By his admission, Senator Adams Oshiomhole is a awful product vendor. In the true industrial world, his premises would have been closed and his merchandise banned.
However in politics, crime multiples grace. Oshiomhole dragged Godwin Obaseki into the governorship race in 2016 when the chances had been in opposition to him. Obaseki’s daytime job was minding his enterprise at Afrinvest, a monetary providers firm he based. However he quickly landed a aspect hustle as chairman of the Edo State Financial and Technique Staff in Osadebey Home, Benin.
When Oshiomhole needed handy over the baton in 2016, after two phrases as governor, Obaseki, the Lagos Boy, didn’t appear to be it. He was not sellable. Pius Odubu, the deputy governor, was in good stead and appeared favoured to get it by most accounts.
Tinubu-Fashola mannequin
However Oshiomhole needed to copy the Tinubu-Fashola template in Lagos. He needed to be the Tinubu of Edo and to make Obaseki, the technocrat and worldly-wise businessman, the Fashola. That was how Odubu, the native politician and village man, misplaced out.
A Lagos-based multibillionaire with a sprawling enterprise empire additionally backed the plan, which lastly earned Obaseki the ticket as a candidate for the All Progressives Congress (APC). Oshiomhole portrayed Obaseki as a genius, the particular one which the Edo folks had been ready for whereas demonising his challenger within the Peoples Democratic Celebration (PDP), Osagie Ize-Iyamu.
As I stated in an article on the time, there was no title that Oshiomhole didn’t name Ize-Iyamu, besides the title his mother and father gave him: Osagie. This man, he stated, was a awful product, undeserving of the vote of the Edo folks.
Quick honeymoon
Genius Obaseki received, however the honeymoon didn’t final. It didn’t take one 12 months earlier than he fell out together with his promoter, Oshiomhole. The disagreement was not about efficiency or social gathering programmes. It was about whether or not or not Tony Anenih, Oshiomhole’s mortal enemy, ought to have been given a state burial and likewise about management of the state’s sources.
The low season governorship ballot in Edo made issues worse. Obaseki inherited a parliament put in in 2015 when Oshiomhole was governor, and the lawmakers’ reelection in 2019 got here one 12 months forward of Obaseki’s. He managed to work with the lawmakers for the primary three years of his tenure as a result of they had been all predominantly members of the identical social gathering.
When he switched to the PDP after he was denied the APC governorship ticket in 2020, a predominantly APC parliament fiercely loyal to Oshiomhole was in place. The Home was a lion’s den, and Obaseki knew he would have needed to plot his survival if he received reelection. Oshiomhole went round Edo State begging voters to forgive him for promoting them a “unhealthy product,” the identical product he used his mouth to promote as a genius deal in 2016.
This time, he provided them Osagie Ize-Iyamu, whom he had demonised and written off 4 years earlier because the rebranded new deal. After all, voters rejected the provide. Obaseki, who had defected to the opposition PDP together with his deputy, Philip Shaibu, received the election.
To outlive, Obaseki ruled with a hobbled parliament. Over half of the state lawmakers had been camped in Oshiomhole’s home in Abuja as a result of the governor refused to swear them in.
Vendor begs once more
The seller has been begging once more for the sins he dedicated in opposition to the Esama of Benin, Chief Gabriel Igbinedion, hoping that forgiveness may also pave the best way for the APC’s candidate, Monday Okpebholo, on this weekend’s governorship election.
It received’t be lengthy earlier than we all know what the voters assume. The stage is ready for a three-way race amongst Okpebholo (APC), Asue Ighodalo of the Peoples Democratic Celebration (PDP), and Olumide Akpata of the Labour Celebration (LP).
In keeping with the election watchdog, Yiaga Africa, there are 17 events with about 2.6 million registered voters. For almost two-and-a-half a long time, the political contest in Edo has been between two events – till final 12 months’s presidential election altered the panorama, producing a consequence that gave Labour 56.97 % of the votes solid within the presidential election, a senator, and a member of the Home of Representatives.
The battlegrounds
The battle this weekend shall be fierce in two native authorities areas – Edo Central, the place the 2 main candidates, Okpebholo and Ighodalo, are from, and the South, which produced a senator and a federal Home member from the Labour Celebration and can be the stronghold of the Obaseki and his ally and former SSG, Osaradion Ogie.
It was within the Central, previously a PDP bastion, that Okpebholo defeated Clifford Ordia, a two-term senator. This weekend’s contest offers Okpebholo an opportunity to show his victory was not a fluke in an election the place the 2 main candidates, each from this constituency with the least native governments (5) and lowest variety of registered voters 440,514 (16.68 %), have all the pieces to play for.
The South is the principle battleground, the state’s vote financial institution with 1,526,699 (57.81 %) registered voters and 7 native governments. It’s also essential to the result for different causes. Other than being the governor’s base and the house of the Labour candidate, it’s also probably the most cosmopolitan, partly explaining the Labour Celebration’s emergence as a drive.
The South is the place the governor’s document within the final eight years and the credentials of those that need to succeed him may face the strictest scrutiny. But, like most elite populations, it’s also probably the most unreliable in outcomes. If it rains an excessive amount of, the climate is simply too scorching, or the worry of violence turns into a transparent and current hazard, the elite has a superb excuse to shun the ballot and sit at dwelling.
With the APC and PDP threatening to make the election a do-or-die affair and allegations by the PDP that the APC plans to make use of drive and intimidation to rig the ballot, low voter turnout, particularly in city areas in Edo South, is a transparent and current risk. This hazard could erode any advantages for Ighodalo from the mixed forces of Obaseki and Ogie from Oredo and Ikpoba Native Governments and tip the scales in favour of the APC and Labour Celebration candidates.
Not on the poll?
Oshiomhole shouldn’t be on the poll. His status as one in every of Edo’s most well-known product distributors of the previous eight years is. With six native governments and 673,794 (25.51 %) registered voters, Edo North, Oshiomhole’s dwelling base, is the second-largest vote financial institution within the state. It’s also the bottom of Philip Shaibu, the stranded deputy governor.
I suppose that Obaseki’s model – to not point out his take-no-prisoner politics, a nasty behavior he could have inherited from his estranged promoter, Oshiomhole – could have additional alienated him and diminished the possibilities of his candidate, Ighodalo, making vital inroads within the North. Outstanding folks in PDP who sheltered Obaseki from vagrancy in 2020 in opposition to whom he turned his again are ready to take revenge.
Will or not it’s the triumph or maybe the redemption of the product vendor? Will President Bola Ahmed Tinubu get his vindication 4 years after Obaseki’s marketing campaign mocked him with, “Edo no bi Lagos?” Or will this be Obaseki’s likelihood to affirm himself as the brand new political drive in Edo and shut down the manufacturing manufacturing facility of the adorned awful product vendor as soon as and for all?
Ishiekwene is the editor-in-chief of LEADERSHIP and writer of the brand new e book Writing for Media and Monetising It.
Views expressed by contributors are strictly private and never of TheCable.
