By Orhovhwoase Oghenevwogaga
For definition, a throe, for humans, is intense pain or difficulty at the point of birth or death, and for society, at the point of change or transition. Perfidy is a state of deceitfulness or untrustworthiness.
Though Governor Okowa had started off presenting a humble and friendly mien, especially always clutching the biggest Bible and addressing the state from the pulpit of churches, those two words describe the present state of affairs in Delta State under his leadership and the ruling PDP as they head into the 2023 general elections.
Deltans are peculiarly a loving and happy people, united in their diversity of tribes and ethnic nations which are mostly inter-related by marital, social and cultural ties.
Blessed with enormous mineral and natural resources, great kingdoms and some of the most intellectually and professionally excellent people in Nigeria, their expectation of a modern and economically prosperous state has remained high.
Into the current democratic dispensation, successive Governors of the state have been pursuing this promise.
Chief James Ibori, reputed as the architect of modern Delta, not only gave political voice to the state, he opened up otherwise remote communities with roads and bridges to connect to the world.
Dr Emmanuel Uduaghan focused on improving health and educational infrastructure and provided gateways to the state for businesses and tourists into the Northern district and particularly the state capital, with the establishment of the Asaba Airport, and into the South and Central districts and the oil producing areas with the upgrade of Osubi airport.
Okowa has majored on roads, schools and the development of small and medium scale enterpreneurships through various job and wealth creation programmes.
He is to leave in 2023 and the people are now faced with the challenge of transition.
Under Ibori, the state seemingly had a consensus on rotation of power through the three senatorial districts. A first circle from Central to South to North has been achieved and it was expected to restart from Central.
The first challenge to the sequence was witnessed in Okowa’s repudiation of the consensus on rotation. He declared that there was no signed agreement on it and cunningly encouraged the Ijaws of Delta South, including his Deputy Governor, to go into the contest.
This generated some confusion which challenged the socio-political stability of the state and harmony of the PDP as the party headed for the primaries, until the political leaders of Delta Central, comprising mainly the Urhobos, took up the challenge of lobbying leaders of other senatorial districts and ethnic nationalities to stand by the consensus on rotation by districts rather than by ethnic nationalities.
It was a development which would have pitched the Ijaws and the Urhobos, on one hand, and the Urhobos and Anioma people on the other hand, against themselves in perpetual political enmity but the danger was averted by the mutual understanding of mostly traditional institutions who determined to disregard Okowa’s destabilising antics and continue to co-exist in peace and friendship as they had always been.
That matter presumably settled in the mind of the people, the next challenge was in choosing a candidate of the PDP from Delta Central.
For the people, minding the challenges of governance in the present Nigerian economic situation, the choice should be about competence and capacity to deliver, but Okowa, again, had a different agenda, to install a stooge by which he can retain control of the governance of the state after his tenure.
Into the orchestra, he sponsored the construction of a propaganda that the choice should be his alone to make, leading to the cultic “where Okowa go we go” mantra of the Delta Political Vanguard championed by one of his Protocol Chiefs.
In picking on Rt Hon Sheriff Oborevwori, he deviously sought again to play the people of Delta Central against themselves by emphasising a seeming division between the Okpe and the rest of Urhobo people under the pretence of promoting equity.
At the same time, he sponsored a regime of spite and hatred against Olorogun David Edevbie, the choice of Urhobo Progressive Union who is widely acclaimed as the most competent and experienced with the hugest capacity to deliver on social development and economic growth.
He sold the resentment that Edevbie contested and came very close at the 2014 primary that brought him in, arguing that he should not have contested since it was the turn of Delta North.
The argument however flies in the face of his own repudiation of the power rotation consensus wherein he stated that there was no written and settled sequence.
Incidentally, at the PDP screening for South South Governorship aspirants, Oborevwori’s credentials were discovered to have inconsistencies in name and age.
The Urhobo Progressive Union is said to have noticed that in their earlier screening of the two aspirants but, as elders, they merely endorsed Edevbie and did not have to reveal their findings on Oborevwori’s credentials.
The particulars of the inconsistencies are self evident. He is known as Sheriff but he filed a First School Leaving Certificate dated 1981 which bears Oborevwori Francis and a WASCE certificate obtained in 1999 which also bears Oborevwori O Francis with date of birth put at November 12, 1979.
His University certificate bears Oborevwori Sheriff Francis, his NYSC Exemption certificate bears Oborevwori Sheriff and his Master’s Degree bears Oborevwori Sheriff Francis Orohwedor.
Apparently, he had been carrying out a flurry of actions, especially by court affidavits through the years to connect Oborevwori Francis to Oborevwori Sheriff as one and the same person in order to reconcile the names and certify the primary and secondary school certificates unto his person.
