Obanikoro: PDP's Bad Boy Of South-West

By Eromosele Ebhomele - Musiliu Obanikoro is one major factor to be considered by both the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, and All Progressives Congress, APC, as the 2015 general elections draw near. If Musiliu Obanikoro, the Minister of State for Defence, were a course of study in Nigerian politics, such a course would be so interesting and fun-filled that at the end, many students could fail an examination conducted on him. Koro, as he is fondly called by his loyalists and sympathisers, remains one politician who knows how to play his game. He carries a soft look that makes him appear a gentleman; his mien at every given time is one that does not show anger easily. But he is what a true politician should be: highly unpredictable. And when he wants to tackle his detractors, he does so without looking back. To the bewilderment of many Nigerians who had followed his activities closely, Obanikoro sent a congratulatory message to Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola just few hours after he was declared winner of the governorship election in the State of Osun held on 9 August. To the junior minister, the battle had been won and lost: won by the APC and lost by the PDP, and there were some lessons to be learnt from the exercise. Of all the PDP members that congratulated Aregbesola, two stood out. One of them, Femi Fani-Kayode, a former minister and controversial figure in the eyes of many of his critics, confessed that Aregbesola won the election “convincingly”. The other person was Obanikoro. [caption id="attachment_8835" align="alignright" width="300"] Musiliu Obanikoro, Seen as PDP’s trouble maker in South-West[/caption] In a statement he personally signed, Obanikoro said Governor Aregbesola deserved the victory he got at the poll and that his re-election was a confirmation of the goodwill he enjoys among the people of his state. “I congratulate the good people of Osun State for once again re-affirming the will of democracy by their exceptional conduct during the just concluded gubernatorial elections. The people of Osun State have consolidated our hope in a democracy where violence-free elections are allowed to thrive. I enjoin all other citizens of our great country to emulate them as we prepare for another round of general elections early next year. I also wish to congratulate the winner, His Excellency, Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola, for his victory at the polls. His re-election is a confirmation of the goodwill he enjoys among the people of Osun State,” Obanikoro said. To Omisore, who he called his brother, Obanikoro said it was a good fight the PDP candidate put up during the election even though he lost the fight. “His rare display of maturity and sportsmanship throughout the period of the campaign and the election is worthy of emulation. History will be kind to him,” Obanikoro explained, while he commended the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, and “our Military and other security forces for their professional conduct which ensured a peaceful, free and fair election in Osun State”. The reaction to Obanikoro’s statement was one of shock from Nigerians. It was more surprising because, to political watchers, Obanikoro is not one to see anything good in the politics of the progressives, as the All Progressives Congress, APC, has termed itself. Recently, Obanikoro, in an interview gave a hint of what some Nigerians had argued was his mission in President Jonathan’s cabinet. “The victory party is a way of serving a notice to the APC that we are coming to take over the entire South-West. So, what we are doing across the zone is a celebration of victory in Ekiti State. We have a winning formula that we know will win Lagos, Ogun, Osun and Oyo for us. The APC has made our job very easy because of its anti-people policies. In 16 years, you cannot accumulate that kind of debt they have accumulated in few years, especially in Lagos where close to N1 trillion is hanging on the future of our state. We have seen accumulation of debts in the United States, and we saw the consequences on the economy. Some of us being aware of the danger ahead are afraid with what our governors in the South-West are doing,” he sounded. True, Obanikoro went almost under after losing the 2007 governorship election on PDP’s platform in Lagos. He became the Nigerian Ambassador to Ghana. Yet, as Nigeria’s representative in that country, he never stopped alerting listening ears of his intention to win the South-West and particularly, Lagos for his party. With the end of his tenure as ambassador, the Presidency, which had desperately gunned for Lagos since 1999, saw him as the most capable force to combat Asiwaju Bola Tinubu and wrest the state from him. Just when Koro was being considered for the ministerial job, the National Weekender wrote: “With the failure of the likes of Wahab Dosunmu, Kofoworola Bucknor-Akerele, Adeseye Ogunlewe and Olabode George to stop Tinubu’s political tsunami in the South-West, especially in Lagos, the PDP and the Presidency critically re-examined the programme