The Court of Appeal sacked Ekiti State Governor, Segun Oni, an engineer, in February. He returned to Government House when he emerged victorious at the governorship re-run election of April. He has since reconstituted his cabinet and appointed other political aides. But the process was slow.
In an interaction with journalists recorded by
Assistant Politics Editor, Maxwell Oditta, Oni bares his mind on the controversy that surrounded his victory at the re-run poll. He also explains why the process of reconstituting his cabinet and appointing political officers has been rather slow, and submits that his government is getting it right in Ekiti.
You have been accused of benefiting from monumental fraud in the Ekiti State governorship rerun election. You faced also similar accusations in the earlier election. Is it in the character of Segun Oni to partake in fraudulent polls?
When they say monumental fraud, you always wonder what it means and where they are coming from. All elections must produce a winner and, maybe, losers. We have had the keenest elections so far in this terrain, since the beginning of democracy. All together the total number of votes that were cast was less than a quarter of a million. Less than half of the votes that brought in Governor Niyi Adebayo, less than half of the votes that brought in Governor Ayo Fayose. And if there was fraud and if that fraud was monumental, you will now wonder how come the numbers of votes cast are reducing. Because if there was fraud, the number would be increasing and you do not have any proof of an epidemic or genocide that wiped off people that are here..
Really, it does not matter what they say. If they say there is monumental fraud, we had the first election, we defeated them and they tried out the places where we won. Do they talk about the judgment? The judgment did not say that there was fraud. The judgment said that accreditation process was done with red-ink pen, and that it was not in compliance with the appropriate law. So how does that interpret to fraud? And we also have our own bones to pick about this, because some of these places were actually done in blue-ink, yet they were cancelled.
In some of these places no evidences were taken and they were cancelled like that. People who are certified riggers, forgers, who should have been accused, always turn round to call other people names. They do this every time. They would talk about forgery, whereas they are the forgers. They would talk about violence, and they are the ones who procure thugs. I'm going to show you a short video here that would let you see some of the things they brought for the elections. They brought in thugs.
You said the thugs used charms and all sorts. Does that reduce this to some voodoo democracy?
There is no voodoo democracy. It's the people, who are desperate. You are seeing them. It was captured live you know the sanctity of pictures to you journalists.
Are you saying in good conscience that when the opposition resorted to these tactics, you didn't do that too?
No. We didn't. Nobody would have survived this kind of tirade that we survived, if they don't have the grace of God. Besides, we would not survive it if we didn't have a very wide margin on the ground. If it was a small balance or a little margin, it would have been wiped off by their antics. But they were not so much on the ground. They cancelled the elections retests of our strongholds. Where in the world do they target a party's stronghold like that without creating an undue chance for the opponent?
If they had cancelled two or three Barack Obama strongholds in the United States, you know that would have given victory to John McCain. We got all their cancellations. Thank God, we were given an opportunity to vote again. And in my home local government, they were now complaining they did not want Ido-Osi to count. They wanted to destroy it. Is that democracy? Wanting to destroy the votes of your opponent where you think they are strong?
In Kayode Fayemi's hometown, virtually all the votes were given to him in 2007. We had 34 votes. The votes came from all the wards. The ward is made up of three towns - Ilafun, Isan and Ilemesho. In Ilemesho, they destroyed all the votes because it was our stronghold.
But you never complained about this.
Winners don't complain. Or what are we going to complain about? What is there to complain about after I have won? That is going to be like kicking a fallen opponent. Did they tell you that in Ire, for example, I had a majority of over 5, 000 votes and the results were snatched, supposedly by hoodlums so that Ire's votes would not count? Did they talk about that? You have never heard of that. They gave a whole House of Assembly to the AC (Action Congress) with just seven votes' superiority, from four wards out of six. And the two other wards, Ire I and Ire II, where we had a commanding majority and that would have given us a majority of over 5,000 in Ire were snatched.
They didn't say it that in Okemesi, three wards had no results in the first elections. They didn't tell you that in Efon-Alaaye 10 wards, a whole local government, there was no result at all.