Ostensibly in 1982, a cousin of his, one Benson Ogolo, swore an affidavit on his behalf stating his name as Sheriff OBORGUVORI (different from OBOREVWORI but possibly also a mistake). It is not clear why that affidavit was made in 1982 or if truly it was made in 1982.
His affidavit of 2003 stating he is Oborevwori Francis Orohwedor and was born on June 19, 1963, as against November 12, 1979 in the WASCE certificate, sought to help him appropriate the Primary School and WASCE certificates to himself. The implication is that he finished primary school at age 18 and wrote WASCE examination at age 36, 18 years after.
While not impossible for any possibly dull student, the plausibility of his claims are widely in doubt, especially as it has been widely held that, by their regulation, the Examination Council does not allow over aged persons to write WASCE but GCE.
In response, he has tried to mobilise old students from Aladja Grammar School which he earlier attended but not any student from Oghareki Grammar School where he claims to have written the WASCE exams seems to know him except a former principal who claims he was one of the best students. How someone who finished primary school at age 18, only came to re-enroll for WASCE 18 years after at age 36, didn’t pass through the school system and didn’t write other tests and exams in the junior classes could be adjudged as one of the best students of the school remains a wonder to Deltans.
How such an intelligent student could have mistaken his own record of birth, to all details of day, month and year, in filling his examination forms, even at age 36, remains also a wonder.
The issue however is that he seems obviously to be altering the name and date of birth in the WASCE certificate to suit his needs. The contention however is if he can do so just on his own by mere affidavits without recourse to the issuing authority.
If he indeed filled his form correctly and the mistake was by WAEC, what effort did he make to have WAEC correct the mistake and where is the evidence of the effort aside mere court affidavits which anybody can swear to anyhow, anytime, anywhere?
Remarkably also, in none of those earlier Francis’ certificates did the name Sheriff appear until he began to attempt to connect them with court affidavits from his university certificates at about his mid 40s.
He claims that Sheriff was a pet or guy name called him by one of his uncles and it is also a wonder if all these troubles are about infusing a guy name to his real name.
In further attempt to cure the descripancies after the PDP screening, he rushed to swear a Deed of Pool to assemble and harmonise all the names and ages together. Curiously, the Deed of Pool dated 2011 had an April 2022 FIRS receipt and stamp and was signed to Gazette personally by himself on May 5, 2022 ahead of the PDP primary on May 25, 2022.
Further to these, it was discovered that the documents and claims he filed with INEC in 2018 to contest elections in 2019 are markedly different from the claims he made in his filing for the PDP primary in 2022.
It was for these anomalies and inconsistencies that Justice Taiwo Taiwo of the Federal High Court, Abuja found his documents lacking in veracity, authenticity and credibility and disqualified him from having contested in the primary, in the first place.
Somehow and admist wide rumours of Okowa and Sheriff compromising the PDP Screening and Appeal Committees with about $2m for clearance, and Appeal Court judges with close to N6.5b allegedly delivered by a former Chief Judge of Delta State, they succeeded in upturning the judgement of the lower court on grounds of technical procedures and not about the substance of the matter.
Whereas the Appeal Court held that the suit ought to have been filed through Writ of Summons, the gazetted directions for filing pre-election matters as provided in the constitution and guidelines of the Federal High Court for 2022 stipulates that “every pre-election matter shall be filed by Originating Summons.”
Also, whereas Section 29 (5) of the Electoral Act expressly and unambiguously grants leave to any aspirant to challenge suspected documents of the winner in a party primary within 14 days after the primary, and this without any conditions attached as to whether the name had been submitted to or published by INEC, the Appeal Court curiously read subsection 29(6) into the previous subsection and decided that the suit was premature. These and many other legal curiosities in the judgement of the Court of Appeal.
It is just the same way as Degi Eremienyo also had same Appeal Court upturn the judgement of the lower court in the case of Bayelsa APC and PDP before the Supreme Court adverted itself to the substance of the matter in pursuit of real and sustainable justice for the good governance of the state and gave judgement to Governor Duoye Diri.
As it stands, Delta is at crossroads. The people are disturbed at the possibility of a Governor and his Speaker, both of whom have connivedly mortgaged the state to the tune of about N200b loan in just six months of the year and are feeling free with the funds to purchase their party and justice in pursuit of their personal political targets, against the best interest of competent governance, thus edging the state unto inglorious, lying and cheating leadership and a regime of perfidy.
There are only two safety valves left for the people. The first is if the Supreme Court will have mercy on Deltans as a people and deliver them from the impending evil by treating the substance of leprosy rather than dancing around technicalities of the certificate and identity discrepancies. The second is for the people themselves to determine to liberate themselves from the prevailing siege of deceit and cover ups by disentangling themselves and their state from that which is obviously untidy and dishonourable.
Orhovhwoase Oghenevwogaga, wrote from Eyara Street in Okpara Inland