Delta 2023: Omo-Agege says probing Okowa, PDP when elected would be a distraction

• vows his government will not be distracted by looking back at PDP’s misgovernment

Deputy president of the Senate and governorship candidate of the All Progressives Congress in Delta State, Senator Ovie Omo-Agege, has said that his government will not seek vendetta against Governor Ifeanyi Okowa and the governing Peoples Democratic Party if elected to office in 2023.

On Thursday, Omo-Agege stated this in Patani, the first stop on his campaign train to the Delta South senatorial district. The campaign also touched down at Agoloma and Uduophori communities, all in Patani Local Government Area.

He said although it is evident that there is nothing on the ground to justify the over N3.5 trillion in receipts that had flowed into Delta State in the past seven and a half years, he would not be distracted by looking back. Instead, he said, he would push forward with the task ahead and ensure that all developmental gaps created by the Okowa-led PDP were filled for the state to move forward.

Omo-Agege lamented the poor infrastructural conditions in Patani, which he said have remained the same, 24 years after Raymos Guanah made his mark as the council chairman. He said the huge allocations that had been received by Governor Okowa since 2015 on behalf of the local government area in terms of FAAC, 13 per cent oil derivation, and 50 per cent of 13 per cent oil derivation had all been misappropriated.

In the face of allegations that Okowa has interests in a newly licenced bank, he charged the governor to hand over the N235 billion recently paid to the state as 13 percent derivation arrears and not salt it away in the bank, in the event that the allegations were true.

“My government will not seek vendetta against Governor Okowa and his PDP; we will not be distracted by looking back at their misgovernance but will hit the ground running to develop Delta State. He should however, hand over the balance of N235 billion with him.”

Omo-Agege said the riverine communities contribute so much to the economies of Nigeria and Delta State, but there is nothing on the ground to show for it, noting that the “prosperity for all” mantra of the Okowa administration was a sham.

“Look at the Ijaw nation; there is not one tertiary institution. Not even when Okowa established three universities in one day without the input of the Speaker of the Delta State House of Assembly, Rt Hon Sheriff Oborevwori, who is also a victim of Okowa’s selfishness.

“In continuation of his selfishness and desire to perpetually impoverish the citizens of Delta State, Governor Okowa has projected the Speaker, Oborevwori, as his decoy for a third term. We are here to urge the Ijaw people to reject Okowa’s third-term bid and his surrogate, Sheriff Oborevwori,” said Omo-Agege.

He promised economic emancipation for women and youths of Ijaw nation, and to expand frontiers of growth and development when elected governor of Delta State.

In his welcome address, Mr Julius Oruma, the chairman of the APC in the local government area, described Senator Omo-Agege as a God-sent to deliver the people of Patani and the entire Ijawland from PDP-imposed poverty and hardship, and as a result, the people of Patani have resolved to vote for the APC “because the PDP government does not care about us.”

A chieftain of the APC in Patani, Dr Chris Ekiyor, warned his kinsmen that if they did not push the PDP away with their votes, “your children will serve their children, but I see a people with the radical capacity to do the needful.”

Earlier, Omo-Agege had visited the Pere of Kabowei kingdom, HRH, Shedrach Erebulu Aduo III, who gave his blessings for Omo-Agege’s governorship bid and encouraged him to carry on with his campaign in the kingdom.