Exposed: UPU’s Lies; As Urhobo Leaders Threaten Jonathan, Okowa, Over 2015 Elections

 

Admittedly, the 2015 general elections may be nationally tougher for the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) than the past elections, but Delta state is not one of the battle grounds the party should lose sleep over.  The PDP in 2011 won four fewer governorships (23 of 36) than after the 2007 elections and though its share of the total

seats in state Houses of Assembly dropped to about 64 per cent from about 70 per cent in 2007 (620 of 963 seats), but then, it has also since then reaped some political benefits  by regaining the governorship offices in some states such as Ekiti, in recent elections.

President Jonathan’s 58.89 per cent of the popular vote in 2011 was very much below Yar’Adua’s nearly 70 per cent of four years earlier. Yet…yet, that should not warrant the threats, empty, terribly hollow ones really, which Urhobo leaders have been scattering in newspaper pronouncements since it became obvious that Senator Arthur Ifeanyi Okowa was the popular choice of delegates at the PDP gubernatorial primaries in Asaba, early December. The threats gained in virulence and intensity and after his overwhelming victory became a fact of life, as the Urhobo Progress Union (UPU) led the attack. 

This misplaced attack is unfortunate for several reasons. The most obvious reason is that their much bandied voter strength is nothing but a lie, a damned lie. This could have been excusable if some sundry faceless commentators have been bandying fake figures about, but when UPU leaders and national newspapers joined in claiming that Urhoboland accounts for more than 60 per cent of the votes, trouble is afoot. Or cold deception, bare lies, really.

So why should President Goodluck Jonathan and PDP’s governorship flag-bearer in Delta state, Senator Okowa not lose much sleep over the threat that the Urhobo would vote against the PDP if an Urhobo is not imposed on the party as its candidate, despite the fact that the same UPU screened Uhrobo candidates, chose back contestant David Edebvie, who emerged a distant second to Okowa? The reason is obviously this; that Delta is strongly pro-PDP such that PDP garnered 98 per cent of the state’s votes in 2011 presidential election. Nothing has happened since then to change this equation.  That the UPU could embrace this call is worrisome in that the call itself is obnoxious; it is asking that a democratically elected candidate to fly the PDP flag be dropped just because he is not an Urhobo, and another, an Urhobo, who did not win the primary, be made the flag-bearer through the back door. Such base and mischievous request should have no place in the new Nigeria that is emerging, where every vote should count. Assuming the PDP harkens to UPU’s call, what would happen if the anointed Urhobo candidate loses the election to a non-Urhobo? Would the UPU also petition the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to award their son or daughter unmerited electoral victory or it would grow angry?

“Very often, the Urhobo have used this lie to garnish their argument; “On the basis of demography and electoral value, everyone knows the Urhobo control over 60 per cent of the voting strength in Delta State”.  The quotation came from an otherwise respected national daily, The Nation. It has also been repeated in the Vanguard countless times.

The facts and figures of the 26th April 2011 Governorship Election of Delta State show these salient facts; 

The population of Delta State based on the 2006 census is 4,112,445.

The population of the three senatorial districts are as follows: Delta North- 1,236,840 (30.1%); Delta Central- 1,570,858 (38.2%); and Delta South- 1,304,747 (31.7%). So, if Urhoboland does not control 60 per cent of the population of the state, how should it, all things being equal, produce 0ver 60 per cent of the votes?

INEC registered number of voters in each senatorial district are: Delta North- 641,125 (30.5%); Delta Central- 827,338 (39.4%); and Delta South- 630,911 (30.1%).

So, here again, the question is germane: if the Delta Central Senatorial District which comprises Urhoboland does not have up to 60 per cent of the registered voters, how would it produce 60 per cent of the votes all things remaining equal?

The spread of total votes cast are as follows: Delta North- 237,460 (22.5%); Delta Central- 396,729 (37.7%); and Delta South- 417,040 (39.8%).

Now, the number of votes cast has been argued to be in total variance with the proportion of registered voters in each senatorial district. But that is another discussion for another day. What that means is that the Delta North people have to remain vigilant that all the votes case in the District counts. But even the seemingly skewered numbers show any day, a collaboration between Delta North and Delta South, as is being planned now, will drown out Urhobo votes any day.

Actually, what has cast doubts over the figures is this; the turnout for the governorship election, which is the number of actual votes cast as a percentage of registered voters in each of the senatorial districts, which is as follows: Delta North- 37%; Delta Central- 48.0%; and Delta South- 66.1%. But even if there was a reason for such low turn-out of voters in 2011, that reason will evaporate in 2015 as Delta North will have a cock in the fight – Senator Okowa.

Taking Oshimili South LGA, which has Asaba as the major town and doubles as the State capital, would logically have a high voters turn out. The analysis of the INEC released results, Oshimili South (the seat of government) had 24.2% voters turn out, the lowest in the State, with DPP scoring higher votes than PDP (Great Ogboru – 12,471 and Emmanuel Uduaghan – 10,665). The point here is that with a high voter-turnout, the votes would be higher in Delta North.

