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I came into PDP with Phillip Abeke at Ozoro –Asaboro

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CHIEF Benedict Asaboro is an Ughelli based-lawyer and hails from Isoko in Delta State. In this interview with SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT John Dugbe, he speaks on the Delta state gubernatorial election as it affects the Democratic Peoples Party and among other issues of public interest. Excerpt:

The last time we met you were in the All Progressives Congress, do you still belong to the APC or PDP?

I have long dumped the APC for the simple reason that the leadership of the APC in the Isoko nation was pretending to be progressive. As a matter of fact, the leadership of the PDP is more progressive than the APC; there is no democracy in the leadership of the APC in the Isoko nation. Most of the decisions in APC are being taken by one man called Senator Okpozo, who does so without consulting with any other person. As far as Senator Okpozo is concerned, anything that has to do with the Isoko nation must be for an Ozoro man, no other person can talk nor benefit. So as a result of that I thought it wise and resolved to dump them and declare for the PDP. This was a long time ago; I am surprised that it‘s today you knew about it.

Now that you are in the PDP, were you welcomed into the PDP fold as a new member?

Yes, it was officially done; in fact it was SSG Ovuzorie Macaulay in collaboration with other leaders that welcomed me into the PDP. I came on board with Chief Phillip Abeke at Ozoro, Isoko North Local Government Council secretariat last year November.

Are you not experiencing any sort of discrimination in the PDP since you joined? 

As far as the PDP in the Isoko nation is concerned, I cannot find any discrimination at all; on the contrary, I am welcomed at any of the party functions. I am with the likes of Arch. Joseph Ogieh and the SSG so I feel very comfortable here.

The 2015 elections are around the corner, and the three major parties contending for the seat are the PDP, Labour Party and the APC. For now, there have been insinuations that the Governor has endorsed Mr. Anthony Obuh, what is your take on this?

As far as I am concerned, the position of the party’s leadership is what I will subscribe to; so I cannot accuse anybody of bringing in any candidate. The person elected by the party at the primary will be my candidate. So therefore, I am not in any way condemning any candidate now on the perceived reasons that some government officials are supporting him, but whatever it takes to bring about any good governor in Delta state should be our priority rather than criticising the government for sponsoring a candidate. The governor is not supporting any candidate. If government is supporting any candidate that does not make such person the governor’s candidate because everybody is entitled to his own decision at any point in time. So therefore, the governor cannot be said to have presented anybody, so to that extent the governor cannot be criticised for sponsoring a particular candidate.

So what type of person do you want as governor of Delta State come 2015?

The governor is really trying to finish very strong, so anybody who can follow up his programmes that he is embarking upon now should be voted for. What he is doing now is worthy of commendation and as far as I am concerned, I have no criticism of anything the governor is doing now.

Are you saying that whomever that will come should continue where the governor stopped or what do you want the person to do in order to consolidate on the achievements of Governor Emmanuel Uduaghan?

What I think the person should embark upon is the three-point agenda of the present governor and the three-point agenda of the present governor are peace and security, human capital and infrastructure development. Because if you talk of roads, medical care, and as it is some officials of the DESOPADEC are playing gallant role in this aspect. For example, in the Isoko nation there are developmental strides in various places. We have 19 clans in the Isoko nation; the 19 clans are well represented in terms of development, roads, water and medical care. We have never had it good like this in the Isoko nation in terms of representing our area. You see, as it is now, Joseph Ogeh as a commissioner in DESOPADEC. He came into power in 2012 and he inherited 100 projects uncompleted, he has completed them and also embarked on 68 others, which he has also completed. This you can find in the report card he presented to the Isoko Progress Union, and in the report card, he presented all that he has done. There is no way in Isoko that anybody can say there is no project that has not been completed by Arch. Joseph Ogeh in his two years in office.

As for medical care, which a lot of people are talking about today and even up till this moment we are talking, he has opened the door for anybody who needs medical attention of a higher magnitude even if the person is referred overseas for treatment.. In his report, human capital development which is one of the three-point agenda of the state government and in line with the Millennium Development Goals, which stipulate that all should have free access to health care by the year 2015, the eight days for the free medical care were not enough to take care of all the patients,

Ogeh noted that those who did not benefit from the medical centre will be abandoned, and that serious cases that have not been handled at the centre will be referred to other hospitals and if can be flown abroad for proper treatment.

What we are saying in essence is that the medical exercise afforded the people of Isoko nation the opportunity to access medical care. Arch. Joseph Ogeh is open to any Isoko person either here or aboard as the situation may demand. So I want to say that before the appointment of Arch. Joseph Ogeh, we were not opportune to have this kind of things like medical care and not only that we now have a water project that is solar powered; the era of looking for generator to power water project has gone, which lessened the aspect of looking for money to repair generator. The solar water project, we don’t need diesel or petrol so in effect, the score card as presented by Arch. Ogeh is a thing of commendation. In that essence it is my humble view that he should be given an award of excellence by the Isoko Development Union. And I am calling on the president general of the Isoko Development Union to give an award of excellence to Arch. Joseph Ajiri Ogeh for excellent representation in the DESOPADEC board as a commissioner representing Isoko nation.

The post I came into PDP with Phillip Abeke at Ozoro –Asaboro appeared first on Daily Independent, Nigerian Newspaper.


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