolve the state executive whereas as soon as that was concluded, we were given certified true copies of the results of the congresses supervised by INEC as provided by law. One day, they just came and said they’ve dissolved it. We sought redress in court and up till now, the subsisting judgement in that regard showed that Hon. Godwin Etim John is the chairman of the party. So, impostors are just buying their ways as a result of favours that does not accrue from any due process.
So, there are no factions in the party. Every action being taken in response to this situation by them is contemptuous. They have also gone ahead to write a petition to he President alleging these same things. Incidentally, I have given a response to that petition. These people have no interest in this party. They came to destroy the party and run back to PDP. Between a man who has stayed for 16 years without changing focus and those who today belong to one place and tomorrow, they are somewhere else, who is more likely to prevaricate in circumstances of pecuniary inducement?
For the south south zonal chairman, he was the national coordinator for the current PDP presidential candidate during the APC national convention in Lagos to choose our presidential candidate. In spite of all the hard currency given to him to win votes for the man then, he failed woefully and took those who were not delegates to Lagos to collect the money and when the man discovered, they fell out and he felt that I was probably responsible for that and so, his antagonism started. I put it on record that in 2012, I sponsored him to be ACN chairman in the state.
In 2014 when we were discussing the zoning of positions in the south South, I proposed his name against the wishes of Cross River indigenes and they told me he will disappoint us. But I stood by him. I honour principles and preserve accords and so, I put his name. For some people who do not have secondary vocations, if politics falls out of place, they will be stranded. So, they pursue political ambitions with absolute temerity of desperation and so, we will not be surprised because we know them. But for me, if anybody says I worked for PDP, go and tell Cross Riverians and see if they will believe you.
Go and ask Lyel Imoke about those he was paying in the opposition when he was governor. Go and ask Donald Duke those who go behind to collect money. Go and ask Ben Ayade those he gives money in the secret rooms. If you were from Cross River, you will know exactly how we stand. For some of us, hunger and abundance makes little difference but honour is greater than every consideration.
I don’t know if you are aware that in the last week of campaign, they sent thugs to disrupt the rallies I was holding for Mr. President and one of them was caught with arms and handed over to the police. Then they claimed in their petition that I was arresting APC supporters. These people have been moving from one party to the other. They are green pasture politicians and I am not. I stand on the conscience of honesty. If they tell you Usani is this or that, let us put forward our political credentials and let us know where we stand in terms of tenacity of character and conscience.
You are yet to say anything about your suspension by the national leadership of the party. Do you think they have the power to do that?
I started administration at a high level in 1992 and I know what administration entails. I know that administration is not done in the open market or village square, especially when you have rules guiding a particular system. If, for any reason, I am accused of committing an offense, the constitution provides how the procedure should go. I did not receive any invitation to answer to any query, neither did I receive ay correspondence suggesting that I am under punitive measure. So, I just presume that it is one of those media rumour and so, I didn’t need to apply myself to it.
I saw a letter from my ward chairman saying I remain a bonafide member of the APC in the ward he controls and that I have not committed any offense to warrant a disciplinary measure. So, I remain a member in my ward and that is where I stand. The question is, why would anybody want to suspend me? All methods, legitimate and legal has failed them in a bid to stop me from my governorship ambition and so, they adopted a cowboy method thinking that pronouncing suspension on air will make meaning. It does not make any meaning.
I was the first party chairman in the state, not because I vied for it but because they said that they needed a character that will not sell the party. So, when they say I have been suspended, I have not receive any correspondence to that effect and I don’t know what offense I have committed. Suspending me is very dangerous because we are very few in Cross River that can hold the party together. Let them show their results in the just concluded elections. It is not about noise. But unfortunately, in Nigeria, noise means strength. But for me success means strategy. I don’t need to talk, but to prove and I have proven.
You said the image of President Buhari is what is keeping the party together. In view of that, what faith or future do you think the party has after Buhari|?
The future of the party will not be determined by the projections of today because tomorrow may turn a new leaf. The determination of the strength of a party does not also lies in the internal melee, but the actions and reaction of contending forces. That can always change the fortunes of the party. At the end of the President’s second term, if Christ tarries, God will give us what befits us because my bible tells me that a leader emerges from the system and the nature of the people. So, whatever happens, it may be a stronger or weaker party, but there will still be a party. But I note again that Abuja residents who have the privilege of entering offices are not the owners of the party. The owners of the party are resident in the states. So, it is not for us to gather ourselves, come to Abuja and claim to be key stakeholders. Those who hold the ground for us to rest on are right there in the states.
If you were choosen as the party candidate for the governorship election, do you think you would have made any impact.
I want to tell you that it is true that the PDP rigged elections and it is not in any way a hidden secret that they rigged election in Cross River. The truth is that the University of Calabar where the returning officers were drawn from is managed by the Vice Chancellor who is from the local government of the governor and majority of the returning officers were drawn from that local government. There were instances where people who retired from the military became returning officers. In my ward, the presiding officers were speaking my language and no youth corp member serves in his local government. These are proofs that PDP rigged the election.
Assuming I was a candidate, I wont assume I will be declared because the reasons for declarations are beyond the ordinary. Legitimate and legal processes shows that we are the real candidates of the party. You can verify that and will find out that the only record in INEC suggestive of a congress or primary puts me as candidate of the party. So, whatever makes INEC to keep publishing what we don’t understand is what we cannot unravel. As at today, even though there are cases at the appeal level, the subsisting judgement remain valid until an appellate decision is taken. The only valid judgement so far is in our favour.
In the first instance, they felt too arrogant to sit in a discussion. For me, what matters in life is not money or position. When the bible said Herod exalted himself above the knowledge of God, it is this type of attitude. Who is who to determine the fate of another man? So, when they behave like that, I don’t care. God gives positions and I don’t need to depend on anybody to get positions. I got this one without lobby. God must have used people to promote me to this point. Go and find out when I served military administrators as commissioner. There were times when I said instead of this, I will resign.
You heard what I said on the floor of the senate during my screening when it was insinuated that I had a parley with the PDP. If you cannot serve the devil, don’t eat his food. That is my philosophy. I wont put my hand behind and collect and then pretend. They were too arrogant to sit in discussion even though I know that I have greater political fortunes in the state than they have put together. My fortunes in politics is from the life I have lived with my people and they know me. It is not a matter of being ambitious, but recognising that we all can form a whole.
Every leader has what it takes to resolve crisis in his domain. So, I have no doubt that the national chairman can resolve the crisis. As the national chairman, he should be able to. For me, I exercise the right and privileged of my membership within the limits of the provisions of the rules of the party. As a member of the cabinet of the President, you don’t expect me to be a dissident and if anybody does not regard his position as a pedestal of honor, you don’t expect me to follow him. If you think suspending me is managing the crisis, you are wrong because it is provoking more crisis. I know that I am not serving any suspension. Did I register in Abuja? We are all members of our ward.