2015 Poll: Rigging Will Be Resisted, says Oshiomhole

Governor Adams Oshiomhole of Edo State, last week marked his 6th anniversary in office. In this interview with ADEMOLA ADEGBAMIGBE, editor and IDOWU OGUNLEYE, photo editor who snapped the shots, the Governor spoke on his labour activisim days, his road to the governorship seat, his achievements in office and the state of the nation Do you entertain fears about 2015, because some people are saying by that time, Nigeria will cease to exist because of this insecurity matter and plans to rig election? Well, there is room for fear, but I cannot be detained by fear. And like I said today, I have personally conquered fear; I can’t be afraid. There is nothing else to live for because coming from my background to live up to my age, I have already crossed the Nigerian average age of 48. But you see, there is no question. When the President says Edo will fall to PDP, Rivers will fall to PDP, is it on account of PDP’s performance in this state? The threat is clear that they intend to rig, but they cannot govern with a stolen mandate. That would be absolutely impossible. Some of us were in the trenches, we fought military governments, we gave military governments ultimatum––not on wages––on political issues. We marched on the streets of Abuja, we demanded for the release of Abiola, we fought on the streets of Lagos, we resisted tear gas. So I cannot be intimidated by anyone, not at this point, because really, it’s better to die on your feet in a cause you believe in than to be wasted on your knees because you lack the courage to rise and be counted. My advice to the federal government is that they should forget any attempt to rig; let the vote count. If the people want anybody to continue, let him continue. If the people want anybody to go, he has to go. That is the promise of democracy. The country is bigger than any of its citizens and I think for any man who is a parent, like any one of us, he must worry about the future of his children. There is no question that the language of PDP is that whether you people like it or not, we are going to rig. And we have seen the way they are managing the way they are going to rig, even within the PDP. When you elect delegates today, and then the senators say they were handpicked by the governors, it means that even though the primaries have not yet been conducted they have already known how the delegates are going to vote because of the person who appointed them. Are delegates supposed to be appointed? And when you have shown that you can harass and you go on strike for two days, then you are called––as we read in papers––that something will be done to give you automatic tickets. [caption id="attachment_14798" align="aligncenter" width="300"] •Governor Adams Oshiomhole[/caption] I read stories about why automatic tickets have attractions; in order to retain experienced senators. Does that not suggest that there is somebody in PDP who is saying that once we have given you ticket, we are also guaranteeing you; as you have automatic tickets, so you’ll have automatic victory? For PDP senators to have automatic victory in a popular election, there is no better statement than the fact the they intend to rig, because some of those senators can’t win their wards. You know it, I know it, they know it. How can every governor be sure of being the next senator if he has not foreseen how he is going to rig election? Why are primaries so important? Is it on account of their performance? What is the performance? Today, federal budget is 85 per cent, 90 per cent recurrent. The other 10 per cent is borrowed, which means 100 per cent of their direct earning goes to recurrent expenditure. They are servicing loans with more than N1 trillion. So the federal government is actually bankrupt. So what is the performance that you’re going to use in order to guarantee that people will return you to office if you do not intend to rig? There is no question. But the fact that people plan to rig doesn’t mean they will succeed in the rigging. Half of the job is done when you are aware that people are planning to break into your house. It will then be up to you to go and sleep and start snoring, leaving your doors and your windows open. But if you know that people are coming then you get ready. And people like us, we are products of struggle. And I think APC understands the language very clear. It is clear to me too. People have been speculating about your political future. Some say vice-presidential ambition and others. Please we want you to talk on it There were people who wanted me to contest for the president, and not for the first time. You know, in 2007 many eminent Nigerians, not to talk of many anonymous Nigerians who said, ‘Comrade, contest for the presidency of Nigeria because after all, without the instrument of cohesion, history will record it in my favour along with my comrades, that we are the only ones in history who, without owning television stations or newspapers, through the power of our message and the fact that the message connects and addresses the critical concerns of the masses, we were able to shut down the economy for one week. Nigerians in the North, in the East, in the South and in the West, Moslems, Christians, including those who are Boko Haram members now, they were in Nigeria, they were obeying my orders, staying at home, because we made the case for everyone. We made the case for business, we made the case for the poor, we made the case for the unemployed, we even spoke for the media. We spoke for NBA. When they shot and killed an NBA chairman in Anambra State, we carried coffin to the Villa and carried coffin to the police headquarters, asking that they must produce the killers, with Mbadinuju as governor of Anambra state. We fought for everyone, and so there is no village you go to in Nigeria where I am not known. So people thought that with such pedigree I should go for the presidency but I said No. First, I didn’t become NLC president overnight. I started as a branch secretary at Arewa Textiles. Unfortunately, it has closed now because of incoherent federal government industrial policies over the years. Then I became the general secretary of the Textile Workers Union, then I became the deputy president of the NLC, before becoming the president. I had known that I didn’t have to become NLC president from day one, so I was convinced that going to my own state, and really, it could have been easier for me to contest elections in Kaduna than in Edo because I have lived in Kaduna from the age of 16. I met my wife in Kaduna, had all my children in Kaduna. The first house I built, which I call my family house, is in Kaduna, and so it would have been easier to contest election there. But some of our laws speak about state of origin and so on. So I had to come back to Edo State, and I said even the honour of being trusted with the leadership of a state, for me, it is huge, and so the question of anyone being too big to be a governor, for me, I thought that one was something I couldn’t comprehend. And so I insisted. I remember very well that when I insisted, Gani Fawehinmi, one of the most consistent human rights activists Nigeria has ever produced, issued a statement saying that, ‘Here is Adams, he is like a lion who has chosen to behave like a Liliputian’, and that it would be easier for me to win the presidency of Nigeria than the governorship of Edo State, given the concentration of very vicious godfathers in Edo State. Those were his statements. But I went to Gani and explained to him why it was necessary that I went for the governorship rather than presidency first, because I ended my stewardship at NLC on the 18th of February, 2007. On the 14th of April, less than two months later, the election was to take place. How can anybody win the presidency of Nigeria under two months? On which political platform? The conservatives would not allow me as their candidate. So it means I was going to have a new party, and I said no, that would not be a realistic thing to do. And therefore, I would rather go to Edo and start and make a mark. [caption id="attachment_14799" align="aligncenter" width="300"] •Governor Oshiomhole[/caption] So I came here and I think I was right. Whenever I look back, I am satisfied that I made a difference, because I told Gani that even as a local government chairman you can distinguish yourself. You don’t have to be president to make a statement. So that is that. And as for this year, there was of course renewed pressure that I should contest. In fact, in 2011 there were suggestions that I should run on the platform of ACN as vice-president and I declined. This year, many people said I should contest as president, I reflected on it and I said No. There is no enough time to give you the reasons that I said so, but not because I have any doubt that I have the capacity. What Nigeria needs is a courageous leader. We need a courageous leader, we need a leader that can think and have the liver to make decisions and stand by them; one that sees beyond the accident of his birth place, one that sees the country as one constituency, one that will downplay religion and play up issues the way we did in NLC. Like Shagari’s son told me, he said, ‘Comrade, when you are announcing on television about action, nobody cares, nobody wants to know where you are from. They just look at the quality of the message and how it relates to them.’ That is the kind of leadership that Nigeria needs; one that will discuss education, one that will discuss agriculture, pure rhetoric, one that will talk about reducing Nigeria to pure production, not importation; one that will insist that we refine all our petroleum products, not importing petroleum, not importing kerosene and losing hundreds of billions of naira every year. It requires courage, it requires commitment. Courage to deal with the big boys, and courage to deal with the small boys. I think even in Edo we have shown that. We’ve pulled down the houses of big people as much as we have done the houses of small people. So when I said am not contesting, it is not out of self doubt. One has to look at a whole gamut of issues and ask oneself the question: Will my candidature at this point help the process? I am convinced that I should rather lend support. So once I am not contesting for presidency, I do not know of any system where people contest for vice-president. When a candidate emerges, the candidate decides who he wants to run with. In my place, when a young man is not married, you don’t ask him which kind of children he would want to have. First is to have a wife. When you have a wife, the issue of whether it’s a baby boy or a baby girl will come in. When my party does not yet have a presidential candidate and I am not a contestant for presidency, I cannot begin to think about being vice-president or nothing. But like I said to people, a small happy fish in a big pool is to be preferred than a frustrated shark in shallow waters, unable to swim, and eventually will die of hunger. So when you look at the challenge facing Nigeria, individual interest should be downplayed so that national survival takes the appropriate front burner. Because I have children and to guarantee their future, Nigeria must work. I commit myself to that work and I am sure you should do the same... Congratulations on your 6th anniversary. We were all at the Ogbe Stadium during the rally. In retrospect, you really worked hard to become governor. What were your expectations before you came to power, the problems you faced before you assumed office and how you solved them? Well, thank you very much. But let me first congratulate your group on its consistency, even at this hour of temptation. We are beginning to separate the boys from the girls and the men from the women. And for all those who have the voice from the side of the Nigerian people without minding whose ox is gored, I think you deserve to be commended. But having said that, I came from the background of struggle, and I spent all my life for advocacy, mass mobilisation, resisting oppression, whether by people within the economic power or political power. So, my coming to government was, if you like, a continuation of a tradition which is based on looking at what is good for the people and devoting one’s time, energy and intellect to struggle for it. So, to come to Edo State to seek the office of governor, my intention was clear: that having spent all my life agitating against bad government, making recommendations on variety of policy issues, trying to be the voice of the voiceless and, as Imodu taught us, being ready to bite the fire so that the people can have cold water to drink, it was time to really find out what is in there that people who are ordinary and seemingly good people, once they get to government seem to forget completely. They begin to pursue policies that are completely a negation of all that they seem to have stood for. Now, coming to Edo State therefore was something that I was anxious about. [caption id="attachment_14797" align="aligncenter" width="300"] •Gov Adams Oshiomhole[/caption] The second is the fact that Edo had been controlled by three political families which I usually referred to as the godfathers. And since 1999, these people had ensured that the votes of our people didn’t count, and they managed to instil fear in the mind of the average Edo electorate. And everybody who wanted a political space had to go and bow before these unaccountable godfathers, and if they smiled at you, you were in, if they frowned, you were finished. And somehow, Edo people seemed to believe that there was nothing anybody could do. I knew from my union experience that that guy who employed you and during the interview, you promised to obey all rules and regulations and in your application for employment you actually signed it ‘Your obedient servant’, all you are doing was just to get the job, and you get the job, you now find out that this man is an oppressor. He takes so much away and he pays you so little. And I found that when very ordinary people have organised themselves and are determined to question their power, not only can they question it, they can harass it, they can engage it, and they can subdue that power. That is what my trade union background taught me and I believe that investing a fraction of that effort in politics was all that we needed to galvanise our people around an idea. The people are not like spectators in a football field where you have 22 players with a refree, two linesmen and of course a team of coaches on both sides and the rest watch. The only entry point for them in that game is either to clap or to boo, depending on who is excited or who is disappointed by the players. In politics and in democracy, the people are not just the object, the essence of governance. They are all supposed to be the drivers of the process. They shouldn’t be onlookers, they are active participants. That was why I came up with the label, ‘Let the people lead’. You know that the people say, Let’s give you the dividends of democracy,’ like, you know, your wife cooks food and is inviting you to enjoy the meal so that you can see the benefits of being married. It’s a bit more complicated than that. I think six years down the road, we have demystified the godfathers completely and we’ve run four elections and in all the elections we have had in this state, we keep on defeating the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, including defeating their leaders in their polling booths, in their wards. And for the first time, a governor won election in the 18 local government areas, scoring about 75 per cent of the total votes cast without the aid of rigging. So, first, I have accomplished my political mission. You will remember that I launched what has become like a national anthem now, One-man-one-vote. We launched it here in Benin. And that was part of my own strategy to deepen the level of awareness and to remind people that they are not powerless. In fact, power truly belong to the people. They may not know it, you may need to assist them to know it. But whether they know it or not, power belongs to them. It’s like you inherited your father’s assets, you don’t know some of it, but they belong to you, whether or not you know it. I believe we’ve made a lot of progress in that area. The second was to reverse the fortune of Edo State. Everybody is saying the state is a civil service state, there are no industries, it relies on federation account, and that is why for four, five months, salaries were not being paid, that is why erosion in Benin was beyond solution. There were all kinds of attempts to rationalise the failure of the PDP in the state for 10 consecutive years. My task therefore was to make the statement that the problem was not with the system; the problem was with the people who have imposed themselves, and because they imposed themselves they were not accountable. And once you’re not accountable, no nation has enough to meet the greed of the greedy class. But every nation has something to touch the lives of the very ordinary people. How far it can go will vary from location to location. But clearly, there are nations which do not even have natural resources, but with an imaginative leadership, they transform deserts. Look at Dubai and several other such cases. In Edo, we have been able to show that we are clearly the poorest in our geo-political zone, compared to other states and yet as things are today, I believe we’ve done more work on roads. We’ve built far more beautiful schools, including the number. It’s not just a question of building one or two schools by the road side or in the big city where people can see it. The beautiful schools you see in Benin, they