I READ with scarcely restrained stupefaction, the sweeping conclusions Mark Onome managed to distil from the contrived premises in his ‘The Uduaghan-Ochei tug of war’, [The Vanguard of Wednesday April 24, 2013].

According to Onome, Governor Emmanuel Uduaghan was left with a ‘bloody nose’ when his veto on the Anti-Terrorism Bill was overridden by the Delta State House of Assembly! Ironically, while I’m writing this rejoinder in defense of the entire House and Speaker Ochei, I actually side with the Governor on the matter.

Unlike His Excellency, the medical doctor, I support the death penalty not as deterrence but as a just dessert. However, as an immutable article of jurisprudential faith, the punishment must fit the crime and the lawyer in me cannot see how the death penalty is fit and proper recompense for the felony of kidnapping per se.

Nevertheless, I would have expected any public affairs commentator to be excited by the spectacle of the independence of the legislature and taken for granted that any genuine Uduaghan supporter would be happy that at last those prejudiced analysts who keep accusing him of manipulating the legislature into an underling of the executive arm, have comprehensively been proved wrong.

Perplexingly, Onome preferred to ignore this significant implication of the development and leapt into the disparagement of the entire House with gusto. Not done, Onome went on to solicitously insult his own Governor by lecturing him that he would be ‘digging his political grave with his own teeth’ should he allow Ochei succeed him in 2015! What gave a political neophyte like Onome the impression that an intellectual like Uduaghan requires his tutorship on whom to support come 2015, simply beats the imagination.

At any rate when did an action constitutionally provided for become the foundation of allegations of disloyalty? Dr. Uduaghan happens to be a discerning leader easily irritated by sycophancy and unimpressed by bootlicking. Loyalty for the Governor inheres in keying into his transformative agenda for the holistic development of Delta, something Victor Ochei has done with remarkable enthusiasm in his career as member and Speaker of the Delta House.

In any case, what was Ochei supposed to do when his entire House had come out, guns smoking, spoiling for a fight with the cancer of kidnapping currently ravaging the state? He may be their Speaker but they are his bosses and in the manner of a true leader, he led where they insisted he must lead.

On account of a decision all the  members of the House collectively took, insisted on, and stuck to, Onome predatorily singled out Ochei for inquisitorial victimisation, mischievously accusing him of being ‘incapable of being influenced, a politician who knows all the answers, who’s every thought is correct and unassailable’.

This is nothing but poorly packaged nonsense. I recall the very first day I showed up at Ochei’s house. A colleague of mine had dropped me off and I found Ochei already out on the steps directing his security detail to ease me in. Once inside, he engaged me intellectually.

Far from being interested in discussing politics he came across as more eager to talk about governance, service delivery and the strengthening of institutions, sharing with me, his legislative agenda, philosophy of democratic governance and vision for Delta State. In remarkable detail, he tabled before me, his dream of a Delta of unity and amity where our diversity becomes our strength rather than what the rabble-rousers amongst us rely on to tear us apart.

When it was time to take my leave, I proceeded to call my friend to pick me up. As Ochei began to see me off, I made a mental note to get to the door before him and open for myself out of respect for his office as number three citizen of my state. In a cool, yet deft manner, Ochei beat me to the door, opened for me and stood aside to let me pass! Outside he told me not to bother calling my friend and summoned his driver to drop me off.

When the gentleman showed up, Ochei changed his mind, offered to take me to my exact destination himself and nicely did just that! If it is this down to earth fellow, the Mark Onome’s of this world delude themselves they can sell to Deltans  as conceited, they have some  hard marketing to do.

At a time when distinguished elder statesmen like Chief E. K. Clark are subscribing to the idea of power shift, it is rather disappointing that perhaps  after all, Onome  is just another one of those divisive fellows who would deny Delta North the opportunity to give us a Governor in 2015. This should explain his pathological hatred for the frontrunner, Victor Ochei. Thankfully, from any equitable point of view, it is an egalitarian imperative that Delta North should produce the state’s next Governor.

This is the only proper political outcome, come 2015, if we are to be our brother’s keepers within the framework of a Delta calibrated by equality, characterised by unity and destined for greatness. The entire idea that a particular section of the state should perpetually retain the exclusive entitlement to the governorship of the state is not a strategy for democratic progress.

Let blood therefore be thicker than water and just as our region, the Niger Delta, a sixth part of Nigeria could produce a president for the country, let Delta North, a third part of our state, with nine local government areas – more than either of the other two zones – produce us a governor in the next dispensation. Our man for the job should be more interested in governance that delivers to the people than in the sort of politics that can only leave them empty-handed. Needless to say, Ochei remarkably fits that profile.

Mr. JESUTEGA ONOKPASA, a lawyer, wrote from  Sapele, Delta State.