ByGab Ejuwa

Nobody, not even the most ardently cynical of critics, can deny that, as far as the APC Delta South senatorial slot is concerned, Dr Emmanuel Ewetan Uduaghan, Delta State immediate past governor ,stands head above shoulder over other contestants, especially if our yardstick  is graduated experience.

Emmanuel Eweta Uduaghan

For sureness, not the least so verifiability,of all the contestants jostling for the hallowed chambers of the legislature, Uduaghan rings the bell as the one who has been the most enduring , the most experienced in governmental operations and official protocol.

Deriving from this is the fact that he is the particular candidate who can best articulate Delta State’s integrated needs, and how to go about achieving them one after the other, having been on the governmental hot seat for many years running.

Quite apart from this, it is self-evident that the dominant ethic group of the Warri South constituency, especially the Ijaw, the Isoko and, as a matter of course, the Itsekiri, are clamouring for his representation of them in the Senate, especially as he had been a unifying factor and influence among these three ethnic groups. The way he achieved ethnic harmony among these groups has marked him out certainly as a bridge builder who can bring off the onerous senatorial assignment, if given the nod to go and ply his trade in the hallowed ambience of the National Assembly.

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Another  allure of the Uduaghan mystique, at least for the Senate, is that in an  unduly long time in the history of our dear country, Nigeria, this is the first time an Itsekiri is gunning for the senatorial job. The last time an Itsekiri made himself very visible in the top three organs of government was the first Republic when  Chief  Festus Okotie -Eboh became the Minister of Finance. Since that  auspicious time the Itsekiri nation has taken a kind of  senatorial or top governmental snooze, so to say, and only an affirmed Uduaghanal candidature can bring crystal-clear echoes of that glorious immediate past, or rekindle the fire of Itsekiri paramouncy in the comity of sophisticated and cultured ethnic nationalities in Nigeria.

And especially because being the symbol of Itsekiri firsttimer grapple for leadership slot worked considerably and favourably for him to become the governor of Delta State, it is also anticipated by gubernatorial punditry that this same gambit is also attractive and practicable enough to see him waltzing through the portals of the DeltaState Governor’s Lodge.

Another indisputably attractive quality that may just catapult Uduaghan into the Senate is his erstwhile eminence in the opposition, the People’s Democratic Party, PDP. It is an open secret that Dr Uduaghan had been one of those livewire governors who had, in a manner of speaking, made the party tick. He was that prized and honoured, so much so that he was one of those governors in the PDP dispensation who consistently won awards for distinguished leadership cum governance.

Not only was this physician given citations of honour in his deft and mature handling of the Warri genocidal crisis, the flame of which he helped extinguish, and which highlighted his level-headedness and consumate negotiation skill, which he brought to bear on his own style of administration to achieve the much-needed cohesion and unity among the principal ethnic nationalities making up the Delta socio-political space: the Itsekiris, the Ijaws and the Urhobo.

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The last, but certainly not the least, of Uduaghan’s aces up his sleeve is his visceral brilliance and visionary power. Even before the parrot cry about restructuring and diversification, which now echoes everywhere all over the nation, Uduaghan had conceived an essentially revolutionary concept of Delta Beyond Oil initiative, revealing a prophetic ingenious administrator of men and materials who could look into the seeds of time and determine beforehand which ones would grow or not. Without the tincture of a doubt, such futuristic projectability, indeed such forward looking stocktaking in burdening introspection is sorely needed in the Upper Chamber of our National Assembly so that together we may take our country to the very apogee of national achievement and pre-eminence in contemporary world affairs.

*Ejuwa is a public affairs commentator.