From Tony Osauzo, Benin
A chieftain of the All Progresives Congress (APC), and former member of the Board of Trustees (BOT), of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Hon. Charles Idahosa, yesterday, stated that Governor Godwin Obaseki was raising alarm that he and the PDP were being intimidated over the September 21 governorship election in the state because “this is the first time Obaseki will be running an election on his own.”
He said there was nothing to the alarm being raised by the governor because the state had always won election from the opposition stand different from the government at the centre, explaining that all the four previous elections held in the state right from when Comrade Adams Oshimhole became governor “have been elections held when Edo State is in opposition to the government at the centre.
“We need to remind Obaseki that he won his first election in 2026 under the APC when the PDP was in power at the centre. He won his second term election in 2020 under the PDP, when the APC was the party in power at the centre. So, what is the difference this time around?
“The truth now is that this is the first time Obaseki will be on his own. This is the first time he will be conducting an election without all the leaders that supported him in the past in his party today.
“Obaseki is only shouting of intimidation because he has no single leader in his party. Over 90 percent of the leaders that brought him to power have left him. That is what you suffer when you are a serial betrayer.
“His political woes today are self-inflicted. Obaseki is like an apprentice tailor, who because his master has taught him how to hold the scissors, decided to do freedom for himself and called himself a fashion designer”, Idahosa said.
He assured that in spite of the alarms raised by the Edo State Government and the PDP, “ this election will be free, fair and nobody will be intimidated”.
Idahosa, a former Commissioner for Information under the Lucky Igbinedion government and Special Political Adviser to Oshimhole said Governor Obaseki would not have had any headaches about the election if he had accorded all those who assisted him politically their due respect.
“But, here we have Obaseki who will leave his comfort zone and will be looking for trouble where there is none.
“During his reelection in 2020, the Resident Electoral Commissioner (REC) in Edo State was from Bayelsa, who was a governorship aspirant under APC. Is it today that he just realised that the REC in this election is a relation of Wike? “, he queried.
Idahosa, therefore, appealed to Obaseki to allow the Police to do its job of fishing out those who killed Inspector Akor Onuh on July 18, 2024, adding that it was foolhardy, given past experience “to ask the police not to prosecute those suspected and arrested in Edo State where the government can easily enter Nolli Prosequi. When the investigation is over, those arrested will be brought back. The Police must be allowed to do its job”, he stressed.
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