Tag: Oborevwori

• By Basil Okoh

A powerful and sinister force has been unleashed on Delta APC. That force is sowing seeds of discord and undertaking a hostile takeover of the party itself. It’s a strong and powerful force operating with deep pockets and dashing boldness.

A few days ago, Rev. Francis Waive, an APC member representing Ughelli North/Ughelli South/Udu Federal Constituency in the House of Representatives called on governor Sheriff Oborevwori to abandon PDP and run the next election as APC candidate. Waive assured the governor that the slot will be reserved for him in APC. He later affirmed to the PDP governor that he will be adopted by the APC to contest the coming governorship election as candidate of APC in Delta state.

A week before that, Ms Stella Okotete, an official of the NEXIM Bank and APC member was found visiting and cavorting with the PDP governor of the state.

The purpose and outcome of the visit, no one can tell, although the governors press corps issued a double-barreled press statement, futilely explaining that she was there as part of a state welcome party as well as being part of a federal team to launch the short road project.

A week before that, the chairman of APC in Delta state, Elder Omeni Sobotie sent a petition to the national Chairman of APC, demanding first, the removal from office of the National Publicity Secretary Mr. Felix Morka, for clarifying the illegality of setting up a “Leaders Council” in Delta state.

These three people mentioned above were all listed to be members of a “leadership council”, an illegal body proposed to be set up by a group in the party.

The proposal for a leadership council, which has now been rejected by the National Working Committee, was a subtle move to impose a new and unelected leadership on the APC in Delta state.

It was a grand move by the sinister force to legitimize the hijack of APC and hand the leadership over to PDP.

Oborevwori, the PDP governor, was proposed to inherit the growing popularity of APC and retain the governors seat, the next time, as APC governor.

So the occurrences related above are not coincidences and we draw public attention to the coordinated attempt to disrupt and hijack the APC in Delta state while Oborevwori the governor is pretending to enjoy fealty with President Ahmed Bola Tinubu as Francis Waive so loudly proclaimed.

So the subterranean force which first came in the name of “leadership council” is working with determination and boldness to take over the APC and reinforce an elite group determined to hijack the leadership and chart a dangerous course for the party in the 2027 governorship election.

The force is a menacing savage dragon that threatens to gut the innards of the APC in Delta state, planting disaffection and setting up the party for ruin.

APC is poised to take over Delta, but the PDP is implementing a deep penetration operation into the party, its agents in high places muddling things up to achieve a hostile takeover of APC before 2027.

The party has to contend now with the conspiracy of its own elite which has been unable to integrate into the party or to mobilize party members for success.

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Even when popularity has being thrust upon APC by providence as we all watch PDP implode and members defect en masse into the APC, the so called leadership council has been unwilling to seize the moment and ride the popular wave for the good of their party.

So this conspiracy is old and deep seated.

PDP foresaw the meltdown of their own party and went to work ahead of time to re-hire elite defectors from their party for the sinister job of bending the APC to provide landing space for Oborevwori.

Thereafter, the APC Exco in Delta went adrift, working at cross purposes, a faction planting discord against their own party and abandoning commitment to win the 2027 election on their own. The party executive is now browbeating their own party leader instead of taking advantage of a fissuring in the PDP to build a bigger political tent to take in the deluge of defectors trooping into the APC.

The party chairman, Elder Omeni Sobotie, Minister Festus Keyamo, Senator Ede Dafinone, Senator Joel Onowakpo-Thomas, Francis Waive, Stella Okotete, Olorogun Otega Emerhor, Elder Godsday Orubebe, and other elite party members are working to disrupt the party’s normative order.

They are entangling themselves in the leadership council fiasco, distracting Senator Ovie Omo-Agege, the former Deputy President of the Senate and the party’s 2023 governorship candidate. Omo-Agege has been engaging with the party’s rank and file, opposing the Delta State government’s stance on governance ahead of the 2027 election.

With a party election scheduled later, these leaders would serve the party well by waiting for the congress to settle the matter of a new executive committee and establish a new party structure. They are instead encouraging dissent and not advancing the cause of the party through beneficial actions.

They are not advancing the party cause. They are also not mobilizing the party for the purpose of winning elections. They work so committedly to supplant the aspirants of their own party for the candidates of the opposition.

Where in the world does that happen? And now, they have sown discord in the State Working Committee of the party and so can no longer bring unity of purpose to the entire organization. How does a party win elections without unity and without rallying round their leader?

The sorry situation in the APC now is that a group in the party is unquestionably working for the opposition ruling party, PDP.

They want to impose the governor and candidate of the PDP on APC. So arising from this treachery, the party is infiltrated by the refuseniks of the PDP and the only hope of PDP remaining in power is to organize a hostile takeover of the governorship candidacy of the APC.

