By  Festus  Ahon

SENATOR Ovie  Omo-Agege  represents Delta Central Senatorial District in the Senate on the platform of Labour Party. He is the only Labour Party senator in the Senate. In this interview, he speaks on his journey to the Senate, his relationship with Chief James Ibori and his stewardship. He also explains what brought him and Chief Great Ogboru together and his resolve to remain loyal to him and the Labour Party.

  Excerpts:  

INEC declared your rival, Chief Ighoyota Amori as winner of the election and the lower Tribunal also upheld his election. How did you go about reclaiming the mandate?

To begin with, I never lost the election. Everyone who followed the 2015 Delta Central Senatorial District election in Delta State expected me to win in a landslide, which I did. But the electoral thieves, who believe they can rig their way into office every four years brazenly invaded polling units and ward collation centres to change the results. Like every criminal, they left credible evidence at the crime scene.  At the senatorial collation centre, we found out that parties that did not participate in the election were awarded votes. On this criteria alone, we annulled so many unlawful votes and I was ahead by over 16,000 votes. Ordinarily, I should have been declared winner that day but when you have the entire machinery of the state government deployed against you, things don’t come easy. As a consequence, we had to go for a supplementary election which they rigged again. That was how Chief Ighoyota Amori was unlawfully declared winner.

Omo-Agege

I went to the Elections Petitions Tribunal to seek redress. We got the card reader report and the register to support our case of non compliance with the electoral act against Chief Amori, the PDP and INEC. The evidence was there for anyone who is interested in justice to see but the tribunal thought otherwise.  We had to appeal.   I made that decision right there in court after the verdict of the tribunal was read because it was obvious to me that the judgment was not based on the facts and evidence of my case. I couldn’t just let the mandate that was freely given to me by my people to be stolen in broad daylight.

So two things gave me courage to appeal. First, I knew the people voted for me overwhelmingly. Second, the required evidence to prove my case was already in the record of the tribunal. That evidence was from the card reader report and the voters register. It was on the basis of this premise that I went to the Appeal. Doing otherwise would have been a let-down and squander of the collective will of the people.

And to the glory of God, we won the appeal. That victory brought spontaneous celebration not only to my senatorial district but to the entire state.   It gave us hope that one day we will drive the usupers of the people’s mandate from power and free Delta State.

In 2007, 2010 and 2011 you were seen as arch enemy of Chief Great Ogboru but today you are in the same political party with him and both of you are now close allies. What informed your decision to pitch tent with him against your former political party, the PDP?

Chief Great Ogboru was never my enemy. Granted that in the past we worked at cross purpose politically, that is not enough to conclude that we were arch enemies. Our families have deep historical ties. Indeed I see him as my senior brother, with whom I have always had a good personal relationship. We both joined party politics in 2002. While he joined AD, I joined the PDP. As a consequence, we had different political interests. But those differences never affected our personal relationship in such a fundamental way as to make us enemies in true sense of the word. It is worth noting too that despite the obvious political differences, we both had one thing in common and that is the passion to bring change to Delta State and serve our people. That passion shaped our political careers, especially in the pursuit of the governorship position.

So when the powers that be, who believed they own Delta State denied me the ticket through a flawed process that was designed to produce their choice candidate who will maintain the status quo, I had to make a decision. Should I remain in PDP, work for the party candidate as I did in 2007 and continue to sustain those who mismanaged the state in power or align with Chief Ogboru, who like me, has been committed to change? It was at this point that I decided that I join forces with Chief Ogboru who has been consistent in the fight for change and whom I believed had a better chance to win the election and bring change to Delta State.

You were a member of the Chief James Ibori kitchen cabinet but today you are an ambassador of the Urhobo nation carrying the banner of Labour Party; a party that is opposing the PDP for which he is the leader in Delta State. So how is your relationship with him against this background? 

Chief James Ibori was my boss. He gave me the opportunity to serve our people, as his Executive Assistant, Commissioner for Special Duties and Secretary to the State Government. I will forever remain grateful to him.  Having said that, I want to make it clear that he never supported me in all the governorship contests in which I was involved. In 2007, rather than support me, he supported Uduaghan. In 2011, he did the same. In 2015, he supported Okowa. But I bear no grudges. He remains my leader.

That is now history anyway. Now I belong to Labour Party and my loyalty is to the party and by implication to Chief Great Ogboru who is our leader.   As I said earlier, both of us have been fighting for change in Delta state, therefore it shouldn’t surprise anybody that we are now together fighting the same cause.  Let me make it clear that we are in this for real. It is for the long haul. No one should be in doubt as to my commitment. I am totally committed to actions that will make change happen in Delta State and there is no going back.

What are you doing to raise the lot of the Urhobo given the present low position of the ethnic group in the polity?

Demographically, the Urhobo nation is the fifth largest ethnic nationality in Nigeria. And as host to more than 15 oil and gas fields and about 400 oil wells and the highest onshore producer of crude oil in Nigeria, the Urhobo nation contributes significantly to the Nigeria economy. Yet we are marginalised politically. No Urhobo son or daughter is represented in the Federal Executive Council. None is in the leadership of the National Assembly. Not even a Federal parastatal of any significance is headed by an Urhobo. Though the Urhobo people believe in Nigeria, we want a nation united by shared interests and shared responsibilities.  I will do all I can to reverse the situation and give a strong voice to the Urhobo people. It is my hope that the marginalisation of the Urhobo nation will be addressed very soon.

As the only Labour Party Senator in the Senate, how are you coping? 

In the Senate, party affiliation is not a big issue when it comes to representing your people. The parties are just platforms for elections. There are no ideological barriers to constrain any senator in the legislative process of representation and legislation. I have friends in both PDP and APC, who have assisted me in many ways to get things done for my people. The support has been tremendous across party lines.

You seem to be having romance with the APC; is it true that your party is in merger talks with the APC? 

First, let me state categorically that I remain in Labour Party, the party on whose platform I was elected to the Senate. Secondly, mergers of political parties can only occur at the national level. What is being negotiated in Delta State is a fusion or conflation of members of the major opposition parties, Labour Party, Accord and APC under the platform of APC to forge a united front against the PDP in Delta State. There are also people within PDP who are sick and tired of the way the party is running the affairs of the state.   They too are coming to join the opposition.  I will encourage and support the coming together of opposition forces in Delta State in order to dislodge the PDP from power in 2019. PDP has taken advantage of the divided opposition to rig itself to power in past elections.