A former Governor of Ekiti State, Engr. Olusegun Oni, recently declared his intention to run for the 2022 gubernatorial election in the state under the platform of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). In this exclusive interview with the AbujaCityJournal, Oni speaks on many salient political issues, including his experience while in the All Progressives Congress (APC) and what informed his decision to throw his hat into the ring again.

ACJ:  You declared your intention to run for the Ekiti 2022 gubernatorial election recently to the admiration of your followers but many stakeholders wonder at your decision to govern the state again, 10 years after you had your first shot? If we may ask in the Nigerian parlance, what exactly did you forget in Ekiti State Government House?

I did not forget anything in Ekiti State Government House and I am not hell-bent. It is important for all to know that I’m not desperate to be governor. The truth is that the good people of Ekiti keep referring to the service I gave to them positively and in all honesty, this has continued to humble me. They keep saying it has been the best they got so far. This is something that can be verified by anybody who comes across Ekiti people. To date, the majority of my good people of Ekiti State keep remembering what we did and asking for more. If they are saying please come and complete the good work you were doing and I didn’t heed their calls, I will feel guilty that I turn down my people and deny them my service. So, I have made up my mind I am going to offer my service until I’m no longer in the position to offer the service. Let me emphasize it again that I didn’t forget anything, but if my service is still required, I’m going to offer it.

ACJ:  Former Governor Fayose left in 2006 and returned in 2014,  Governor Fayemi left office in 2014 and returned in 2018, you left in 2010, now warming up to return in 2022. Is this a trend in Ekiti or a response to the competition?

No, as I said, when I left as Ekiti Governor, I didn’t plan I was going to come back. In fact, I addressed the press when I was leaving and I didn’t say I was coming back and I didn’t see anything that would make me want to come back. But when I was in the All Progressives Congress (APC), the Ekiti caucus in the 7th National Assembly, came to me and said; “look, the system is very hostile to us and we think you are the only person that our party can put forward and receive a friendly welcome,”. The group included senators and house of representative members. Initially, I declined but after much pressure, positive ones for that matter, I accepted. Except for one of them who passed on a few weeks ago, others are still alive and can testify to this.  At least two out of the three Senators in the National Assembly then; Senator Anthony Adeniyi and Senator Olubunmi Adetumbi appealed to me to come out and contest in 2018. It was only Senator Babafemi Ojudu, who didn’t come with such a suggestion. And out of the six members in the House of Representatives from Ekiti, at least three persons came with the same proposal. I remembered vividly that Hon (Dr). Ife Arowosoge, Hon Oyetunde Ojo, and Late Hon Robinson Ajiboye of blessed memory beckoned on me to come forward and fly the APC ticket. At this point, I didn’t know what to do, I felt really humbled and I asked myself ‘Who am I to turn down these respected people and other well-meaning Ekiti people who are daily calling and making the same appeal. Instantly, I decided to change my resolution that I wouldn’t want to run for any election again. That was why and how I ran for the 2018 APC primaries. The rest is history. After I left the party –APC, the clamor that I should come back continued. My people kept urging me to lead them back and it is still the process of leading that I am now. To me, this is a burden of leadership. Of course, everybody knows the circumstance under which I left the APC, but I will come to that shortly.

Look, everybody that knows me very well can attest to the fact that I am not one of those who believe that power is so sweet and that I will always be going back to the same assignment all the time. I am not the type that just wants political power by all means. You can find out, I’m not the type that is desperate for office either by appointment or through election.

Immediately after the 2018 primaries of the APC, Governor Kayode Fayemi came to me in Abuja and offered me a Senate seat. I thanked him and I said I would not take the offer but that I know somebody who should do better than me in the Senate because if the person goes to the Senate, he would be a second timer with more experience than whoever is going there as a fresher. Immediately, I suggested Senator Olubunmi Adetumbi. Therefore, if I’m looking for a political assignment by every means, I will probably not be free to do what I’m doing now. I believe that the people who said I did well were not lying. And probably, that is the role God wanted me to play and that is why I’m going back to the contest.

ACJ: Many of your promoters often describe you as being urbane and principled, but despite that, your politics in recent times appears to be contradicting that position. You were in PDP and made it to the top as Governor and later national vice chairman, yet you quit and joined another party –the APC. In a jiffy, you got yourself adjusted in APC and made it to the top again as Deputy National Chairman m, but you left again and joined PDP. The argument in some quarters is that you leave any party that fails to do your bidding. Can you clarify this sir?