The elite advocating for the PDP governor of the state to defect to APC and become the governorship candidate of APC in the next election are definitely making fortunes from the effort.

The grounds are already being prepared for Oborevwori to be imposed as governorship candidate of APC in the 2027 election.

For Oborevwori, the numbers are definitely not adding up for electoral victory in PDP. Oborevwori lost two senatorial districts out of three in the last election.

The Delta North he won came with so much controversy. Senator Ned Nwoko’s defection from the PDP has exacerbated the race for the exits in the PDP of Delta North.

The PDP’s losses were sweeping, with the party ceding all three House of Representatives seats in Delta Central Senatorial District to the APC and Labour Party, which won two and one seats, respectively. Notably, Oborevwori failed to carry his own senatorial district, losing the popular vote to APC governorship candidate Omo-Agege. The APC’s strong performance in the district extended to the House of Assembly elections, where the party secured five seats, surpassing the PDP’s four seats.

Individuals like Waive within the College of Leaders, who are championing this cause, has lost his electoral value in his community.

Their current positions of power are largely attributed to Omo-Agege, who propelled them to their present roles. These treacherous APC members are politicians who are unable to survive without their teeth and tenterhooks sunk deeply into the flesh of Government House treasury.

The PDP in Delta has long lost the credibility to rule the state. So the plan is to transmute to the APC to continue PDP rule in Delta State.

You know, as a snake molts and shed skin to renew itself and continue to live and thrive.

But however it molts, it remains a snake with its poison and venom still active.

That’s exactly what PDP plans to do in Delta State, molt into a new APC identity, shed its skin but keep its nature as PDP and continue to rule the state.

With so many people leaving the party in droves, PDP is aware that it can no longer win elections in Delta state.

So what to do? It molts, shedding it’s skin to the form and brand of APC and transmuting into a party aligned with the presidency, confiscating the brand of APC and continuing in the ruin of Delta state while keeping it’s inner core as PDP.

Governor Oborevwori’s mortal fear of competition and loss of the governorship is driving Oborevwori’s growing desperation to defect to the ruling APC and become their governorship candidate.

It is a master plan for him and his group to remain the ruling party in Delta State. And this is the political caper Waive is promoting within APC and Delta state and presenting it as worthy of consideration by the APC.

Having witnessed the brigandage and overwhelming emasculation of PDP in Edo State, Governor Oborevwori would rather be a traitor and win as governor in APC than remain in PDP and be a loser in the coming governorship election in Delta state.

So to avoid the shame of losing the 2027 governorship election, Oborevwori is opening the treasury of government House to the fifth column of APC to help prepare the grounds for him to defect and become governorship candidate of the APC.

And so when Oborevwori defects, Delta state will remain a PDP state but not in name anymore.

All the courtesans of Governor Oborevwori will remain in their posts and so will the entire crowd of special and not so Special Assistants. That will be the classic Mephistophelian coup. Delta will continue in its morass in a renewed “shege”.

So when you see the insistent muddling of the leadership and governorship contest in APC by its own elite, understand that the game is to ensure that Ovie Omo-Agege does not emerge as a governorship candidate of the APC and the pressure will mount to prepare the grounds for Governor Oborevwori defection into APC as the governorship candidate.

Everyone has to understand that all the elite quarrel about the absence of “leader” in APC Delta grinds down to creating a false vacuum for Oborevwori to come in and fill.

It is all about denying Ovie Omo-Agege’s leadership and bringing in Oborevwori to take his place as governorship candidate of APC in Delta state.

Nigeria has become the cesspool of enervating political intrigues and we are watching one political intrigue unravelling in real time in Delta state.

Many among the elite of Delta state are complicit in this conspiracy of ecdysis of Oborevwori molting into the APC.

The insult to the APC is not obvious to these black legs of the party in Delta. That they cannot find anyone from among themselves capable of leadership is a shame that they don’t realize it’s portents. It remains a depressing irony that the state chairman of the party listed 41 “who’s who” personalities in APC in Delta state, as contained in his petition to the National Chairman.

That they cannot find one person among these men and women is the ultimate disgrace.

People have forgotten so soon that Sheriff Oborevwori was rejected to govern Delta State by his own party PDP and N63 billion had to be spent on the litigation to accept him and to legalize his election victory along with certificate deficiencies.

 So having to accept Sheriff Oborevwori, a PDP reject whose initial choice as candidate destroyed a ruling party PDP in the state should be an utter disgrace to APC.

It is the insistence of former PDP governor Ifeanyi Okowa to field a barely literate Sheriff as governorship candidate of PDP that caused the rupture in the party and brought it’s evocative decline in Delta State.

Now the same runaways from PDP are bringing the same Sheriff as governorship candidate of the APC. Sheriff will have the dishonour of bringing destruction to two major political parties in the state.

