INTERVIEW
For Iyiola Omisore, his foray into politics has been a mix bag of steady progression dogged by controversies. His bid to become the governor of Osun State was cut short and he eventually settled for the deputy-governorship slot. However, his tenure with his former boss Chief Bisi Akande was marked by violence that eventually consumed late Chief Bola Ige. Recently, he spoke to a cross section of journalists on the murder of Ige who then was the Attorney-General and Minister for Justice as well as his decision to unseat Raufu Aregbesola as the governor of Osun State. OLAOLU OLADIPO was there.
What are your plans for 2015?
Well! 2014 is just around the corner, electioneering is gathering momentum and since there is no room for independent candidature, any form of aspiration would go through the political parties. What we are doing now is to ensure that we secure the ticket of our party. By the grace of God and all things being equal, we shall secure the nomination of the party. I believe that I am well suited to be the governor of Osun State using many yardsticks. I think amongst the people contesting today in the state, I am the most experienced having been deputy governor of the state, elected on two occasions into the Senate where I had the opportunity of being the chairman of appropriation committee, the last time.
What is your assessment of the current government in Osun State?
We are all aware that the current government in the state came in through judicial pronouncement; we are trying to create a platform through which we can offer our party, the Peoples Democratic Party as the best alternative for them. My assessment is such that, either by action or inaction has not met with the expectations of the people of the state. The engine room of government is the civil servant but as we speak now, they are on warning strike. A state that cannot pay minimum wage can afford to charter aero plane at exorbitant costs. You need to know the huge amount of money that the government pays to host their friends from Lagos. These are facts that are in the public domain. A state that cannot pay minimum wage can afford to buy a helicopter for N4 billion. We have records of their financial recklessness. We in the South West are noted for our thirst and zeal for education, during the time of the Late Chief Obafemi Awolowo, efforts were made to bring the schools closer but all that have been done away with by the policies of the current government by collapsing schools. In summary we have a situation whereby the government engages in unnecessary expenditure.
But you and prominent politicians who are considered as gladiators lost in the last election into the Senate...
Interestingly, we are in court contesting the validity of the electoral process. To us, elections were manipulated by the resident electoral commission. We went to the court and the court gave an injunction and yet they went ahead. The elections were nullified by the courts and they are in Appeal, so to us, the election was a ruse until the courts decides otherwise. I believe that another round of elections would take place soon.
But election for the governorship will be due in 2014...
It doesn't matter; anybody going through a legal process is only doing so to make a point. All the same, if the time lapse occurs, the pronouncement of the courts would still count and it will be in the judicial records and will still be cited as reference in future litigations. They have been doing a lot to delay the process.
In specific terms, how do you assess the current government in Osun State?
The engine room of any government is the civil service, as we speak now, they are on strike. The issue in Osun State is calamitous. In the old Western Region, we are known for our fervor for education, this is the major policy thrust of the politics of the late Chief Obafemi Awolowo and his followers. The politicians of old believe that education must be nearest to the people but what we have in Osun State today is that the current government has been collapsing schools with the attendant effects being that pupils will now have to trek several kilometers before assessing education. The performance of Osun State students in NECO conducted examinations have gone down considerably in the last few years. It has gone down by 35 per cent. There has not been any single improvement in the healthcare delivery system since he came into office. There has not been any coherent programme on healthcare in the state since he came on board. What we have is a situation whereby he is importing ideas and dumping it on the state. The physical development that we have in Osun State now is from the Federal Government.
But you party was in power for so many years...what was its achievements?
What I am saying is that things have nosedived in the state. We took over from the AD in 2003 and the results of our activities are on ground. All we have been having are plans and proposals. In 2005, the state came third throughout the country in the performance index in examinations conducted by WAEC. The sad irony is that the state does not any appreciable position anymore.
Don't you see the dominance of the ruling Action Congress of Nigeria in the politics of the South West a mortal threat to your ambition?
I don't think so, judging by their outing at the recently conducted elections in Ondo State where they (ACN) came third after the results were collated by INEC. So, in all honesty, they are fading away.
Let us go to the issue of the murder of the late Attorney-General of the Federation, Chief Bola Ige, it has become very controversial...
Late Chief Bola Ige was my mentor and leader, I have no reason whatsoever to think or contemplate his murder. My former boss, Chief Bisi Akande sometimes in 2002 said the death of Chief Ige had nothing to do with the crisis in the AD. In spite of all these, we were hounded into prisons for two years, we were tried, discharged and finally acquitted by the law courts. As far as I am concerned I have no hand in it and that accounts largely for my ability to win the senatorial seat in 2003, even in the home town of late Chief Ige. All manner of schemes were carried out by the investigators, they even brought in a machine that has to do with detecting lies and I was given clean bill of health. The man who led the operation even gave us that were accused a pass certificate. Unfortunately, this fact did not come to the public domain.
But why are you still being see as the culprit?
The only reason was that I granted an interview to a newspaper and when the matter now became litigation, the newspaper denied the reports saying some parts of the reports were smuggled in by the management of the paper. Unfortunately, it is being used as a tool to malign me in the public. Thank God, the people of Osun know better. That informed my victory in 2003 where I won convincingly in the election. Even the Festus Keyamo angle was brought in and the allegations were debunked the same day by Fryo. The day Ige was killed, the family members went to the police to report that they had been robbed by armed robbers. The report is still incidented at the police station till date. It was the AD governors who tried to make political capital out of it.
People are saying you escaped justice because you were a top PDP chieftain. How far is that through?
I was in prison for two and a half years; if the PDP was interested in the case I wouldn't have been there for so long. The process went through the right process and the judge in his wisdom ruled that the case had no merit. The court ruled that I have no link what so ever with death of late Chief Ige. For the records, the original advice from the Office of the Director for Public Prosecution was that we should be set free as investigations did not link us with the murder. This politicization of late Chief Bola Ige will not allow for the conviction of those suspected.
But about that time, there was an event in the palace of the Ooni of Ife where the cap of late Chief Ige was removed by those said to be closely linked to you...
For the records, Chief Ige was just an umpire in the crisis in Osun AD at that time. In fact, I met him a week to his death. The true position is that the day the cap of Chief Bola Ige was removed, I was the deputy governor at that time, when I was told, I was even the person who ensured that he was taken away from Ile-Ife alive. Two weeks before Bola Ige was attacked in Owo, these were local politics of the people which were beyond us. Sincerely, I don't have anything to gain from the death of Chief Bola Ige but some people are profiting from it.
Source: allafrica.com
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