No, that’s not true. Let me give some background and I will not waste time in addressing the issue. I left the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) then because many of us were unhappy with the direction things were going and we tried unsuccessfully to control it and we left together. At least politically conscious Nigerians can remember what led to the formation of the then nPDP, which was an offshoot of PDP. In APC, yes, as Deputy National Chairman of the party, I believe that I have had the opportunity to contribute my own quota. But suddenly, after being deputy national chairman and contributed my quota to the best of my ability, I was suspended from the party and my key supporters were also suspended from the party. The irony of it is that the suspension came from my ward. It will shock you that up till today, the letter of complaint that my supporters wrote to former Governor Oshiomole, then national chairman of the APC hasn’t been replied. Perhaps it is a law of retribution that the same way I was treated which he (Oshiomole) could have used to correct the anomaly and lay precedence was also later extended to him as national chairman. Because I remember I told him that Look; if someone is the national chairman of a party or deputy national chairman or even member of the NWC that he could be so treated at the ward level. To me, such treatment in any political party doesn’t show respect.

I remember when I was in office as Deputy National Chairman of the party, Chief Clement Ebri was suspended that same way in Cross Rivers and I called them and said it’s impossible; this is not a party of disrespect. You cannot disrespect a former Governor and now be suspending him at the ward level. What for? I said I’m not saying he cannot do anything wrong, please if he does anything wrong, please report him to us at the national working committee level. I thought we should be the ones to pronounce judgment after finding out, not those at the ward level. Whatever happened, the ward should have reported him to the NWC first. That was my thought.

I don’t think it is right in any political party at all for a group of people to orchestrate the expulsion of a national officer of a party who has risen so well at the ward level. It is disrespectful. Somebody who is or was a Senator for example, who has represented his people; is it not odd for some people to sit somewhere and conclude he should be accused and suspended at the ward level. That’s humiliating and disrespectful. Whatever should happen, the ward should report him to NWC that will now set up a panel of inquiry and take care of the situation. That’s why I see my suspension as uncalled for. For God’s sake, I was a former Governor and a former Deputy National Chairman. Some people now sat at the ward level as accuser and judge and said I have been expelled.

I think it was wrong and I waited, expecting the party’s national chairman to make a pronouncement in the interest of the party because that will ensure that something of that nature doesn’t happen again.  I also think that kind of development may call for the party’s constitutional review because yearly, there is always an opportunity to amend the constitution and take care of such knotty areas, but APC bungled that opportunity. Let me also add that this ward that suspended me is in my home town. It is not in an urban area like Abuja or Lagos, where all of us came from different communities. It will also interest you that I am the Asiwaju of Ifaki, the same town where award was coerced to suspend me. It was so much of an insult and I expected the party to do something to right the wrong. Meanwhile, time was running off and nothing was being done. That was the stage my supporters met and said we were no longer going to be at this party. That’s where we are now.

Yes, you guys used a lot of beautiful adjectives to qualify me; that I’m urbane and principled. Thanks for those words, but not somebody immune to rough treatment.

ACJ: Sir, your decision to pitch tent with former Governor Fayose, despite your earlier stance that you would never be in the same political camp with him has continued to generate debate. Has Fayose suddenly become a ‘born again’ or you see him as the only messiah who could help you actualize your governorship dream?

First, let me state categorically that I didn’t go to PDP because of former Governor Ayodele Fayose. No! PDP has been my party from inception but as stated earlier, there was time we left through a collective decision of many of us. Coincidentally, many of us who left then – at least 50, 60 percent of those of us who left then - are back in PDP. For instance, former Governor Bukola Saraki, Prince Olagunsoye Oyinlola, and other bigwigs are back. We discovered there is a big ideological difference between where we were coming from and where we found ourselves. You never know how well or bad you are sitting until you try another chair. I don’t want to offend the gender people so let me don’t use marriage as a case study.

However, if we are talking about internal democracy, I realised that where I was coming from is much better. It was much better because there is so much injustice in APC. For instance, my expulsion was even unfair because I was not given a proper trial. I was suspended indefinitely – though not so stated, it later became indefinitely. Two, I knew it was a sort of a kangaroo arrangement. That is why as a former Governor and former Deputy National Chairman of the party, a ward in a community where I was born and raised could come out and say I had been expelled. It was insulting and degrading. Meanwhile, when they were putting people together to run the affairs of the party, there was no congress election. They handpicked and made as executive members, people who were not even from that town so that they would be able to adequately carry out their hatched job. And in a traditional setting like ours, we are running a serious political party, will you assume that Chairman and Secretary would not be from Ifaki. But they planned and stage-managed it from the onset so that they would fit into what they wanted to use them for and I was not keen about it because I didn’t know they were warming up into a coup. If you look at what happened to me in APC properly, you will agree that I didn’t trigger it, rather I reacted to it.

ACJ: Civil servants in Ekiti have become like mere tools for politicians over the years. After winning the election, it becomes a case of used and dumped. What’s your reaction to this and what will be their fate under your administration?