 It’s a clear path to ruin.

With Delta state accelerating its pace of infrastructure development, OKUNGBOWA AIWERIE, highlights Governor Sheriff Oborevwori prudent financial management strategy in a bid for value for money and drive the local economy.

Delta Governor Sheriff Oborevwori has continued to bask in the warm afterglow of national media spotlight on the back of a string of accolades from diverse groups, recognising his strides in infrastructure development, bestowed on him “Governor of the 2024 Award”.

The dust, on the prestigious THISDAY/Arise Media Group for fiscal discipline and infrastructural development of the state held last year in Lagos, had hardly died down, when, yet another news outfit, New Telegraph, honoured him for his  commitment to the development of the state’s infrastructure.

Two other groups, National Association of Delta State Students in conjunction with the National Association of Nigerian Students (NANS) followed in their footsteps, by presenting him with a Merit Award in recognition of his outstanding contributions to the educational sector.

NADESSTU President, Monday Wiska, said the award celebrates Governor Oborevwori’s achievements, including approval for year 2023 and 2024 bursary payment to 30,116 and 32,028 students respectively.

Wiska also listed enhanced access to quality education, improved infrastructure in schools, and promotion of educational reforms that support student’s development as other reasons for the award.

Despite delivering so much at frightening pace, Oborevwori has promised to do even “more”, in clear alignment with the overarching mission of his M.O.R.E agenda, a social contract he entered into with Deltans upon assumption of office in 2023.

The State Commissioner for Works( Rural Roads) and Public Information, Mr Charles Aniagwu Mr Aniagwu said the state government had not borrowed a dime and had paid loans obtained by previous administrations to the tune of N240billion.

He said, “First of all not only that Delta is not borrowing under the Oborevwori administration, he has paid over N240 billion in the last 20 months to service or defray existing contractual obligations as well as some other funds that came in form of loan in the past.

“So for you to know that he is not only just funding infrastructure today I’m not too sure you have heard of anybody going to the streets to protest that they have not been paid pension.

“Oborevwori’s prudence is such that he works hard to properly preserve government funds for the good people of the state, by cutting off a whole lot of things that could have led to wastages.

“For instance there was another novel approach he brought to prudence and financial management where he proposed a reduction in the profit margin for some contracts upon 40 percent mobilisation.

“He argued that since the state usually provide contractors 40% mobilization, we are first of all saving them the agony of raising cost of funds should they have proceeded to go to any financial institution to ask for such funds.

“When we looked at these parameters from just about five different memos, we were able to save N4.5 billion, yet the contractors were still very much interested in carrying out such projects.”

He attributed the state’s solvency to Governor Sheriff Oborevwori’s financial management abilities which he said is “anchored on fiscal discipline, prudence and accountability”.

Mr. Charles Aniagwu who spoke in an interview on a live television programme monitored in Asaba, said Governor Oborevwori’s greatest asset was being underrated, adding that by his governance philosophy, the Governor had continued to confound his critics with tangible proofs and accolades across the state and country.

According to him, Governor Oborevwori is likened to that book that almost everybody judged by its cover and by the time they attempted to open the book they discovered that it’s not written in French language but in pure English.

“All the facts that you need to know about certain things that you thought are not possibly available in that book are all put together in that book.

“One of Oborevwori’s greatest assets is the fact that he is underrated, his financial management abilities is almost second to none.

“Let me inform you that even as the Speaker of the State House of Assembly for six years at the end of his tenure he returned N500 million unspent funds to the state coffers so when you look at the story of people who are usually there as politicians in different levels you will understand what that means.

“When we thought that was a flash in the pan that maybe it was just one of those things but we didn’t know that that is his pure characteristics and leadership style.

“When we say that Delta today is solvent we are not solvent because we contracted a native doctor to help us preserve our funds.

“We are solvent because Oborevwori is demonstrating a whole lot of accountability and prudence in the management of our resources.

“Two weeks ago when we had our first EXCO meeting for the year 2025 we approved projects worth over N275 billion naira. Not only that we approved those projects, the governor was also magnanimous for us to proceed to mobilize each of the contractors wit 40 percent of the contract sum.

“We have been doing that since he came in and that is why you can see that a number of these projects are moving with speed.

“Beyond the issue of giving out this 40%, there are a number of projects that are on Irrevocable Standing Payment Order (ISPO), where in which case every month, certain amount of funds kicks in.

“The moment you present your certificate in terms of milestones, the state pays.”

Aniagwu further said Oborevwori was carrying out the projects across the three senatorial districts without sentiments.

“There are so many things that he has done in terms of taking on big projects, in terms of carrying the three senatorial districts, irrespective of ethnic differences, along.

