16 POLITICS | THURSDAY INTERVIEW
Sanctity of Truth
Thursday, May 15, 2014
Why we banned campaigns in C’River –Okon You have been the state chairman of Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) for the past two years. What have you achieved? Achievement? The first thing God has helped us to achieve is that the executives have been able to work together as a team in the party. We have been able to work in a cordial relationship with the leadership of the party led by Senator Liyel Imoke who is the leader of the party in the state. So, one of the biggest achievements is that we have been able to work as a team and interface with the government. The other achievement which we claim credit for is that we have been able to, more than any other state, deepen internal democracy in the party. We have been able to put structures in place from the ward to the local, to the zonal and state levels to drive the process. You will notice that we have a kind of decentralised government here. You don’t see people crowding around us. You don’t see us being the centre of activities. We have put in place all the structures. That is how democracy is supposed to work. So, we have been able to achieve that. We have also been able to put in place administrative structures. If you go round this office, you will see that we have the planning and research unit, the account, the administrative and the secretariat where you can go for records as well as other units meant for good administration. We finished the local government election and we won all 18 local government chairmen and 196 councillors hip seats in the state. More importantly, we have done gender mainstreaming such that we have four female chairmen holding some of the biggest local government areas in the state and that is Ogoja, Calabar South, Bakassi, and Abi, the home of the governor. Again, we have a lot of councillors who are female. In appointment, we have met the 35% affirmative action. We did all these with very little rancour. For me, the state is stable. So those are the kind of achievements we have had in the past years. It has been rumoured that the former state chairman was removed so that you could come in and do the bidding of the governor. Is this correct? Well, I don’t know about that. Let me correct you. I think the former chairman had finished his four-year tenure and he was to re-contest for another term. But there were consultations and stakeholders which included senators, house members and the rest sat down and reviewed the situation and felt that the party needed new hands to drive the process. Of course, God brought me into it. So, he was not removed. Now, talking about doing the bidding of the governor is a way of trying to blackmail the leader, who is the governor. If you have a leader and the chairman, they are supposed to work in unison. It’s not as if he is imposing himself on you. The president is the leader of the party nationally and the governor is the leader of the party in the state. Other governors are there. But what is happening in other states, is it happening here? I am talking about the freedom of the party to be able to take decisions. So, rather than malign a democrat who has given the party a free hand, we should appreciate him. I will continue to consult him till tomorrow. We could sit down here and take decisions and he doesn’t bother. But as a leader, we have to consult. There’s no way I can remove my relationship from him. He has been a leader and has managed the affairs of the state with utmost wisdom. Cross Riverians love him and he has been doing wonderfully well in the state. I just cannot see myself doing anything without consulting my leader, the
Elder John Ochort Okon was the former Clerk of the Cross River State House of Assembly and current state chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). In this interview with CLEMENT JAMES in Calabar, he speaks on a number of burning issues in the state. Excerpts:
targeted at any individual. If you say you are our member, you must abide by this directive. There have been controversies surrounding the ambition of Goddy Jeddy-Agba, especially in recent times. Is he a member of PDP? No. Not to my knowledge. He is not a member of PDP for now. If he comes in and ask to be registered, we will register him. There are processes for registration. As far as we know, he is not a cardcarrying member of the PDP in the state. But he is said to have registered in his ward. We are not aware of it. How can he be registered in the ward level and we are not aware? Who put him in the ward? The ward cannot register a civil servant. There’s a rule that the ward cannot register a civil servant. He cannot come and say he wants to contest on the platform of the party because we will look at the constitution. What would you say about PDP members who have aligned with his ambition? Have you seen the party chairman or the secretary there? Somebody has not found out the policies of the party and he starts having a Director General. We are not bothered about those who are there. We are waiting to get to the bridge before we see how we can cross it. In any case, have you seen where there is honey and you don’t find bees? We are prepared to sanction anybody who is engaged in anti-party activities. This party is a disciplined party and the leader is a disciplined person. So, we are ready to ensure that discipline is maintained in this party. If he wants to be a member of the party, he has to resign first from his appointment and then we will register him and if he has an ambition, we will look at what the constitution says and follow the process.