are the same schools you will find in the village of the leaders of PDP. It is the same quality of schools you will find across the 192 wards in Edo State, whether these are urban-based or rural-based. And so, we have demonstrated that it is possible to touch everywhere. Number three, there has always been a tendency to refer to rural people dismissingly as if they were inferior, such that when we talk of rural roads, it means usually sub-standard roads. In fact, sometimes they just grade the roads. But I insist that rural people are not inferior to urban people. The challenge of long term sustainable development and part of the most potent strategies for poverty eradication is to connect rural communities with standard roads. And in Edo South, in Edo Central and in Edo North, we have built a number of roads. We’ve also built hospitals, health centres, and in Benin here we are building ultra modern central hospital. In Esan land, we’ve completed a very beautiful hospital and we have already equipped the hospital and we have extended electricity to several communities. So, across the length and breadth of the state, we have changed the politics of development and the narrative – from government has earmarked to government has eye-marked. Eye-mark is what I called a system in which, or a situation in which it is not about what I promised or that I intend to do; it’s about what I’ve done, six years down the road. And I think the pain of PDP today is that when I engage them on this question, when Edo people engage them on comparative evaluation of stewardship, everybody can say, in his own area this is what Oshiomhole and APC government have done in my ward. They can’t point at what PDP government did in 10 years, in the area of roads, schools, water, you name it. And for me, this is fulfilling, not because we’ve done all that we needed to do, but we have shown that the situation is not hopeless and that the state is capable of touching the lives of everyone, regardless of your location. So, for me in terms of the political sub-structure, which is important, and the core issue of development, I believe we have made a huge difference. You came from the background of labour activism; now you’re in government. How do you feel now when some people are agitating, protesting, and you are in government. How do you feel? Good! To be honest, I think that was also part of my promise––that was my campaign when I was in then Nigeria Labour Congress, NLC––that for democracy to translate to good governance, you need not just voters, not just people willing and ready to vote, you need an activist citizenry. If citizens are passive, even in the face of provocative attack by those who wield state authority, democracy will not translate to good governance. So, really, the promise of democracy is that leaders are accountable not only in terms of naira and kobo; citizens have the right to interrogate those who wield power, because the power that you exercise is not as a result of your personal endowment. It is the power of the people that have been entrusted in your care. The sovereignty belongs to the people and they, at any time, have the right to engage their leaders. So when people come to the government house, and to be honest, there is hardly any week that people don’t come here; it is either they come to complain about people who are oppressing them outside or a market woman is telling me how a driver smashed her potatoes or tomatoes. Or a driver is complaining how somebody blocked his car or collecting wrong taxes from him, or that some elderly people come to tell me how people have taken over their land which belonged to their father or that they are protesting against my own decisions, the decisions of Edo State government or some actions by government officials, whether I know about it or I don’t know about it. People feel able to come up to the gates of government house, they are not harassed, they are not attacked, they are not shot at, we don’t fire tear gas at them. Often times, I don’t send people, I go by myself to hear them out without knowing what their grievances were. For me, that in itself is part of the benefits, it is the most outstanding evidence that the people feel free. We do not want what you might call graveyard silence. When I was in the NLC, I used to try to mobilise people to Aso Rock Villa because I believe the President must listen to his people. Here, I listened? So when people come to protest, it is not negative. When people interrogate their leaders, when they speak in anger, it’s not negative. It depends on what to make out of it. However, if you think that you’re his majesty who cannot be questioned by his subjects, then the problem is yours. Therefore, I am happy when people protest. The other thing is that there is a certain level of expectation on the part of the people that The Comrade that we know, if he hears about this matter that is bothering us, we are sure that he will do something about it. And most of the times they have come here, they come here agitated, they leave clapping because I am in a position to listen and if there are issues that have to do with the government, as the governor, within the limits of the law, I have the power to make decisions that would reverse whatever pains or whatever injustices that they have seen. If on the other hand, the actions of certain powerful individuals and I’m convinced that those individuals are oppressive, of course I will use my privileges to prevail on those individuals to take it easy. The second protest is about people who have made money over the years and now, because they have become rich––I’am not going to make statement on the source of that money, whether it was legitimately made or it was stolen; however it was acquired, that is not my headache for now. But over the years, you know in this country, people believe that the way to show that they are big men is to breach the law with impunity. And so we have people who built houses precisely in a place where they knew they shouldn’t build houses? And when you ask them, they ask you: Do you know who I am? Now, in this state, we have demolished houses belonging to big people. We have removed perimeter walls and other structures that we labelled as illegal structures by reason of the fact that they offend the right of way. Even the Central Bank of Nigeria, the wall fence, we pulled it down because it offended the right of way. And so, for me, as we were doing those things, some of these big people also protested. That was my happiest moment in the sense that God has placed me in the position to subject these people who think that they are above the law to remind them that they are under the law. And where they remain stubborn, we have charged them to court, and not once, not twice we have secured conviction. We have imposed taxes on the income that people earn; where they disputed, we took them to court and we got judgment and we forced them to pay this tax, courtesy of the law. And when people like that protest, I feel fulfilled because part of my argument is that Nigeria has been reduced to almost a banana republic where to obey law is to be weak. If you’re powerful, the best evidence of power is that you breach the law, and the culture of impunity is everywhere. So, to the extent that we’ve been able to do all of those things, I feel good. So, protest is not dysfunctional at all. I have enjoyed every bit of it. Let me take you back a bit. You praised the Oba of Benin, Omon’oba Erediauwa the other time when you were giving your speech at the stadium. It is rare for him to leave his palace to visit anyone, but he visited you at your official residence. How did that come about and what does that mean to you? Well, I do not have the appropriate words to express it, but just to say that I felt extremely, extremely humbled, because we have a royal father in the person of the Omon’oba who people refer to as Omo, who everybody knows does not travel. He is not the Oba who goes to visit big people because they are celebrating birthday in order to collect some crumbs from their tables. He is not an Oba that is hungry and will go to power to ask for contracts. So he carries his royalty in a way that reminds you that in this part of the world, we have people of character, leaders that are role models. So the Oba doesn’t go out. In fact, one day I suggested buying him a car and he said, ‘No, Comrade, thank you, where is Oba going to?’ This is an Oba who could have said, ‘Comrade, I need Mercedes 600, befitting my status.’ Rather, Oba said, ‘Car? Where am I going to?’ So we have a very unique monach who all of us respect. And this is one state where the Oba’s influence transcends Benin land. Across the length and breadth of Edo State, there is not one traditional ruler that wants to contest the fact that this is their paramount traditional ruler. So, coming to the house of a very ordinary person of my own very, very humble background, even the courtesy of democracy and his own support, I have become the governor of this state, it’s like your father leaving the living room to open the door in your small room to say, ‘How are you doing my son?’ For me, it was a very humbling experience. And what was it that Oba Erediauwa said when he came? He said, ‘Comrade, I thank you for what you’re doing in the Kingdom and in the state. I understand the financial challenges of the country. May God continue to give you the means to fulfil all of these laudable projects that you have started. I will continue to remember you in my prayers. We asked God and ancestors to protect you.’ That was it. And every now and then, if Oba hears that one road is blocked, I will get a letter, ‘Comrade, I think you want to check so, so, so street.’ Although he doesn’t go out, like I read in my primary school, there was this King Darius with many eyes and many ears. And as a little kid, I was surprised: How can a man have many eyes and many ears? And then, as I read the novel, I found out what the author meant. Every king is capable of having as many eyes, according to the number of people who see and report to him. He has as many ears as much as those who hear things that are happening and they inform him. So whatever you hear, I hear and we inform him, he has heard all. Whatever you see, they see and report to him; he has seen them all. And sometimes, he therefore gets to know or see things before I get to know, which means that he has a robust traditional machinery for monitoring what is going on in the Kingdom as well as hearing what is happening in the Kingdom. So, we Edo people have so much respect for the Oba of Benin that I do not have the right words to explain to you how I felt that day when the Oba informed me that he was coming this time to pay me homage at my official residence. I will ever remain grateful to him. 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. Incidentally, the guy who decamped is from Ubiaja. We’ve done all those roads and we have industrial boreholes that we did using our heavy duty rig which we procured. The fourth place we sank borehole is at Ekpoma. I didn’t win election at Ekpoma in 2007, but we won in 2012. Before 2012, we had sunk a borehole there. It was the first place we sank a borehole. They had an overhead tank that had been there for 25 years, because they were told there can be no water in Esan land. But we put water there in Iruekpen where Professor Osunbor comes from. You know the relationship between me and Osunbor at the beginning, but today we are good friends. We have moved on; no bitterness. Life has to go on. Things have happened but we will not be detained by the past. Today I can wholeheartedly describe Osunbor as a friend. He was a friend before that unfortunate thing and we have since overcome the bitterness on both sides. But even before then, I sank a borehole in his community of Iruekpen and that is one of the arguments he canvassed when I visited him; that, at least, some of the things that he wanted to do as governor which he couldn’t do and he is happy to see me doing some of them. We built a number of schools in Iruekpen, Uromi, Ubiaja, Ewohimi, Ewato, Ugboha, Irrua. All these ones are in Esan land. In Edo South, I can’t count them. In Central, I can’t count them. In Edo North, there is no way I can count them. We have a dual carriageway now connecting Auchi to Jattu. In Akoko-Edo, we’ve done a road connecting Igarra to Dangbala, to Ososo, passing through some Uneme communities, all the way to Ososo. There is this contractor whose chairman used to be a PDP top notcher. The leadership is still broadly PDP. When he came last week to visit the place, he was shocked when he drove to Ososo and he said he didn’t believe that that road could be done. I’am talking of Setraco Construction Company. Their chairman used to be the leader of PDP in my area, and we gave them the contract. Now, that should interest you that APC government gave contact to a company who’s chairman is PDP. Just like I said in Abuja about three days ago when they were talking about due process, when you talk of competitive bidding, contracts are advertised and the best person wins, and I told them, the way to test it is to see the federal government begin to give contracts to companies that are headed by APC leaders. When they begin to do that, then you know due process is working. But when we see PDP people winning PDP contracts, it doesn’t seem to me there is due process in that. But in Edo State, I’am proud to say that most of our major contracts have been done by companies who’s leadership is dominated by PDP. It doesn’t matter to us. What we are paying for is not their party membership. We are paying for the skill, and my argument is simple: the foreigners we give contacts to, do they belong to my party? Is it because these ones are in Nigeria and I know their party affiliations? I am also convinced that every political leader should be sufficiently broadminded to recognise that those who are not with you today might be with you tomorrow. And when you see how people are adjusting politically, whether you call it decamping and so on, it reinforces my conviction that we don’t have to be bitter enemies on account of different political affiliations. So if you say everywhere, yes, everywhere. There is not one of the 192 wards where we cannot show what we’ve done. In fact when the traditional rulers of Esan land gave me the title that the Chief of Uromi gave the late (Anthony) Enahoro, the Adolor of Uromi, all the traditional rulers of Esan land, having looked at what has happened in each of their domains, they came here and said, I’m quoting them: “All of us can now boast of red roofs in our communities.” Red roofs is how they described the modern schools that we are building, both primary and secondary. And therefore they’ve agreed to give me the Adolor (reedemer of our people) of Esan land. Although I don’t accept chieftancy title really, which is why nobody addresses me as chief, that is not to say many people have not offered and conferred on me chieftancy titles. But I am basically Adams; if you like, Comrade Adams. So there is no better evidence about the fact of the spread of our programmes. You just look at the reactions of the people. I could not have won 18 over 18, all the local government areas, all the wards in Edo South, all the wards in Edo North and about 85 per cent of the wards in Edo Central. There is no way I could have won all of those without government’s presence in those communities. The other time I listened to your speech at the stadium, you mentioned in part, what you are doing about the erosion problem in the state. For the benefit of our readers and for governors who may want to copy that, I want you to expatiate Yeah, we carried out a comprehensive study of Benin City because, over the period under PDP, once it was raining, everybody would run helter-skelter in Benin because of flooding problem. And I had argued during the campaign that you can’t deal with the problem of flooding in Benin on an ad-hoc basis. And the challenge has been that in most of the roads, there is nowhere to drain the water to. And roads were built without drainage. Even though the roads were poorly constructed, that made it easier to be washed off. But even if they were well constructed without drainage, every engineer will tell you that the most potent enemy of roads is water. Once water goes under, the roads will go bad. And so, we contracted a foreign consultant to carry out a study of Benin City and its environs. We call it Benin City Waterstorm Master Plan. And after about one year, they came up with reports which established the number of basins in Benin and what we needed to do to construct primary drainage into which we can now direct secondary drainage. Without that primary drainage, which is like underground drainage, you cannot deal with the secondary drainage. The first phase is a N30 billion project. We had a very interesting debate, looking at our finances: can we afford this? But each time I watched the news in the print and electronic media, you’ll find so many communities under water during rainy season. Not only in Nigeria, but around the world. And each time I say to myself, God has been merciful, if we have two to three days of sustained downpour in Edo State, Benin will go under, and then we would not be thinking of N30 billion. We would be talking of loss of both human and property. So, we decided to deal with it. We awarded the N30 billion contract. It’s the most ambitious project we have had. In fact, the mobilisation of it, 25 per cent of N30 billion, it was about N7.5 billion. And as we speak, we’ve done about 65 per cent of the job; done and paid for. And the job is continuing. As a result, areas that