and plans of Obanikoro as regards 2015 and was convinced that he is the man capable of slowing down the Lion of Bourdillon if he cannot be out-rightly stopped.” He was therefore picked as a minister to get him closer home to effectively meet the plans of his party in 2015. Quoting an undisclosed source, the National Weekender said Obanikoro’s plan to deliver Lagos State to the PDP would start with the employment of over 150,000 youths and sending another 100,000 abroad for various training programmes. This, it said, would assist in the PDP campaign aside the media organisations the party would set up to match what it believes is a grip on the media by the APC. It was therefore not a surprise to those who hold this opinion when, upon his appointment by Jonathan, Obanikoro saw the need to tackle the government of Babatunde Fashola, who had hit at the Presidency for appointing a Lagosian as a junior minister despite the importance of the state in the country. One of the first things he did was to castigate Fashola for reclaiming land at the Ilubirin end of Lagos State for the purpose of development. Ilubirin, before now, was a floating area close to the third Mainland Bridge inhabited mostly by women. The residents, mostly from the Ilaje-Ese Odo area of Ondo State, mixed freely with indigenes of Benin Republic and Togo in makeshift buildings. But when the state government decided to develop the area, it first sent the dwellers packing. It then started to sand-fill the expanse, using Julius Berger plc. That done, the state government started to erect buildings on the land, calling it the Ilubirin Foreshore Housing Estate which, it said, would have 1,254 two- and three-bedroom apartments on eight floors. Suddenly on 2 April, Governor Fashola alerted Nigerians during a celebration to mark his 2,500 days in office that the Federal Government was thwarting his efforts at completing the housing project, which is being handled by the contracting firm of Cyrou Turnkey Builders, with a time frame of 15 months. And none other person was mentioned by the governor as the Federal Government’s tool for the alleged act order than Obanikoro. According to Fashola, the minister had stormed the site of the project with soldiers. He said Obanikoro ordered that work on the site be stopped immediately. “Our respected first Federal Commissioner of Works during General Yakubu Gowon’s regime, Alhaji Femi Okunnu, had informed the state that the place belongs to Lagos and not Federal Government,” Fashola said. “I was informed that Senator Musiliu Obanikoro brought in soldiers to stop the housing project last weekend. Why is it now they lay claim to the place after we have sandfilled it?” The governor did not hide his feeling that Obanikoro was plotting trouble ahead of the 2015 general elections with such posture just weeks after attaining the ministerial position. To Fashola, such action by Obanikoro was nothing less than misuse of office and the Nigerian Army by a minister who should immediately settle down to work in a country battered by security challenges. In the governor’s opinion, the PDP did not mean well for the state and residents who should be the beneficiaries of the housing project. Obanikoro did not deny his visit to the site. In a heavily worded reaction days later, he agreed that he had visited the area of the state as a concerned indigene of Lagos who was bothered by the safety of residents of the state. He said prior to the visit, he had nursed some fears and wanted to either confirm or discard the fears. “I made an unscheduled visit to the land on the fateful day in question to take a physical assessment. Perhaps the presence of the military men attached to my convoy is what was termed ‘commando-like’ by the Lagos State government. But one would expect that the governor should know better if his intentions are genuine,” he slammed. He further dismissed the allegation that he stopped the continuation of work at the site. According to him, residents of the state could confirm that as at when the government raised the alarm, work was still ongoing at Ilubirin. “Beyond a physical inspection of the land by my team, no attempt was made to disturb workers on the site. It, therefore, was a mirage that the governor saw what he allegedly claimed to be a deployment of solders to the land and the phantom signpost proclaiming the land a Federal Government property,” he said. In his opinion, the Lagos State government had been pricked into the consciousness that it had done the wrong thing concerning the land. He disclosed that the original reclamation of the lagoon to create Ilubirin housing site was illegal, citing sections 10, 11, 12 and 13 of the Nigerian Inland Waterway Act of 1997 to back his argument. He said the government failed to get the approval of the Nigerian Inland Waterway Authority, NIWA, before embarking on the project. “Given the commencement of development on that land by the state government, it is clear who the land grabber is. My worry is on the safety and the appropriateness of the reclaimed land for mass housing. Mass housing is for middle and low-income earners who depend