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*By: Elahor Wisdom*
*_....says his experience serves lessons to the upcoming politicians_*
I remembered vividly during the 2015/2016 contestation for governorship election when Aiyevbekpen Osakue was the DG to Obaseki strictly for the purpose of the primary election.
I recall how Aiyevbekpen was selected due to non availability of politically knowledgeable and experienced politician at that time. Virtually every experienced politicians were either with one aspirant or the other.
There is a parable that when the 'wants' is not available you make use of the available.
That exactly was the case. So, he held sway until talks as to why one of the aspirants in the person of Barr Osarodion Ogie would jettison his ambition to join forces with GO was sophisticatedly reached on a roundtable with emperor Comrade Adams Oshiomhole presiding, the then apostle of "say NO to godfatherism: let the people lead" and who ironically became an aspiring godfather in the politics of Edo.
The stepping down of Barr Ogie gave a high sigh of relieves to the pro Obaseki at that time leading to his preference as DG well above Aiyevbekpen. Barr Ogie became the DG and work had begun.
Categorical speaking, I knew how proposals to release funds were made under the inept DGship of Aiyevbekpen prior to the taking over by Barr Ogie and it was accordingly released from campaign funds almost on a weekly basis with no meaningful results.
He and his cohorts had taken advantage of GO innocence on the running of campaigns to syphon funds raised through fundraising ceremonies as well as funds from financiers.
It was like to Aiyevbekpen & co ' an opportunity to make money has come and we must make a better use of it to enrich ourselves'.
Actually, many of them made reasonable amounts; some built houses in both villages and towns, bought expensive cars, some married second wives, acquired properties all over the places worth millions of naira for their self aggrandizements and to the suffering of campaign funds. Each time GO would want to raise eyebrows to it, elder Aiyevbekpen was always devising a means of talking him out of it, making it looked like a traditional phenomena.
Little did GO know that political breakthrough was directly dependent on party structure and that when you don't have the structure you can spend billions without meaningful impacts
It became clearer to GO when he wasn't asked for more funds to go about the campaign under Barr Osarodion Ogie as Director General, DG of the campaign organization.
It was like a dream to him that results were been achieved without spending up to 30% of what was been spent under Aiyevbekpen.
This, perhaps could be the reason why some of this characters could not secure appointment in the present administration. Rather than telling the whole world what went wrong, Aiyevbekpen is going about acting the barbaric way.
As far as some of us who were privileged to this fact are concerned; Aiyevbekpen and co were like contractors to the 2015/2016 campaign organization with huge resources deployed.
It was expected that as contract has ended both the contractor and awardee of the contracts part ways, instead, they still want to eat the already consumed cake. Is that a possibility? It is therefore preposterous, delirious and drug intoxicating to think that you can eat your cake and have it at same time.
Maybe Aiyevbekpen didn't remember that while he was occupying the main campaign building in Aiguobasimwin crescent we were occupying the EDO IN SAFE HANDS building adjacent to it.
Just because of the ways we embarked on campaigns without monetary enticements we were tagged the second fiddles by the pro Aiyevbekpen groups.
Thank God we were not tempted to do same even in spite of the pressure on us.
Perhaps, Aiyevbekpen didn't know that despite the enormous contributions of the pro *Edo in Safe Hands Group* that saw to GO's emergence as Governor we could only secure appointments through our respective local govt party structures.
That is the level of importance GGO administration has made APC as a party looks. 90 to 95 % appointment now come through party structure unlike his predecessor who would sit down and singlehandedly appoint every dick and harry into positions without recourse to party relevance.
This is why I laugh at shenanigans parading as members of EPM when they accuse Gov Obaseki of abandoning party members.
If Aiyevbekpen & co were the popular politician as were made to understand and his presumed closeness to Comrade Oshiomhole who was the defacto Governor at the early reign of the present administration by reasons of his dominance over Edo affairs until GO realized that it was disadvantageous to have two Governors at a time in a State.
This was after so much humiliations and suffocation suffered in the hands of the defacto Comrade
It takes only the gullible Edo EPM members to take Aiyevbekpen Osakue serious in his current vituperations against GGO.
However, in the words of Governor Godwin Obaseki " Edo people's money is meant for the development of Edo and not to widen individual pockets as envisaged by few political elements".
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