were not accessible over the past 15 to 20 years, those areas are accessible now, including a place in Benin that they call Teachers’ House. You also have this place called Five Junction, which used to be flooded. After five minutes’ rain, you can’t find your way. Now, courtesy of this Master Plan, we’ve dealt with that area, constructed underground drains in the place, built a roundabout to re-order the traffic, and today, the place is easily one of the most beautiful places in Benin City. The area called Upper Lawani, for over 25 to 30 years, even Okada–motor bikes–couldn’t get there. The road had been silted up to about 1.6 metres high, and people who had homes there at the beginning had to relocate. These are middle class people. They kept raising their wall fence that, at the end of the day you couldn’t even see the buildings. But the more they raised the fences the more the road got silted up. And I remember the case of a family who woke up after a heavy downpour and found so much pool of water in front of their home and over time the road was washed off. They could not drive out their vehicles––a beautiful Toyota Camry and a Honda––and they parked their cars for about two, three years before I assumed office. The man has the Camry and the wife has the Honda. That tells you the nature of that middle class neighbourhood. Others had put their houses for sale, but nobody could access the houses. This couple was now using plank to tip-toe out of their house. The day we got there and I told them we would do the road, they were like, ‘Well, we heard that whatever you promise elsewhere, you do but this one, it remains to be seen how you will do it.’ But as we speak, that area is now restored with complete side drains all the way to the river because you don’t construct a drainage that does not flow to a particular destination. It’s either you drain to Ogba river or to Ikpoba river and into the moat. So those neighbourhoods have been reclaimed. At Ogbemudia area, about 16 roads were done. I remember in 2012 when PDP people went to see Chief Samuel Osaigbovo Ogbemudia to ask him to play more active roles in the campaign for the governorship of Edo State. Ogbemudia asked them one question. it was in the print; he asked them: “Which road did you follow to my house?” They mentioned it and he asked again, “How did you see that road?” And they said it was good. “Did you see street light on it? They said yes. Each of the 16 roads complete with street lights and drainage, some of which are two to three metres deep. And he said, if he (Ogbemudia) comes out to tell people ‘don’t vote for the governor that constructed this road’, the people would think he is mad. Even those of his own household, they would stone him because, as a military governor, he is easily the most outstanding governor that Edo has had and he did a lot for this state (then Bendel State). But then, according to his own account, as it was reported that day, he had intention that towards the end of his tenure he would do the roads in his own area of residence, so that he is not accused of not paying attention to where his own house is. But of course, he forgot that a military government does not have a tenure. He woke up one day to hear martial music, and the rest is history. And so, all those years that Ogbemudia was leader of PDP, during my election he was the returning officer to my opponent. He was one of the “PDP ruling houses in Edo State” and yet, PDP in 10 years failed to do something about his area. He told me, you can ask him, that at a point, every of his neighbour of means left or relocated, because the situation was clearly hopeless as far as they could see and people were asking him, ‘What are you still doing there?’ and he said, at old age, for him to relocate was like, you know as a military officer, you don’t run because the enemy is approaching you; you have to confront the enemy. And so, he had to remain there. Somehow, we have restored glory to that area––roads built, complete with street light, drainage and even sidewalks. It’s one of the most beautiful parts of Benin City. So, across the length and breadth of the state, we’ve made bold statements. That is why I arrogantly use the word eyemark. We can eyemark what we’ve done in six years. Let PDP eyemark what it did in 10 years before I came. Among these, which will you consider your signature project, the one you’ll remember as your best when you leave office. And how have you been handling the finances of the state, now that there is problem at the centre because of the dwindling oil revenue? I believe everything we’ve done is important for those who are affected. For example, as you land at the airport in Benin, the first road you see is six lanes. When I arrived here six years ago, that road was like one little Oni and Sons––you are probably too young to know what Oni and Sons roads are––bush path. They were always like that: narrow roads with potholes here and there. We had to scrap it completely and reconstruct solid six lanes. A future government can only expand it if possible. But that is a road that will stay forever, and whenever people land in Benin, they will remember. Across the city, like I said today, there was no one street in this city, in this state, in which you had side walks. Even traffic lights are new. There was not one traffic light. But today, six-lane roads are common in many parts of Benin City and street lights are everywhere. On the way to Ugbowo, there used to be a very chaotic situation where you could spend two hours trying to commute between Ovorhamwen Square and University of Benin. Even the federal government’s dual carriageway had failed completely. Well, they have resurfaced the dual carriageway now but even at that, it did nothing about the erosion and flooding. And without controlling flood, no road will last. They left it like that. I remember following Chief Lucky Igbinedion as governor of this state and myself as President of Nigeria Labour Congress then. Lucky invited me to follow him to see the then minister of works, this guy from Lagos (Ogunlewe) who was saying ‘We are going to take over Lagos’ but at the end, they took him over. He pleaded with Ogunlewe to do something about the flooding around the traditional grounds and around the area they call Tom Line. Once it rained there for five minutes, if you found yourself there you had better run for your life because the flood could sweep you away. And I remember an SSS man who told me he was nearly drowned there. Louis Odion told me his own experience inside his SUV there. The water got into the car and covered it up to the steering wheel. Thanks to his height. If it was like me, he woulod have gone. That’s the way it was. Now, as we speak, the federal government did nothing about it. They merely resurfaced the old dual carriageway. We had to reconstruct the drainage, expand and deepen it, so that the water can flow. We also decided to build two or four lanes in addition to the old dual carriageway. So, effectively on that road, we now have eight lanes if you include the provision for parking: the old federal government dual carriageway plus two additional lanes on each side of the road, and we are mounting street lights on it. Everything being equal, we hope that by January or so, we should be done with the street lights and that will become one of the most beautiful roads in this city. Again, I believe that’s a landmark. But it’s not only roads. The Central Hospital was built in 1903. So you can imagine how old it is––with asbestos roofing and a lot of the asbestos have broken; the floors, you have potholes inside the hospital walls, windows are gone, ceiling gone and over the years they were just patching it. My first vist there, I was shocked that we had a place like that in the heart of the city and I decided there and then that we had to build an ultra-modern hospital. In the brochure that you saw, you will see the hospital under construction. And even as we speak today, people are working there. The first part of it will be ready latest December or January. If you see it, you’d think it’s an hotel; but that is a hospital. It is meant to be as attractive as any hospital anywhere in the world, because my policy is, People say we are third world but we are not third world. When God created us, He didn’t create us as third world, He created us as standard human beings and gave us the best that he had in our soil, he gave us the intelect to think and the energy. There is nothing that we lack to become first world, except leadership. And so for me, I think big. I might be small in frame but I think very big. And whenever I’m doing anything, I’m like: What is the state of technology today? That’s what informed that design. If you look at it, there will be no hospital in West Africa, perhaps anywhere in Africa, that will look like thisAnd it is something