Okon
governor. After all, I did not create that position and none of us created it. It’s constitutional and he has been able to hold the party together, compared to other states. No governor has allowed a party structure to function the way we are functioning. You have been hearing that people hold senatorial meetings. Do you see him? Except when we did the inauguration, he doesn’t attend the meetings. We cherish him and we get a lot of support from him. Sometimes, he takes the flaks for innocently being the leader of the party. It’s been reported that you have asked your members not to campaign in any form. What’s the rationale behind it? We did not say that. But let’s be frank. The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) guidelines and the electoral law are clear. What if people start campaign and INEC sanctions us? We know that there are people who want to rope us into this corner. How will it look if INEC sanctions us tomorrow because of political activities of some people? We are a law-abiding people. For now, the national office has not given us guidelines. But we have provided enough structures for people to consult and discuss and I think that has been going on. But we do not want people to print posters and stickers because that would be against the electoral law and INEC’s guidelines. We believe we should follow the process. Don’t put stickers on cars to give us a bad name. We have put in place structures that should help those who are aspiring. By the time a governorship aspirant quietly goes to the 196 political wards, he goes to the 17 ward executives and the 18 state executives, with your blueprint, you should be able to win the people. We don’t want people to just get up and start working outside the structures provided by the party because that will mean you are not recognising the existing structures. How can somebody set up coordinators in each of
We have given a sevenday gap for everybody to stop the use of campaign stickers. At the expiration of the seven days, we will set up a monitoring committee the wards when there are coordinators within the party’s structure? What you are saying is that you don’t recognise the party structure. That’s trying to create confusion. By the time you sell your programme or blueprint, you would have gotten support and this could take you some three months. We are not running open primaries as is done in the United States. We are aware that some people who went to APC are trying to come back to create crisis situation. We have preempted it and we have put in place measures to checkmate it. So, we have not banned political activities but we only want aspirants to avail themselves of the existing structures in the party and work within the law. We don’t want to violate the electoral law. We don’t want people to paste posters. Now that you have banned the use of stickers and posters, what will happen to those who have been displaying them? Yes. We have given a seven-day gap for everybody to stop the use of campaign stickers. At the expiration of the seven days, we will set up a monitoring committee. We are a disciplined organisation and any organisation without discipline will run into trouble. So, we have given directives and so far, we are happy at the responses. This directive is to our members generally and it’s not
With this position, are you foreseeing any crisis ahead of the party primaries? I am not foreseeing any crisis. We have put in place structures that were inherited from my predecessor, Ekpo Okon. They say somebody has opened a campaign office; do you know what a campaign office is? Have they put our flag or symbol there? Have you not seen Senator Imoke’s campaign office in the past? I dare them to put any of our symbols there then you will see what we will do. But in 2011, Sandy Onor was Imoke’s campaign manager. Now, he is heading Agba’s team. Sandy Onor was once in All Nigeria People’s Party (ANPP) as state chairman. He moved to PDP. Do you know where he is moving to this time around? He was a commissioner in this administration and he lost his job. So, he has to get another job. But certainly, all of that is not done under the PDP umbrella. We have our guidelines and when we get to where we will act, we will act. For all I know, those who are not birds of passage are consulting within the structure of our party. So, we are neither concerned about JeddyAgba nor are we bothered about Sandy Onor because they are non issues. It looks like there is a problem with the cohesiveness of the party in the state. The party in the state is very cohesive and the leader, Governor Imoke has been running the affairs of the party with a sense of passion. We have a cohesive party and serious aspirants are working within the rules. I can assure you that what is happening now is not crisis. It is called trend. Naturally, there are interests here and there. But I can beat my chest and say that we have been able to accommodate genuine interests and we will continue to do so.