“Of course, Delta is a multi-ethnic state. Irrespective of even political affiliation, he’s carrying everybody along. That is why you see that even when the few pockets of opposition speak to certain issues that are at variance with reality, Oborevwori doesn’t waste time responding to those issues.

“He only concentrates more on the projects as a means of response to those criticisms and today, all we ask people is, tell us your local government and then we will tell you what Oborevwori is doing there.”

He said Governor Oborevwori introduced a novel approach to the budget that was equitable, fair and just, adding” the Governor was able to come up with a novel idea in our budgeting approach and good enough, my ministry was saddled with that responsibility of implementing certain funds across the 25 local government areas.

“In 2024, we provided one billion for roads alone and that is a specific intervention, because that is not the only amount we provided, but for specific intervention so that even if you don’t have a big man or you don’t have anybody speaking for your local government, that fund is there and must be spent in your local government.

“Having seen the magic in terms of the level of infrastructure we are able to implement using that model, in the 2025 budget, Governor Oborevwori directed that over N2.1 billion should be provided for the purpose of short intervention across the local government areas.

“It might interest you to note that even the EXCO we had less than two weeks ago, we approved projects across more than 80% of the local governments in Delta, in one EXCO.

“So anybody who wakes up and says they have no idea of what we are doing, we don’t even need to say what are you talking about.

“We say please, can you tell us your local government so let us even know whether you are among those who don’t visit home.”

Despite the flurry of construction activities across the state, Gov Oborevwori has prioritised some legacy projects.

These include but not limited to the N78 billion contract for the construction of three flyovers, a cloverleaf, pedestrian bridges and ancillary road expansion projects in the oil-rich Effurun and Warri metropolis, completion of Ughelli- Asaba Dualization project, Trans Ode Itsekiri Bridge project, remodeling of the Warri Township stadium and Asaba Waterfront City.

During an inspection, Governor Sheriff Oborevwori, said the project was conceived by the previous administration through a Public Private Partnership (PPP) Model.

He said the state government’s role was to construct a 6-lane access road to the new city, while the developers were expected to reclaim the land and develop the city.

He said: “Asaba is becoming very attractive to property developers who are coming from Lagos to Asaba because Asaba today is housing most of those people from the South-East.

“They are coming here because they find Asaba very comfortable and they know that we are also hospitable.

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“The Asaba waterfront city project is a Public Private Partnership (PPP) arrangement between the state government and the developers.

“Our obligation is to reclaim the place to give them an access route, a six-lane access road, to this place. They have done about 20 percent of this job; the challenge they are having is the buildings on the right of way.

“We have released money for compensation to the property owners and we have also released funds to the contractor for the project.

“They have assured us they will complete the road project in July; so, I have come here to look at the work that has been done and I am happy that they are on site.

“If they continue at this speed, I know that before the end of this year, the project will be completed.”

In a bid to combat poor quality and get value for tax payers money, Gov Oborevwori launched a whistle-blowing policy to enable citizens report poor quality and substandard projects delivery in the state.

Speaking through an aide, Oborevwori said: “So today we are launching a new partnership, and a partnership that emphasizes that Deltans do have a role in governance under the Oborevwori administration.

“As part of that demonstration of that invitation to join us in governance and ensure that value for money is given its pride of place in the administration of Rt. Hon. Sheriff Oborevwori.

“We are launching our whistleblower line and that the line, even before we made it public, is already functional.

“Our whistleblower line is a line that is designed for people to reach out to us. Our people in Delta, we want them to be able to interact with government. If any project in your community is going on and you feel that either the contractor or the supervising ministry is performing below what you see or believe it should be the standard, our whistleblower line is for you to be able to reach out to us.

“You can send text messages, WhatsApp messages and we also  encourage pictures and videos if possible.

“We are using it to ensure that our people who are living in their respective communities participate in our governance process so that it is not only the ministry, or the officials of government that will be able to talk to us or talk to the government with respect to projects that are within your community.”

Delta State Governor, Sheriff Oborevwori, has congratulated elder statesman and former Minister of Police Affairs, Alaowei Broderick Bozimo, on the occassion of his 86th birthday.

In a statement by his Chief Press Secretary, Sir Festus Ahon, in Asaba, Oborevwori hailed the distinguished lawyer and political leader for his contributions to the growth and development of the state and country.

He lauded Bozimo for his significant roles, particularly in the development of the state as a member of the Advisory and Peace Building Council and for providing political leadership to Ijaws in Delta.

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Oborevwori said: “On behalf of my family, the government and people of Delta State, I congratulate our father and leader of immeasurable value, Alaowei Broderick Bozimo, on the occasion of his 86th birth anniversary.

“I join your family, friends and well-wishers in thanking Almighty God for His continued guidance, protection and provision for you in the past 86 years.

“It is my prayer that God will continue to shine His divine light on you in your avowed commitment to providing immense service to humanity and nation-building”.