that I believe, not that I want anybody to remember me for it, but it will be difficult for you to look at the hospital and not remember the person who headed the government that built it. We are also building a university that will be run on Public Private Partnership basis. What I’m trying to do is that, you know, over the years, government built and run universities. We charge politically convenient fees. Politically convenient because, this is the only country where both the rich and the poor are subsidised. There is no serious country that practises such policy, where the son and daughter of a senator would be attending a Nigerian university and the school fees are subsidised. Nowhere else that would happen. This is the only country where the son of the man who says he is a billionaire, who buys BMW cars for his sons and daughters to go to university and he pays N300,000 school fees, side by side with the son of a peasant farmer. This is the only country where a governor’s son or daughter goes to a university and is paying N400,000, exactly the fees that the son of a peasant tomato farmer or woman who sells akara would pay. In every other part of the world, you subsidise those who need subsidy. You don’t subsidise everyone. And when you take into account that the rich hardly pay correct taxes in this country, that compounds the problem. The amount of time I need to deal with this, I don’t have it. But I have seen a lot of our people, Edo people, in government, Edo people in business, traditional rulers, children of professors, children of middle class people, those who can afford, they send their children abroad––Europe, America. Those who are not so endowed, the lower middle class, they send their children to Ghana. So we are building a university on the basis of PPP, where government and private people who are interested in quality university education, who have passion for education, can co-finance so that we can have a world class university that the children of the rich can look forward to, better than what they will find in Ghana. On the other hand, the door is not shut to children of my own backgroun, children of the poor, because the university will collect the fees they need to collect from those who want quality education and we can provide subsidy for children of the poor who are gifted and who have what it takes to pursue a degree programme, so that you will provide for the needs of the poor irrespective of the economic circumstances of their parents. But on the other hand, you’re not going to subside education of those who drive BMW cars to school. I want to be able to put that in place as a model that can be copied, because today we have a lot of private universities but they are basically driven by profit motive, which is why a lot of them do not have enough academic staff and often times they rely on retired professors who go there to teach on part time basis; they lower entry requirements in order to raise the money they need to meet their running cost as well as make substantial profit. I want to move away from that and give the Edo people a qualitative alternative such that they will not be drawing from government fund, but government has made the initial investment which is enough to cushion and to provide the basis for some of the children to be admitted even if they can’t afford the fees. So if you look at the quality of the university, you’ll now ask at yourself: Should I go to Ghana’s mushroom university? And for the rich ones, do you need to pay N8 million a year, which is about $35,000 for a small university in U.S.? You pay a fraction of that, you get the same quality here, plus the fact that whether you like it or not, having your child far away could create its own challenges. There are a lot of Nigerians who send their children who are too young overseas and they get exposed to western values and only few of them are able to make it because the environment there treats the child as an adult. If you decide to spend all your night watching pornographic sites while you are glued to your computer, it’s your headache. But here, we still have a little bit of control even though we are fast losing grip because some parents are not paying enough attention to their children. That is something that is dear to my heart. I pray that we are able to make what I want to call irreversible progress in the building of that university and of another teaching hospital, so that our people can have access. It’s a shame that we go to Europe to seek attention for malaria and typhoid fever when we can deal with it effectively here. So those are things I’d like to be able to do. There is still the question of the finances... You made a point about the finances. But one point you made which I’m not sure I want to agree with is the declining of oil prices. I think the problem Nigeria has faced is not the declining oil prices. Rather, it’s escalating oil theft. In the face of a helpless state, I mean, when you’re told that 700,000 barrels of crude are stollen everyday; 700, 000 barrels cannot be taken away in drums, it can’t be taken away by the so-called illegal refiners who buy small, small drums. Those are big-time business people who act in collaboration with state officials and security officials. You know, to position big ships on our waters, using smaller shuttles to take crude and feed them into the ships and carry them away. Some of those ships are on our waters for a couple of days. I don’t want to believe that we are as helpless as we think. And so we have been losing what we are told officially is as much as 40 per cent of our crude to thieves. So if you are already losing that money, over the past two years, the federal government has never funded the JAC account in full; never! It is either they tell you that because of oil theft we cannot get it in full. In fact, after the last subsidy withdrawal, the revenue accruing to states dropped; this time, not by subsidy but by oil theft, or alleged oil theft, because really, I don’t know of any known face who has been convicted for oil theft. If you know any, you tell me. So if you have that volume being stolen and yet no thief has been arrested, I don’t know how we can explain it. But whatever you say, the dwindling revenue accruing to the various levels of government, including the federal government, is not so much the result of the oil prices, it’s as a result of the volume of alleged oil theft. And talking of things I will want to be remembered for, we launched the One-man-one-vote campaign and we have since realised it. Votes are counting everywhere. If votes are not counting, there is no way ordinary people like us who do not control instrument of rigging, there is no way we could win election even in a ward. So, defending the sanctity of the ballot box, I think, would be one of our most important political legacies. How have you been managing to finance the projects in the face of the dwindling revenue? Yeah, we had to look inward. Incidentally, when I assumed office exactly six years ago, oil price dropped to about $40 to $45 a barrel. That meant that from $140 a barrel as of April 2007 when I won the election and was rigged out. By the time I recovered it in the court 18 months later, the price dropped to about $48, $45. I think at a point it got low to as low as $40, and the revenue accruing to the federation account crashed. That time, there was no oil theft, at least. However, prices fell so bad. We had to look inward. I took the entire Exco to Lagos, and we (Fashola and I invited Asiwaju Bola Tinubu) and I said: ‘Look, there’s no shame in copying what works. Nigerians like to go to see what’s happening in US, what’s happening in Britain. Within this country, there are islands of success that we can see. Lagos is one.’ Asiwaju devoted considerable energy to reinvent the concept of tax payer, and I knew that everybody battled him––business communities, landlords, tenants. Everybody battled him. Everybody wanted a Lagos that works, but nobody was going to pay for it. But he as an accountant and having been a fighter, he started that fight, and today, it is history. Lagos has moved from about N200 million to N400mn a year in tax revenue. I remember my first encounter with Asiwaju as governor and myself as NLC president. He brought out his book, he said: ‘Comrade, my local revenue is N600 million; my Abuja account N3 billion, total N3.6 billion. My wage bill is N4 billion, how do you want me to pay? And you want me to pay the new minimum wage.’ And I said, ‘That is your headache.’ But when I looked at the books, if I allowed the evidence of the books to persuade my opinion, I would have had to tell my people: ‘Sorry o, the minimum wage was not realistic.’ But it is a law, and it is not my business to help him to explain. So I just told him, ‘You know what, your excellency? My business as workers’ representative is to ensure that the workers work and once they work, it’s your business to look for the money to pay them. I cannot carry my headache and also carry your headache, just like you don’t want to know how we manage to get to work, how we pass through this traffic hold-up in Lagos. Do you know? Whether we ate or not before coming to work is not your business but if we don’t come, we are fired. So when we manage to come, you have to look for money to pay. From that seemingly hopeless situation, they have grown the IGR to what it has become today; so much that when the Lagos local government allocation was withheld by the federal government, the Tinubu administration was able to run Lagos State and support the local governments for a period of almost 18 months. You remember that? People have forgotten now before Yar A’dua restored it. Edo was the second APC state, after Lagos, then ACN. So, I said to my colleagues, when you have a big brother that is working, we don’t need to go to UK for tutorials on how to deal with issues of less dependency on federation account. So I took all our Exco members to Lagos, and I invited Fashola to tell me the secret; Asiwaju, to tutor us on what he did you to get people who were not paying taxes in Lagos to begin to pay to begin to make Lagos to work again. When we came back, we had a 23-hour non-stop Exco meeting–9am to 8am–the following day, interrogating every sub-head. And so we deepened the tax thing in Edo and today tax is an issue in Edo State. If tax is not an issue in a place, then something is wrong, because in every democracy tax is an issue. You know, typically, the conservatives don’t want taxes. The progressives, the social democrats, they want taxes so that you can provide for the poor, you can provide for public good. Obama said, “I will tax the top 2 per cent, the money I will realise I will use it to fund education, to fund research and re-equip the military so that America can maintain its superpower status. Somebody must pay but it will be the top 2 per cent. The Republicans say no, no, no. Just reduce public spending, forget about the poor, take less taxes from the rich so the they can invest and create jobs. You know, this is what defines the character of a government. Today, tax is an issue in Edo. Sometime ago PDP said they were going to have tax-free in Edo, I said yes. If a man breaks your egg and he doesn’t make you an omelette, you know you’re going to stone him. So if he knows that his intention is never to give you an omelette, he may not have the audacity to touch your egg. So they will concentrate on stealing what comes from Abuja, and that robs them of any moral platform to look at the people in the face and say, pay your taxes. Today, Edo people have come to accept tax; no pain, no gains. We are able to do a couple of things now. Although our locally generated revenue is still small, but relative to where we are coming from, at least, it has increased by more than 500 per cent. But it’s hard work blocking loopholes, cutting wastages in order to find resources to work. The first year, we saved about N5 billion from our recurrent expenditure and the cost of running government house. So such revenue we used. Number two, no space for white elephants or loopy projects. I am celebrating, proudly showing the kind of hospital that we are building. There are many of my brothers who want to celebrate state-of-the-art government house, state-of-the-art presidential lodge, state-of-the-art governor’s office. In Edo, we want to celebrate state-of-the-art hospitals, state-of-the-art primary schools, state-of-the-art secondary schools, and by the special grace of God, state-of-the-art university. So it’s about getting your priorities right, and that reflects on your values. I was happy when I saw in one of the newspapers, they took a photograph of two state government houses in the South-South, and then they showed the photograph of the university, and then there was a caption: Nigeria’s governor’s houses are more beautiful than their universities. And I said, let them come and take Edo, they will find that this building–Edo government house–is more than 50 years old. Rather than building a new government house, we just carried out internal renovation. For me, it is perfect. I don’t need ultra-modern government house but I need ultra-modern primary schools, I need ultra-modern hospitals, I need ultra-modern university. For me, this is what matters. It also tells the story about the character of the party on whose platform we are running the government. It’s about the people first, the people second, and the people last. All over the world, insecurity is one of the dis-incentives to investment. You have tackled insecurity in this state; how has that paid off in terms of attracting investments to the state, both local and foreign? Well, the dollar, they say, is a coward, it doesn’t like war zone, and nobody is going to put money in a place that is not safe. Unfortunately, the apparatuses for security management are exclusively in the hands of the federal government. So there is very little a state government can do other than providing some support to the security agencies. But in terms of control, employment recruitment and training, we have no hands. That is a major weakness. So, even though governors are referred to as chief security officers of their states, sometimes we have actually been victims of insecurity. As you would have seen in a state where the commissioner of police and the governor were at each other’s throat, two security chiefs fighting, that shouldn’t have been the case. That tells you something about the contradictions in our environment. However, we were beginning to have some worrisome levels of kidnappings and other violent crimes. I must say that the security agencies in Edo State––the police, the SSS, the army, the officers and men of the 4 Brigade, all three working together––have been able to apprehend a number if kidnappers, and Ministry of Justice has been working hard and we are beginning to get convictions. Several kidnappers have been sentenced to life imprisonment over the past four, five months. As you’ll know, I also signed death warrants of condemned criminals. Of course, some people make noise about it, but my point is, there is a lot of hypocrisy in this environment. When I took oaths of office, I swore to uphold the constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, not the recommendations of the European Union, whatever that means. And so, once the Supreme Court affirms a death sentence, I’am ready to sign, because every governor must find the courage to do what is right. In fareness to the President, he had encouraged all of us to sign this death penalties. But many governors prefer extra-judicial killings rather than signing formal warrants that they can own up to. By extra-judicial killings, I mean there is no need hiding, the truth is that many notorious criminals have been quietly wasted with the knowledge and encouragement of the governors. I don’t want to talk about allegations of politically motivated killings. But when you encourage notorious criminals to be wasted quietly and you refuse to sign the death warrants of people who have been convicted by our law courts, to me that is hypocrisy. I want to uphold the law, regardless of whose ox is gored. During your electioneering campaign you promised to “make poverty history”. How far have you gone in empowering the people? You know, what government can do is to lay foundation to empower the people to fight and confront poverty within their ranks. Like I have argued somewhere, it’s not like you’re going to have a state dining table where the governor would invite everybody who is hungry to come and eat; or a huge state wardrobe where those who have no clothes could come and get something to put on, or you’re going to build several houses for all those who need roofs over their heads to pack in. It will be nice. What a state government can do to confront and eradicate poverty is to provide the enabling environment so that citizens can realise their own potentials; government has a duty to provide roads, so that when a farmer works hard on the farm and is blessed with good harvest he can have commesurate rewards for his labour by getting proper pricing in the market. When you work hard and you are blessed with good harvest, but there is no road to your community, you watch your farm produce rot away. That compounds rural poverty, leading to abject poverty. So, our rural road programme is designed to empower and enable our rural people to take full advantage of our agricultural land. We are blessed with good weather in this part of the country, we have beautiful arable land, and our people are hard working. By creating rural roads, people can now move their goods to the market and therefore get better prices for their