largely on the government to ensure and protect them against environmental hazards and natural occurrences. It is for these people that the Lagos State government plans homes for on a reclaimed lagoon land. I have spoken to experts on matters of reclaimed land and related environmental hazards in relation to this land. None of them has seen the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) for the Ilubirin development nor the protection plan against rise in water levels.” He further stressed what he described as existing allegations by researchers that the reclamation of Ilubirin was contributory to flooding in areas of Lagos Island. “In other words, a comprehensive EIA with stakeholders’ approval is sacrosanct to the development of that land. The question is, did Lagos State government get such before the commencement of the development on that land?” he queried. Apart from this, Obanikoro noted that one of his fears was confirmed. And this had to do with the project being very close to electricity cables which used to be in the middle of the water. He said, “While I recognised that it is usually difficult to enforce the legal setbacks for development around such high-tension cables in Nigeria, it was disturbing to see that the Lagos State government may be in the process of violating such setbacks,” adding that this would compromise the safety of lives and property of proposed residents of the estate when completed. Though Obanikoro received a lot of battering from the APC and other residents with sympathy for the state government, he did not budge. At least, he had made his point and added a plus to his mission. Then came the governorship election in Ekiti, for which the APC still broods but which Jonathan and the PDP have continued to celebrate. Obanikoro proved with the success of the PDP in that election that he has a back on which the President could rest his thought to win the South-West. Days before the election, the minister became a major force to reckon, with even though he is not an indigene of the state. Unable to bear such intrusion any longer, John Odigie-Oyegun, former governor of Edo State and current national chairman of the APC, shouted out to Nigerians to help call Obanikoro to order. Odigie-Oyegun said the 21 June election had been planned by the PDP and Obanikoro to favour PDP and attributed series of reasons as justification for his belief that the election would be rigged. One was the heavy militarisation of the state ahead of the election. The APC chairman listed among the unsavoury deeds by PDP, the thumb-printing of ballot papers by 11 persons who were arrested by security operatives in a building owned by Fayose’s campaign manager, and the gun attack on Fayemi and APC supporters by the police, leading to the death of one of them. Again, he fingered Obanikoro as the mastermind of the plot by the PDP to take over the state. “On Tuesday 17 June, 2014, two loaded aircraft landed at the Akure airport with undisclosed content. The presence of the Minister of State, Defence, Musliu Obanikoro who was on ground to ensure the safe delivery of the cargoes suggests official collusion and knowledge. The contents were immediately loaded into a bullion van under the watchful eyes of the Minister of State, Defence, Obanikoro,” Oyegun alleged, maintaining that “this series of developments and events are undeniable pointers to a desperate plot to rig the elections at all cost. We warn Mr. President, that election rigging in the past has always had serious consequences for the government in power and the country as a whole”. Oyegun further sounded a warning that his party would not sit and watch such brazen acts by Obanikoro and his co-travellers. He said the APC would not accept any result from Ekiti that did not flow from a transparent election. “We are not asking for any favours. We only demand a free and fair election,” he said. On Election Day, Governor Kayode Fayemi, candidate of the APC in that election, also wondered what the trio of Obanikoro, Jelili Adesiyan, the Minister of Police Affairs; and Chris Uba were doing in the state going about with armed military men. He expressed certainty that they were in his state for sinister reasons. But Obanikoro laughed their grouse off with a simple analysis. His movement could not be restricted by any group of individuals, he said, adding that his portfolio of minister in charge of the Ministry of Defence affords him the opportunity to move around the country, if only to ensure peace. In a recent reaction to the series of allegations against him, however, he said if the involvement of the military would be the best way to avoid violence during elections, then he would wholeheartedly subscribe to it. “I make bold to say that we are majorly lazy people as a country. If something works for you, what you do is to study it to the letter...It is not militarisation of the society if we come to realise that with the military participating in our security activities during the election, and we are getting improved outcomes. It makes good sense to study and invest in that. Up till now, the military are still way ahead of other