Group Classifies Ojougboh’s Attack on Governor Okowa as Baseless and Unpatriotic

By Miracle Enuji

Legacy Group, a non-governmental and political pressure group has classified the recent media attacks by Dr Cairo Ojougboh on Governor Ifeanyi Okowa as self-serving, unpatriotic and not targeted at promoting peace and tranquility in Delta State.

The group which gave their verdict at a World Press Conference in the state capital, Asaba, urged Deltans to rise up in one accord and reject the falsehood and propaganda peddled by Dr Ojougboh as his outbursts are baseless and lacks objectivity.

Disclosing the report of their investigations on the said allegation to journalists, the Vice President/National Leader of the Legacy group, Dr Chris Okobah flanked by executives of the group, said; “Our investigation revealed that Dr Ojougboh asked Governor Okowa to allow him be in control of his Ika South Local Government in terms of elective offices and appointments, without adherence to democratic principles. But the Governor would not acede to such an undemocratic request. Rather, he encouraged him to follow democratic principles, which obviously didn’t go down well with Dr. Ojougboh.”

Okobah further revealed that Dr Ojougboh was said to have have undemocratically wanted to retain his seat as National Vice Chairman of the PDP, South South but in line with the principles of fairness, equity and justice, all major stakeholders of the party in Delta State, zoned the position to another Senatorial District other than the Senatorial District of the Governor where Ojuogboh belongs. “If indeed these are the sources of his anger, again we believe it is unfortunate and yes, self-deserving, he submitted”.

The group lauded Governor Okowa’s judicious management of the Paris Club Refund and commended his giant strides even in the midst of economic recession and 16 months downtime of the Forcados Export Trunk Pipeline. “Governor Okowa has managed to fare well in the area of Road Construction, Schools Rehabilitation, Job Creation and Urban Renewal and to this end, we will confront anybody who will not take steps to encourage the Government to consolidate on those modest achievements. Here again, the cry of nothing is happening by Dr Ojougboh cannot be said to be a reward for the administration’s hard work and that is our concern as group focused on the overall development of the people.”

They however said that they were not against people or groups asking government to be accountable to the people, neither do they believe that those in authority are infallible but such calls must be done in accordance with acceptable democratic norms and must be borne out of genuine love for development and not to the detriment of the electorate.

“For the avoidance of doubt, we expect citizens to criticise the government when the need arises because it is an essential ingredient of democracy but we hold the view that such criticisms must find a reasonable space on the track of objectivity and patriotism”.

Dr Okobah while stressing the drive and mission of Legacy Group noted that, as part of their responsibility in monitoring and x-raying the utterances and actions of stakeholders in the state with a view to evaluating the extent to which they promote or hinder the progress of those in authority, averred that, it is on account of such evaluation that they classified the media outbursts of one time member of PDP, Dr Cairo Ojougboh on the person and office of Governor ifeanyi Okowa as unpatriotic.