labour in the markets. The second is that people can now locate industries and businesses in communities that were hitherto unaccessible. I’ll give you an example: Anegbete used to be a community that you could not get to. For this time of the season––it’s getting to November now––you cannot get to Anegbete unless you know how to swim. The federal government under PDP said this road is beyond even federal government resources. The people told me when PDP came there to campaign and they drew their attention to the road, they replied that the road was beyond PDP, and they didn’t even take the campaign to the villages because they couldn’t get there. They stopped at Fugar, which is the headquarters of the local government, and so they told the people that it was their fault to locate in that neighbourhood. Today, we have built the road to Anegbete, one of the most expensive roads we have constructed. As a result of that, a couple of things are happening. There is now an Anegbete indigene who has set up a huge factory, making furniture and other products out of bamboo. Because of the terrain, they have a lot of bamboo in that area. You will be amazed by the kind of products that you can make out of bamboo. That factory has been set up there and he is in partnership with South Koreans to set up that factory at Anegbete. They brought me samples and I accepted. One of them was a beautiful chair, much stronger than woods. He said, once he found out that he can now drive there, one of the major huddles was overcome. And so he has located the factory there. The only problem he has now, as he told me, is that power in that area is low, and so he is incurring huge cost in maintaining giant generators to run the factory. So, with a factory located in such a rural area providing decent, modest sustainable jobs, you are confronting poverty. Number two, Dangote, the largest African business conglomerate, has decided to take advantage of that road to locate 50,000 hectares of rice farm; and Brazilians and Americans have already been deployed. They’ve done the aerial survey–using aeroplanes–and they will soon start planting rice; producing rice so that Edo will become a net exporter of rice. This is in addition to the Vietnamese who came here two, three years ago. So when we say we will make poverty history, it’s not that we are going to carry foods cooked in governor’s kitchen and take it to Ovouramwen Square and share! We were going to create an environment that will enable people to generate economic activities that will enable them to fight poverty within their ranks. The other day, the President came to do the ground-breaking ceremony of a privately owned Azura-Edo power plant. We are partnering with this power company that has attracted about a billion dollars from Western banks, including a division of the World Bank, to fund that power project, taking advantage of the positive image Edo is beginning to attract. The President came to do the ground-breaking ceremony. That project will offer thousands of jobs when it is completed, in addition to providing power and contributing to the national grid. We have at Ologbo some Edo indigenes in the US who have come home to set up an industrial pack, using 100 per cent private sector funds, bringing back home huge foreign capitals to invest. They will be creating thousands of jobs. I could go on and on about many people who are bringing investments. So when the state creates the enabling environment, the private sector responds. Once you provide the right incentive, the right police and there is good governance, the first thing that begins to result is investment interest. And of course, Edo is easily the safest compared to the rest of the South-South, there is no question about that in every aspect. And so, when we say we are going to make poverty history, that is one of it. The second is the right investment in education. In my Union Studies, it is said that God is so merciful that for every one mouth God created, he created two hands strong enough to feed that one mouth. But for these two hands to feed the mouth, the hands must be skilled, and in the process of skilling and multi-skilling which modern economic requires, you must lay solid foundation––primary education, secondary education. You know in Nigeria we have this so-called basic, compulsory education, so called in the sense that if we have to enforce compulsory basic education, it means that for every child not in school, the parents will be heading to prison. There is a law. I don’t know how many people have been convicted but in Edo State, we have our own share of out-of-school pupils but we are the best in the South-South, according to the statistics of the Federal Ministry of Education. I think Edo is about seven per cent out of school. The state nearest to us in the South-South is 12 per cent. Some states in the South-South have as high as 20 per cent, so Edo is doing best. That means that we are equipping our people. In the last examination, Edo came third, but we ought to come first. By the time we are done with the retraining of our teachers––another reform we are carrying out in the ministry of education––we expect Edo to return to number one position. So when people have skills, then they can work and every two hands can feed one mouth. Again, it’s not as if anybody is going to bring food and give you, but we can equip you to be able to look after yourself. I think the greatest weakness we have right now, why we are not getting the kind of response we should get, is the weaknesses arising from the federal government’s mismanagement of the power sector over the past 16 years, such that as we speak, this government house is still running on generator and all the industries in Edo are still running on generators. And that entails huge, huge cost. Again, the power sector, unfortunately is still a monopoly of the federal government. And the privatisation they did, those who are given the businesses are precisely those who know next to nothing about power distribution and management. This area was won by a banker. A bank MD is the general manager. And a man who had never had a history in the sector is the husband and the chairman. So it has become a family business. The result is that they try to collect money from poor people who they have not given any light. A couple of times we have had riots. So that is the privatisation that has gone sour because it was used for patronage rather than attract fresh capital, and you heard the federal government now saying that they are going to use tax payers money, N220 billion, to support this private sector. So when government puts in N220 billion, is that still a private transaction? How much did they pay to acquire the assets, that you’re now going to give them N220 billion. Is that not a return to state ownership? Somehow, Nigerians are not asking these questions. But I am not fooled. And this is to say nothing about the fact that as we speak, everyday I receive demands from communities for transformers for extension of electricity to various communities. Why should government buy transformers with tax payers’ money for a privately owned distribution company, because the distribution company ought to have the financial muscle to procure transformers, because that is part of the distribution chain. That is the major inhibiting factor that has not enabled us to realise the full potential of our investment in infrastructure and in our war against poverty. But we’ve also abolished school fees at secondary level. So today, the Edo child goes to primary school, it’s zero fees; secondary school, zero fees; we abolished all of that, plus if you take Edo public transport, which we call Comrade Bus, and you’re in school uniform, including private schools, once you’re wearing any school uniform, to enter the bus is zero cost, both to school and from school, Monday to Friday. These are pro-poor instruments which we have put in place to address the challenge of poverty in addition to creating employment in the area of public works. We have over 10,000 Edo youths, we have just employed another 3,000 under the Neighbourhood Watch and last week we gave (employment) papers to 26,000 under what we call Grassroots Empowerment Programme. So when you add all of these together, we are talking of about 40,000 people. But this is not the long-term solution. These are intervention schemes. The long term solution is to get the power right. And like I said today, when a man fails an exam for 16 years, the most poorly managed university will say: ‘Ol’ boy, you’re now an overgrown pupil.’ In fact, one guy who decamped from PDP to join us said the reason he was leaving PDP was that when a child keeps failing, Papa go say, ‘Look, if you no fit pass, come learn work. You know what it means by come learn work? You withdraw him from school and put him under apprenticeship.