Dr Tom Ohikere is a former Commissioner of Information in Kogi state and currently the chairman of the APC NewsOnline. In this interview, he bared his mind on the dynamics of the political wrangling particularly within his party, the APC in Kogi state.
You were quoted as saying that with the APC structure in Kogi State Alhaji Usman Ododo will win the November 11 governorship election. Why are you so confident?
Yes, as of then but with the recent dynamics, it’s 50-50. Presently I am expecting the leadership of the party in the state and the administration to articulate the collective interests of stakeholders and shareholders, aggregate preferences and channel maximum energy into the campaigns, but the prevailing circumstance is that we are seemingly losing touch with the realities. Typically, the governor reject honest critics who hold up a mirror to him and speak the truth to power. Instead the governor surrounds himself with sycophants who tell him what he wants to hear. Over time, the governor loses the capacity for honest dialogues as others learn not to confront him with the realities or truth.
You once made a case for coordinated campaign and inclusivity devoid of disjointed campaign. Did the composition of the APC campaign council meet your expectations?
I faulted the manner of uncoordinated and disjointed campaigns but I think strongly that with the campaign council already in place, the disconnection and anomalies could be corrected. The party urgently needs to intensify its effort to use the modest achievements of the outgoing APC administration of Governor Yahaya Bello to campaign. The governor has actually recorded some success stories in some key areas.
The campaign council should also be aware that the Kogi election is about APC versus APC as the other major contenders were major players in the APC before they were forced to take other platforms to contest. For example, Muri Ajaka was the Deputy National Publicity Secretary of the party and a major contributor to the election of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, while Hon. Leke Abejide was a founding member of APC who was also forced to ADC for his ambition for the House of representatives but today, he is still very interested in APC as his significant contributions to Asiwaju’s presidential campaign or is it Admiral Jibril Usman who worked closely with Hon. James Faleke in the Tinubu Support Group and the APC presidential campaign council.
So the forthcoming election in the state is mainly about APC lords.
This is demonstrated by the followership of these titans who are all APC members. We can hardly blame anybody for anti-party today.