There is another reason why both President Jonathan and Senator Okowa should not be bothered by the UPU threat; by issuing such threats, the UPU has abandoned its traditional role for politics. And from the result of the Delta PDP primaries which it attempted to decide by asking the Urhobo to vote for a particular candidate, it failed woefully. Okowa won the votes from delegates from all parts of the state. So, if that happened in a small contest, it would happen in a greater version in a bigger contest.

This happened because, for taking a brazen position during the last PDP primaries in Delta State, the UPU not only abandoned its real role but opened itself to public odium and ridicule. Actually, this is a betrayal of all Urhobo sons and daughters whose dignity the UPU trampled into the mud instead of protecting it. Now instead of the UPU leaders taking responsibilities for the fall out of their inappropriate actions, they have turned around to start seeking for saboteurs where none may exist.

So the first mistake that the UPU made is in its much advertised support for Chief David Edebrie as its anointed candidate in the PDP primaries of December 8th in Asaba. Its attempt to influence the outcome of that political exercise should have been done discretely and not as brazenly as the UPU leaders went about it in newspaper adverts and public pronouncements.

The first effect of UPU’s open advisement of a candidate Edebrie for the PDP is that the organization totally disowned all sons and daughters in the other parties, or does it mean that an Urhobo son such as chief Great Ogboru who is the Labour  Party candidate or Chief O’tega Emerhor who is in APC are no longer bonifide Urhobo people?  So, how does the UPU hope to punish the PDP when Urhobo PDP card carriers have their political interests to protect?

Most of all, threatening President Jonathan that the Urhobo votes will go to the opposition party is to tell him that he made a mistake in appointing an Urhobo son, Dr. Andrew Oru, as Minister of Niger Delta, and that he should not repeat such a costly mistake – when PDP triumphs again in Delta state – without Urhobo votes.

Most of all, in 2011, an Urboho son, Chief Great Ogboru contested to be governor of Delta state. His opponent, Dr. Emmanuel Uduaghan, is an Itsekiri. The Urhobo, smarting that a non-Urhobo was about to succeed an Urhobo, Chief James Onanefe Ibori as governor, supported Ogboru. The result was plainly this:

Delta State

Total Votes		1,051,229
	Candidate (Party)					Number of Votes	% of Votes
	Emmanuel Uduaghan (PDP)					525,793	51.69%
	Great Ogboru (DPP)					433,834	42.65%
	Ovie Omo-Agege (ACN)					15,526	1.53%
	Afro Biukeme (MPPP)					8,004	0.79%
	Peter Osalor (ACCORD)					7,908	0.78%
	George Emakpo Oyefia (ANPP)					7,893	0.78%
	17 Others					18,276	1.80%
Invalid/Blank			33,995 votes
Total Valid			1,017,234 Votes

Now, please understand that even non-Urhobo people must have also voted for Ogboru, after all, he even defeated Uduaghan in Asaba. Come 2015, two prominent Urhobo people will be in the race in opposition to Dr. Okowa – Ogboru of the Labour Party and APC’s O'tega Emerhor. This time, Asaba and the entire Delta North will have no reason to vote for Ogboru.

In the gubernatorial election, Okowa, a grass roots man may actually trounce the two Urhobo contenders in Urhoboland, as many have speculated that he has the support of Ibori’s formidable political group. What is certain though is that Ogboru and Emerhor will split whatever part of Urhobo votes that does not accrue to Okowa, and both will be trounced by Okowa by wide a margin. This is because no non-political but a purely socio-cultural group retains the power to dictate how people should vote. Beyond all else, the Urhobo people do not control 60 per cent of the votes in Delta state. Fortunately for Delta, the three Senatorial Districts are about equally matched – in population. The differences are in trivial single digits!

Most of all, it was not even the Urhobo votes that made Urhobo sons governors of Delta state. For instance, the Urhobo voted overwhelmingly for Ibori’s opponent  in 1999, Kraggar, while Delta North voted for Ibori and PDP all through. After Ibori, the Urhobo stood against Uduaghan and still could not decide the election, perhaps the UPU is well aware of these facts and figures and have now embraced bare-faced lies about a phantom 60 per cent voting power to hoodwink the people and obtain by tricks, concessions from both President Jonathan and Senator Okowa, This will only make the UPU lose respect, as it is now doing, among the traditional rulers in Urhoboland as at least 10 of such are already displeased with the alliance the UPU formed with the Olu of Warri in the attempt to fructify Dr. Uduaghan’s plan of making David Edevbie victorious in the December 8^th PDP primary in Asaba. Ample Urhobo votes were cast in support of Okowa that day as though to tell the UPU that it had over stepped its bounds. The open rebellion may have even started as this attests:  A former member of the of House of Representatives, Mr. John Edijala, in the December 17 edition of the Vanguard newspaper, called on the Chief Joe Omene-led leadership of Urhobo Progress Union, UPU, to apologise to Urhobo people and resign.