agencies when it comes to enforcement of law and order in this country.” He noted that the use of the military was necessary in areas like the South-West, where inciting people against the government for simply losing election was becoming the order of the day. He accused the APC of hypocrisy, arguing that the party never wanted to taste the opposite of victory. In Ekiti, he said, there were observers from all over the world, including journalists. “Did you hear any one of them complaining of harassment, intimidation or direct engagement of police and the military in the electoral process? The cry from the APC is just propaganda.” The minister also clashed with Tinubu, national leader of the APC. Recently, the former governor of Lagos expressed worry that Obanikoro had devoted much time to politics than facing the job for which he was appointed. Tinubu wondered that despite the increasing attacks by the Boko Haram insurgents, Obanikoro had engaged in political activities. Obanikoro, not one to be silent at any point, fired back, saying Tinubu had yet to recover from the trauma of the defeat of his party in the Ekiti election. “It is unfortunate that people like Tinubu have chosen to politicise our war against the Boko Haram insurgency. To begin with, the mess we are trying to clean up was created by the opposition which had promised to make Nigeria ungovernable for this administration. If I have a political campaign anywhere in the country to participate in, I will go there. It does not in any way affect my responsibility as a Minister of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. In other advanced societies, their leaders deal with their security issues without reducing it to politics,” he blasted. Prior to the Ekiti election, Obanikoro had been fingered in the crisis that followed a bye-election in Ilaje/Ese-Odo area of Ondo State. Though Akin Orebiyi, the Ondo Resident Electoral Commissioner, later denied making such comment, he had accused Obanikoro of causing the election to remain inconclusive. At a meeting he had with stakeholders in the state, Orebiyi said Obanikoro had soiled his hands with the bye-election. Orebiyi, who accused politicians of being responsible for the crisis which took place during the election, said that election did not take place in about 59 units, with over 28,000 registered voters. “We are aware of how Obanikoro even soiled his hands obstructing the electoral process. You can quote me anywhere. You can quote me anywhere,” Orebiyi was reported to have alleged. And when PDP members at the meeting protested the allegation, the REC said: “One of our officers was almost lynched by the people because they mistook him for Obanikoro. We know what happened and you can quote me anywhere. Let the Minister of State for Defence defend himself, let him defend himself.” This allegation threw up a lot of condemnation. The Coalition of Oodua Self Determination Groups, COSEG, asked Jonathan to caution Obanikoro and Adesiyan. A statement, signed by the chairman of the group, Mr. Ifedayo Ogunlana and the Secretary, Mr. Rasaq Olokooba, said: “We, as an organisation, have noted with regrets Obanikoro’s recent actions in Lagos and most recently at the inconclusive Ilaje/Ese Odo bye-election. We are of the opinion that with Obanikoro’s meddling with electoral matters using his office as the Minister of State for Defence, Nigeria may be in for another season of inconclusive elections.” Continuing, the group said: “It was widely reported how the Minister of State for Defence allegedly turned a vandal, usurper and mastermind of the crises that dogged the Ondo electoral processes and has been fingered by the Ondo State Independent National Electoral Commission for the inconclusive elections.” This followed a commendation of Orebiyi for having the nerve to make such allegation. Back in Lagos, there is fear that Obanikoro’s ambition for 2015 would further tear the PDP in the state apart. This is considering the number and calibre of people in the race. Apart from some former aspirants in previous elections under the flagship of the party, Jimi Agbaje, a new entrant in the race, may have started his campaign through text messages to residents of the state. Political analysts believe that, apart from slugging it out with other contenders in the party, Obanikoro also has a major obstacle in Bode George, another leader of the party. In the main, Obanikoro has not shown any sign of being scared. “I am a grassroots politician,” he said sometime ago. “I have supporters and I understand the language of grassroots better than most of these elitist politicians bandying around with nothing to offer. They believe we didn’t go to school because we identify more with the commoners and they identify more with the elite. I won’t stand here and tell you that the recent array of activities and awareness in Lagos PDP is about my interest in running for the governorship of Lagos State. If I decide to run, the media will be the first port of call and I will tell you that I want to offer myself again for the office of the governor of Lagos State. So, don’t equate banners with posters.”