ASABA—Barely 48 hours after Obarisi Ovie Omo-Agege threw his hat into the gubernatorial ring in the fresh election in Delta State, the development has been generating  excitement  amongst opposition parties in the state, who have indicated intention to offer him a platform to run.

Some political parties, including the All Nigerian Peoples Party, ANPP, Labour Party, LP, and Progressive Peoples Alliance, PPA, are said to be reaching out to him individually, with the offer that he could run on their platforms, it was learnt.

Sources close to Action Congress of Nigeria, ACN,whose candidate was excluded from the voided 2007 poll in Delta State, also, said some elements in the party were urging  the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, to endorse the move to get Omo-Agege run on the party’s platform.

Corroborating his party’s position, the chairman of the LP in Delta, Mr Emeka, said the party was ready to form an alliance with the ACN, in the state,  if the party (ACN) was not allowed to field a candidate for the re-run election.

The state chairman of  PPA, Mr Kaju Isichie,  spoke in the same vein, when he  said his party would be happy if the coalition of political parties supporting Omo-Agege would allow him to run on the platform of his party.

The LP chairman denied that the rush to offer the aspirant the platform to contest the fresh election did not amount to a gang-up against the former Governor Emmanuel Uduaghan, who has also declared his interest to run.

“What is happening does not amount to a gang-up against Uduaghan. It merely underscores the popularity of  Omo-Agege, not only among the Delta political class but also among the people.

He is generally seen as a credible aspirant, a sincere politician, a man of the people, genuinely interested in the peoples’ welfare. He is the viable alternative, the new face of Delta, the change we need to redress the fortunes the sacked administration frittered away in the last three and a half years,” Emeka said.

Isichei decried the ethnic coloration the forthcoming poll in the state has assumed in some quarters, saying what matters is competence and good governance as enunciated in Omo-Agege’s  programme.”

According to him,the need to find an alternative in Omo-Agege is imperative to stop the return of the sacked administration.

“Forget the claim that the Uduaghan administration was imposed on Delta. We are all living witnesses to the poor performance of the sacked administration which raked in about N700billion in federal allocation and IGR but with nothing to show for it”, the PPA chairman stated.