So, if they are on ground and all these are there, we should ask them why there were no results in Eda-Oniyo and Iludun in Ilejemeje Local Government?
When they have done all that and the thing failed they would now turn round to accuse somebody else. This is very unfortunate. This is one thing I know that is very clear, there is God. No matter what human smartness thinks no matter how smart we think we are, no matter what devices, we think we possess, there is God.
Let us talk more about Ido-Osi. There was a demonstration by women, ageing and young, exposing their breasts. You didn't think that some kind of anomaly warranted that kind of naked demonstration? What was your wife's view?
It is very unfortunate. It is not the feeling of my wife that matters now, because my wife only thought it was crazy people who arranged them, because my wife knew it was an arranged thing. And the people who brought them did not even show the example themselves by standing upright behind them. Just a few vulnerable women who were poor were put in front. The commanders had their own clothes on. It is very unfortunate.
When they said it is a curse wherever they do that, I said there is no curse. I said wait and see how they would be defeated in the elections. So all that now has come to naught.
What was the monetary cost to your re-run election campaign?
To me, the monetary cost is little personal. You should recognise the fact that I was out of here after 21 months with almost nothing. Let me tell you a story. When I left government, the following morning after the tribunal, because I insisted that the speaker be sworn in that day, some suggested that it should be the following morning. I said no. There was nothing we were staying to do here. That extra day, we did not need.
And the following morning, I was sitting and I needed a vehicle, all my vehicles had been reduced to only one. And my wife's cars, she had dashed out to brothers, sisters and friends. So I had only one car and my wife none. I called a motor company; I don't want to name it. I don't want to embarrass them, and I said I wanted to buy a car. Somebody was actually doing it for me. Right there and then, the company said we would give you a car ex gratis. That is the grace of God. And that same morning while I was relating it, somebody said 'I would give you a jeep'. And that same day, less than 24 hours after I left government, I was three jeeps (SUVs) richer. I sat in my house comfortably for three months even with the enemies raging, to find whatever to dent my image. But they couldn't. I wish my father were alive. I would have whispered to him. I told my mother. She is still alive. She is about 100 years old. I said' you must have done a good job that cannot be faulted'. I was here, people who wanted to be governors, to be in government at all cost; who were looking for everything virtually under the sun, could not come up with one. That is the story.
You have been so slow in constituting your cabinet. How would you describe the state of governance under you?
The state of governance as you can see is excellent. I have been here for only two months. Last Monday, we were only two months. How long did it take for other governments to be constituted? I don't think more than 20 per cent of cases in Nigeria, you get people put it in place in less than three months. There would be consultations and so on. We were able to do it faster because there was a long gap between election and swearing in. But this one, we won election on the fifth. We were sworn in on the fifth. And our time started counting from there. In spite of the fact that there was a long time between elections and swearing in, in 2007, go and find out how many governments were able to do it in less than three months. And that is after having long period of time between elections and swearing in. We had no time between election and swearing in and we are two months old.
I must say that the processes we have taken, takes everybody into consideration, and that is why we are very confident that we have done the right thing. We have a group of people here whose business is to malign government. When we started the roundabout we had to employ guards because they were being destroyed at night.
You will not believe it. I did not believe that any opposition would be that desperate. We introduced free feeding. They said some people had charmed plates and so on. They are always out to destroy government. They think that is the only way to make headway, and we commit them to the hand of God.
We were not slow in constituting cabinet. In very few cases in Nigeria would they constitute cabinet earlier than three months after an election. And usually, there is a gap between swearing in and victory. We are ready. And that is the summary. We are not in any way slow. You have to take stock of the state of affairs. The first reasonable thing for any government is to find out the state of health of the treasury, you have to put people to work to do that. And I can tell you in our own accountability and review process; it also falls on a time we have to do the five plus seven review, the half-year review of the budget, which is a very detailed and rigorous process and we are going to send the result of the review to the State House of Assembly. If you want to run government properly, and it is not government of the gutter, there are some basics. That is why we are always getting it right.