Mr. Sergius Ogun is a member of the House of Representatives representing Esan North-East/Esan South-East federal constituency of Edo State.

An expert in the oil and gas sector, Rep. Ogun in this interview explains the readiness of the House to forge a working relationship with the administration and the readiness of his Peoples Democratic Party, PDP to reclaim Edo State in the election due next year. Excerpts:

By Ediri Ejoh

President Buhari’s is less than 100 days in office. What is your assessment of the new government?

The administration is three months old already that’s almost 100 days. The president says he is slow and steady, I personally didn’t expect anything in 100 days. Having said that, we are ready to work with the president and his cabinet when in place. We have only one country called Nigeria and it belongs to all of us, necessity is laid on us to make it work.

Elections will take place in Edo state next year. What is the chance of the PDP in the state?

The PDP will take back the state in next year’s election if we get it right in the party primary election in choosing the governorship and deputy governorship candidates. The party must be transparent leading to the primary, conduct a free, fair and credible primary election that will be acceptable to all. Thereafter manage the post primary election problems, if we go into the election proper as a united party we will over run the APC.

But how can you do this given the alleged performance of Governor Adams Oshiomhole?

Performance is relative, if the PDP in nine years, eight months that they were in office borrowed N4 billion and the present government in seven years has borrowed over N70 billion (this is inclusive of the dollar component) this can best be described as mortgage and not performance. We don’t even want to go into the IGR collected by the government. As much as one will like to commend the governor for the initiative of the IGR drive we should see what the money is spent on. After all, the tax is from the sweat of the people and should not be seen as pocket money by the governor.

What will you say made PDP to lose the recent presidential election?

A couple of reasons but this is not the forum for that. But let me quickly add that PDP was never going to rule Nigeria for ever anyway. PDP losing the election was a testament to the fact that Nigeria has joined the League of Nations practicing democracy and as such we should congratulate ourselves. In advanced democracies of the world I am not aware of any political party that has been in power for more than three terms in the last 20 years.

PDP claims the anti-corruption fight of President Buhari is aimed at the opposition which is the PDP. How do you react to that?

Well, it is no longer the PDP alone that is saying this, everyone is saying it. Every well meaning Nigerian wants the cancer of corruption out of our system like yesterday but I don’t think the government can even afford to target only the opposition. The distinctive dividing lines of the different political parties in Nigeria is still blurred.

Nigerians and the international community will believe that PMB is ready to fight corruption when he can successfully prosecute corrupt officials across party lines. I think we have had enough of this trial in the media let us approach the courts and let the court convict and jail those that have flouted the laws in our statute books, this is the minimum acceptable standard for fighting corruption in modern democracy.