BY  GABRIEL  ENOGHOLASE

Chief Dan Orbih is the Edo State Chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). In this interview, he spoke on the recently conducted local government election in the state and why the party will not accept its outcome.

What is your assessment of the recently conducted local government elections in Edo State?

The worst ever conducted by any government in Nigeria. it is more painful that it has taken the ACN government in Edo state close to five years before it even conducted what has turned out to be a sham. It has completely eroded any confidence that the people have in the government before this exercise. It is bizarre and unacceptable for the government to sit and write the results of the election for Edo people.

But the governor blamed your party for the twice postponement of the election in Esan North-East?

I think that the governor is economical with the truth. He knows very well that like in most local governments that today if local government election is conducted twenty times under a free, fair and conducive atmosphere, he would lose twenty times.  I have stated before now the reasons responsible for this. After the gubernatorial elections on July, 14 2012 a lot people are now beginning o see the other side of the governor. Before the governorship election, I came out to inform Edo people that we had it on good authority that the government was going to introduce property tax.

The governor denied this, but immediately after he was sworn-in, he went to the State House of Assembly asking for a law to be enacted to enable the government collect property tax. That decision shocked the people of Edo State, that decision embarrassed the people. Here was a man who said there was nothing like this, but immediately after he was sworn in he went to the State House of Assembly to ensure that the law was passed to that effect, to empower him to collect the property tax.

Chief Dan Osi Orbih

You know what followed; a lot of demonstrations by the people, not by the PDP, but by Edo people, those in ACN and the PDP. Everybody in the state protested. So, you can imagine how those who voted for him in the governorship election would feel it is these disappointed people in Edo state that are now asking for a change.

Don’t forget that all those people who made the errors in the PDP in the past are now the ones in ACN and the people are not surprised that they are now the ones behind these bad policies; starting from their State Chairman, who was the Speaker of State House of Assembly under the former PDP government to the National Chairman, (South-South) who was Secretary to government of that era, to the Deputy Governor who was a member of the House of Representatives under the PDP.  People are now seeing the new face of the PDP in Edo state as those who believe in deepening democracy, who believe in grassroots democracy and using the ballot box to effect a change in the government of the state.

What is your reaction to the cancellation of the election in Esan North- East LGA by EDSIEC?

First and foremost when no election took place on April 20, a lot of our members came out to say that there was no need for us to continue with the exercise, he would do exactly what he has done in the other 14 local governments, but knowing the governor’s capacity for propaganda, I insisted that since our National leader comes from there, he will say, oh the PDP could not even contest the election.

That was why I insisted that let us participate in spite of the fact that he has released the results of the 14 local government areas in the previous election held on 20, April.  Our people came out in large numbers and they won all the wards all the presiding officers were there waiting for the Local Government electoral officer to take the results from them, collate and declare the results. The man disappeared into thin air and those people slept there till the following day with no returning officer to enter their results.

As it was during the June 12,  1993 election, all the results had already come in from all the units, it was only left for the returning officer to enter them into his results sheets and announce the winner. So, what happened in Esan North- East can only be compared in Nigerian political history to the June 12 annulment in 1993.

It is alleged that some of your party members never wanted the party to participate in the LGA election. How true?

You cannot blame those who said that we should not participate because from the beginning it was clear that the government was not prepared to conduct a free and fair local government election. It took the government close to five years before deciding on the fact that there was need to conduct this election. From the beginning the government put together a team it wanted to dictate to at every turn in the process.

EDSIEC came out with a guideline where it was clear to our members that they were not prepared for free and fair local government election. They ignored the constitutional provisions concerning qualifications to contest local government elections and introduced foreign elements into their own guild lines for qualifications.

They said people should pay N100,000 for chairman and N50,000 for councilors and these are unconstitutional demands by EDSIEC and all these were done to discourage the PDP from contesting the election. Come to think of it, the governor did not pay any money to collect form to contest the governorship.

It is argued that local government elections conducted in PDP controlled states were all won by the party. So, why the cry?

I can only speak on what had happened in Edo state, I was not in the other states, but elections conducted by the ACN led government in Edo state were not free and fair. In fact, they did not conduct any election, they wrote results of elections and swore in people who were not elected by the people. So, I don’t know what happened in other states you are referring to, I can talk about Edo state because I knew what happened in the state.