How are political leaders in the state handling the crisis in the Edo State House of Assembly?

There’s no crisis. Like I told you before, there is this PDP that wants to give the impression that they are above the law because they control various security agencies; otherwise, what is the crisis? Three members were suspended, they refused to obey the suspension order. The leadership of the House of Assembly, rather than use thugs to keep them away, approached the high court and showed the relevant evidence that these people have been suspended and prevailed on the court to order them to obey the suspension order; and the court granted the order. But the members would not obey the House, they would not obey the court. They went to the Federal Court of Appeal; that one is a federal court and so it it is under their control. Because they are in the federal government, therefore everything is a department of the PDP. And so the Court of Appeal heard their own agreement but ordered them to go and obey the court order which says they should stay out of the premises of the the House. But of course they would not obey. The police would also not obey.

Of course, the House of Assembly was under repairs. The speaker ordered that it should be shut down, they published the relevant notice, the relevant gazette, saying that the House would relocate temporarily to the old assembly chambers while the current one they were using would undergo renovation. This was published in line with rules of the House. And of course, they have been sitting there. These elements refused to go there, but those who know the law and who believe in the rule of law, and happily they are 15; these 15 are attending and these other people, six of them, in fact, five, because three are under suspension, the seat of one has been declared vacant in line with the provision of the constitution. So five of them left. They have chosen not to attend and of course, in a democracy, there is no force labour. We have a senator here. If he decides not to attend the red chambers, there’s nothing you can do. But the only thing is that if you absent yourself for a certain number of days, then of course, under the constitution your seat will be automatically vacant.

Now the refusal of three people to obey court order, it has gone beyond internal matters of the House, it is now about obeying or disobeying court orders; and the failure of five others to attend sittings does not translate to crisis in my view. And the best evidence we have filed is that the budget for 2015; I have since presented it publicly. It was televised, I didn’t do secret presentation. The House deliberated on it, they invited all the commissioners and ministries, departments and agencies, MDAs, to defend the provisions of the budget as it relates to their MDAs, and at the end of the day they reviewed the budget estimates, they made the necessary amendments, they passed the budget with overwhelming majority of 15 out of 21 members, since three have been suspended and one had his seat declared vacant. Effectively you have 20 and out of the 20, 15 endorsed the budget and I have signed it into law publicly, so Edo is working.

But here now we recognise that there is no forced labour in Nigeria. We cannot force you as editor of TheNEWS, to go to work if you choose not to, provided you do not insist I pay you for the job you’re not doing.

If somebody sits down in Akwa Ibom today and says he is now the editor of TheNEWS magazine, you know under freedom of expression he has the right to say so, provided he does not come to try to forcefully take over the property of TheNEWS. But if he simply says so for whatever it is worth to him, that is up to him. You know that is part of freedom of expression, including the right to be stupid. So, for me therefore, Edo is working. We recognise a couple of irritations here and there, and some had a grand design––they were working on impeaching me. Somebody was already celebrating he was going to be the acting governor and so on. They were pumping money to them. But you know I was born into struggle and I live through struggle, so I understand the language of struggle and when it is in the air, I am at my best. So we have curtailed it and we are fine.

How are you trying to build reconciliation and work with the Ize-Iyamus of the state, because in any political setting there is bound to be conflict?

There is no conflict. When Nigeria’s democracy matures, as they say, water will find its level. The name you chose to mention, I would rather not mention because I don’t think those are issues now, because in a democracy, people adjust. Birds of a feather will eventually begin to flock together. And those who are in politics of either I or nothing, once they don’t get the I, they will move on and we allow them. It doesn’t affect our personal relationship and I don’t begrudge anybody. We are fine. Actually, the party is stronger today than it was just a few months back because some of the internal contradictions arising from the fact that people who do not believe in change, who want business as usual, were there even when we insisted that Nigeria cannot be business as usual, they moved on. So there’s nothing to be reconciled. If they are happy where they are, we wish them luck and I am happy where I am and I pray they wish me luck.

We came to this state during our Guild of Editors Conference and you took us to Edo North. We saw many roads, places that had not been opened up which this government opened up. What are the states of those roads now and how evenly distributed are roads throughout the state?

In fact, I told Louis (Odion) that we will have to re-invite the editors, particularly the managing editor of The Sun (Funke Egbemode). I remember Funke tried to climb the hill, she was already tired. They were doing bush clearing then, the hill to Okpekpe. Okpekpe is the village where Grace Egbaigbe comes from, where we are now doing Okpekpe marathon race. The road has since been completed––new bridge, beautiful roads.

If you look at our brochure, you will find pictures of that road. That hill that Funke couldn’t climb that day, today it’s levelled. I’ve told Louis that we must invite some of the editors back so that we go back there. That is what we call eye-mark. Edo under the past party for 10 years, and Edo under my stewardship and APC over the past six years, those roads are now beautiful sights, all of them. One was going to Okpekpe, the other one going to Ibie, Imiegba, Imiakebu. Both have been completed, and several other places.

How evenly distributed throughout the state are they?

There is no senatorial district where we are not working. Like I mentioned today, even the road leading to Arue, it’s the home town of the leader of the PDP, Chief Anthony Anenih. We built it, we didn’t say that because he is the chairman of PDP Board of Trustees, BOT, and therefore his people should not benefit. No, because his people are Edo people. They are entitled to good governance. We’ve done that. We’ve done the road that leads to Ugboha, the village of the PA of the Chief who is today the leader of PDP in Esan land, Chief Giwa. We did the road connecting Uromi to Ugboha. And again, it’s not an issue that Giwa comes from there. We’ve done the road connecting Irrua to Igbegun, to Subenu, connecting Ubiaja to Ewohimi, Ewato, Ohodua, et cetera.