Well, I don’t know about ‘used and dumped’. I was Governor and I didn’t use and dump any set of people in Ekiti. I stand to be corrected: no group, no sector, no organisation or institution can come forward and say Segun Oni used them and dumped them. The people who dumped them might know the reason they did that.

ACJ: Looking back at your first term in office, will you confidently say you fulfilled your electoral promises so well that Ekiti people will queue behind you again in 2022?

Gentlemen of the press, I would also want to ask you guys a question. What are the people of Ekiti saying? Are they saying I did not fulfill my promises because what I was hearing may not align with the type of question you guys are asking me? If what I’m hearing is not one-sided, it will obliterate that question. I came here and delivered service to the people and I’m still hearing that they haven’t gotten it so good. Anywhere you get to; Ekiti people are always quick to say Segun Oni work as governor was good and credible.  If anybody has a contrary opinion, such a person should feel free to state it and I will be glad. It’s a free world.

ACJ: Can you appraise the performance of governors between 2010 and now, have they met your expectations?

No I will not appraise them. I will not do that. I don’t want to comment or do such an appraisal. But let me say this: we talk about roads, infrastructure, and other physical projects. They are good and necessary and I did a lot in that direction as well, but beyond those areas, what I think I did that was fundamental was in the area of education and future of the young people. Before I became Governor, people were carrying bench and benches to schools in Ekiti. I’m sure many Ekiti people still remember that period. We came and said no, it shouldn’t be. Within three months, we swung into action and made sure it stopped; pupils were no longer carrying benches and desks to school. When I was governor, there was a full complement of textbooks given to every child-free, to make education easy. When I was governor, I inaugurated a digital process, through which students were given laptops free of charge. The reason we did that was that every child in Senior Secondary School was expected to spend three years and we made sure we gave to them in year one of their senior classes. Our plan was to make sure that the students became friends and addicts to their computers before they left secondary schools. But the unexpected way we left office scuttled that initiative.

Experience has shown that the people who benefitted the most from digital culture are not people who went to the University to study Computer Science or related courses, but people who developed friendships with their computers over the years. And from that friendship, they go into developing applications and small apps.  Look, a small app could earn its developer more than enough for a lifetime. We wanted Ekiti Students to have such an opportunity also because we know that our own children are also not dull.  Under such arrangement, they would have become friends with their computer from S.S 1 till the rest of their lives. Some of them by now - more than a decade later - would have become entrepreneurs who own megabucks in the IT sector.

These are more exciting to me than roads. But even at that, we did roads and nobody did as much as we did. We did water and again nobody did as much water as us, but all those are just to ensure an enabling environment but our focus is actually the future of the youth.

I remember I brought Chief Adegboye Onigbinde to Ekiti to do development coaching for football, I brought Amelia to Ekiti to do development coaching for athletics and I have brought coach Abbey, a certified development coach from the US to come and do development coaching for Lawn Tennis. Let me state this for the records, less than a dozen Nigerians as we are talking have run 100 meters under 10 seconds. And two of the chosen ones who have done it – who are super sprinters, are from Ado Ekiti. To date, we are still proud of the likes of Olusoji Fasugba and Oluyemi Kayode of blessed memory. Soji Ige still maintains the African record to date. I don’t know whether he is a coach now but I know he has retired from active sprinting. My mission for attracting all those development coaching opportunities was to make the youth have access to all these early in their lives and become stars.  By venturing into such an area of human endeavor, Ekiti would have been rebranded and come out in another fantastic form.

Anybody with commitment and seriousness will build good roads. If a governor is not taking kickbacks from contractors and they know he is a serious-minded person, they will do a good road, one which will agree with his or her specification. But that is not it; the thinking that supposed to propel us for the future is in the area of digital education and sports.

ACJ. PDP is polarised in Ekiti and one wonders what magic wand you will apply to win the primary. Don’t you think you are in the wrong camp and the wrong place?

I believe we will resolve our problem. Ekiti PDP will soon emerge as a strong, one-family party. Meanwhile, if anybody capitalises on the fact that we are divided, the person has missed it, because I believe we will resolve our problem. All over the world, polarity, realignment, and reconciliation are all intrinsic characteristics of political parties. What matters is the ability of the leaders to manage and resolve them.

ACJ: Some of your critics have argued that funding a governorship campaign may be a tough one for you. Don’t you see that as a challenge too?

Well, I believe that there is no challenge that is too difficult for God to handle. During my first time, I was not lacking, as God gave me the latitude.  Besides, I relied on the investment that I had and people that believed in the vision also joined hands with me, especially after the primaries were done. However, if God wanted to put me in the position, trust, He will do all the needful. So, I don’t think money would be a challenge to me. I repeat, if God wanted me to do this job, He would give me the wherewithal to sail through.