Vice President: Aide Faults Campaign Against Okowa

The Chief Press Secretary to Governor Ifeanyi Okowa of Delta State, Olisa Ifeajika has debunked what he described as a campaign against the fitness of the outgoing Delta State governor for the office of vice president as has been widely speculated.

Reacting to comments made during an Arise TV programme by an analyst in which the governor was described as provincial and not to have done much to merit the position, Ifeajika while speaking to Government House, Asaba correspondents said:

“In the last two days, the media have been awash with reports about the PDP primaries and the outcome and the things that will follow.

“I don’t know when onlookers have become serious politicians that are deciding for politicians. What we know, for those who understand politics, is that after the presidential primaries, the party leaders and the candidate will sit down to decide who the running mate will be.

“It is not done in one day or immediately after the convention; what is important is that the party selects somebody who can assist the candidate to win election and that is done before the campaigns will start.

“There is no hurry about it; they usually take time to do it and it is the prerogative of parties to do that but I am aware that one analyst or commentator, precisely one Frank Tietie, in an attempt to assess some persons that were listed as likely Vice-Presidential candidate of the PDP displayed so much malice against Okowa.

Noting the harsh analysis on his principal when the Vice President slot was mentioned, he said: “When he got to Okowa for his assessment, he said that the gôvernor could not be the Vice Presidential candidate because he had not developed Delta and that he lacked national exposure, among others.

“To become a Vice-Presidential candidate, you don’t have to have a national exposure for you to emerge. It is the prerogative of the party to pick who it thinks will win the election.

“You don’t have to be one star anywhere; the party takes time to see who will join the presidential candidate to win election and that’s what I am sure the party will do,” he said.

Ifeajika said that Jonathan and Osinbajo were relatively unknown until they were nominated to be Vice-Presidential candidates.

“There are instances that buttress this point; when former President Obasanjo nominated Alhaji Atiku Abubakar as Vice President in 1999, he was governor-elect of Adamawa. The only thing known about him was that he was a retired Customs Officer and a businessman.

“During Yar’Adua’s tenure, Dr Goodluck Jonathan was not known anywhere aside being Deputy Governor of Bayelsa and later Governor, following the impeachment of his boss. He wasn’t a national star anywhere but he won election with Yar’Adua.

“Again in 2015, Prof. Yemi Osinbajo was chosen as vice-presidential candidate to President Muhammadu Buhari. Before then, Osinbajo was known just as a Professor of Law and former Attorney-General and Commissioner for Justice in Lagos State.

“Osinbajo was not a star in the political hemisphere at that time. So for somebody to say that Okowa is not known nationally in politics is to say the least, derogatory and it shows how uninformed whoever said so is in politics.

“Okowa, for the records, was a Commissioner in Delta for eight years, Secretary to the State Government, Senator and later as Governor,” he said in affirming the outgoing governor’s fitness to be vice president of the country.

“These are enough credentials to make him known nationally. Even as a first time member in the Senate, he was Chairman Senate Committee on Health while there were ranking senators. That was evident that he was already known before coming to the Senate.

“What we have today as the National Health Act in Nigeria is a product of Governor Okowa’s effort in the health sector. He sponsored the National Health Bill, which was passed and signed into law in 2014,” he said.

“For everything, by way of credentials, somebody should have in this country, Okowa has it. He is a giant in politics, a goal-getter in everything he chooses to do and a material any day in the politics of this country.

“The said comment is not just unfortunate but malicious and hence we are responding to it.” he stated.

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