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In this interview, Ekiyor Welson, executive director of Campaign for Democracy and Development in Bayelsa (CDDB) and lecturer with the Niger Delta University (NDU), highlights the challenges of choosing a people’s governor and efforts to address violence and other sundry matters ahead of the election in 2019. Welson, a one-time chairman of Bayelsa State Council of the Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ), publicity secretary of Ijaw National Congress (INC) and Chief Press Secretary to the governor, said CDDB has found a leader who will have the pain of the people at heart. Excerpts:
May we know what CDDB is all about?
CDDB is an acronym for Campaign for Development and Democracy in Bayelsa. It is out to promote two things: development and democracy. These two concepts go hand in hand and one eliminates the other. So, we are basically trying to promote democracy through development. Some people think that democracy leads to development. That is not true, it is development that leads to democracy. Why Africa cannot practise democracy is because we are backward, we are not developed. Why is it so easy for the western world to practise democracy? Because they are developed. And what is development? Human capacity. So, can we mobilise Bayelsa people through some kind of teaching and sensitisation for them to understand the need to be democratic? They need to take part in the democracy of the state. When they begin to take part, then it will become easy for the political class.
You took your sensitisation campaign to all parts of the state. Havng done that, what is your conclusion?
The conclusion now is this; the people at a point believed that they had no part to play. And all they were made to do was on Election Day, they come out and collect whatever they can collect and vote for whoever gives them the highest amount of money. So to speak, the highest bidder. But now we have come to realise that they are actually willing to take part in the political process. Now, how do you take part in the political process? It is to watch out for the kind of people that can serve you. The problem we have in this part of the world is that the people that want to be served do not take part in who serves them. So, the reverse is coming up now. Bayelsa people now are looking for the kind of people that can serve. They now know that they can actually choose and participate in the political process. That is why you see that there is a lot of enthusiasm in the state now for what we are doing. That is our final conclusion, a lot of enthusiasm. So, we are building on it now.
Do you actually see the people voting their choice going by past experiences?
Yes! We know that in philosophy the past does not necessarily resemble the future. There is no connection like it happened like this before, it will happen like this tomorrow. So, now based on reorientation – it is tough, I tell you it’s tough – when you think of limited resources and you think of limited scope, you will realise that what we are doing is almost passing the camel through the eye of the needle. But, we are going somewhere. We are going somewhere. The people are made to realise that indeed they can take part and it is beginning to dawn on them. And so, we are seeing a situation where they believe that they can now vote for the kind of people that will serve them. They are now believing that their votes can really create a difference, especially when they look at their experiences, what they are facing. So, they are willing now to consciously look for the kind of people that will serve them and make them happy.
The political parties will come up with the candidates and the kind of candidates they come up with may not necessarily be the kind of people that the ordinary man is looking for to serve him…
We have nipped that in the bud. We have nipped it in the bud. I meet people who are also concerned about the political happenings in Bayelsa State and they say things like, ‘We are going to wait for all the people that are interested in any particular office. We will now screen’. The question now is ‘How do you pick from the worst?’ Plato says the best must lead the rest; meaning that you must consciously look for the best. Therefore, what we have done this time around, we have worked within the parameters of development to search. We are starting from the top. From the top, we carried out a process that took us four months. Who do Bayelsans think being in Government House will carry their interests in his heart? And we announced to the entire state, please subject yourself to our scrutiny. Three people did and we sampled Bayelsa people and from the sampling we arrived at Okoya. Our responsibility now is to take that man to every nook and cranny of this state to achieve what we want to achieve. So, right now, the people have chosen. From our last press release, we are calling on all the political parties that operate in Bayelsa State to adopt our product because our product came out of a process by the same people that will vote. We have cut across all strata, all sectors of the Bayelsa society. Miraculously, as I speak to you right now, it is a popular movement. So, the political parties now will look for those that can win elections for them.
The last time, we know that money for vote was a big issue. Do you see any change in 2019?
Based on our scientific projections, there is likely to be a change. Let me tell you one thing. When there is an election, and the people that are contesting do not connect with you, you will want to profit. But when you connect with any of them, you will not want to make profit. For example, among the people contesting an election, none of them is your person, you will ask yourself, ‘What have I got to gain? I don’t know any of them.’ Mundane thinking, of course! But if one of them is somebody you know and you know that if he wins, you will benefit, you won’t collect any money from him. You are likely to vote for him. So, what we have done now; we want to create a situation where Bayelsa people will vote who they require. By owning him on Election Day, they will support him. They will just go there and do what they need to do. Bayelsa has never been blessed by a popular candidate. Go back to 1999. Look at this last election, what they had to do was like trial and error. They did not know what to do. Whatever they got, they got. But this time around, we are seeing it.
Last time out, you remember the violence that characterised the election. How do you expect the people to defend their votes because the main thrust of the matter is for the people to defend their votes?
I believe that our election is still far off. When we get close to the election, we should be able to sit down and map out the kind of strategies that will curtail the violence. You can sit down and do some calculations. Why did the violence come up in the first place? Who are the perpetrators of the violence? The two main contenders were violent. They both brought in militants. Why did they bring in militants? Who allowed them to bring in the militants? What can we do to stop them from bringing in any militant? Can we interface with those militants? We are working on all of those things. We are talking with the militants themselves. What is their interest? Is it any person that pays them, they work for the person? Can we go to these people and tell them there is no point fighting if we can agree on the person that will come and protect our interest? So, we are coming from very scientific angles to see how we can nip the problem of violence in the bud because they have conflicting interests. Can we unify their interests? If we can unify their interests, the fighting will disappear.
We have the PDP and APC as major parties. Are you sure that you have the capacity to bring them to the understanding that you are canvassing?
We are not going to the parties. We are going to the people they engage for the violence. They are the people we are going to. They are our people. Surprisingly, some of them that perpetrated the violence then are already working with us. So, we are not bordering ourselves with the political parties. We are bordering ourselves with the people that they normally engage for the violence. For example now, their boys. The boys are talking with us. They are telling us they are also tired. So, we are going to create the kind of situation that will make them not to be interested in carrying guns.
From your sensitisation so far, as you said, you have zeroed in on Arch Reuben Okoya. Can you tell us about him?
The first characteristic that you notice about Reuben Okoya; he is a team player. He is a team player, a bridge builder and he is also a bridge. Politically, you can’t find Reuben in a situation of having political enemies. All the political blocks in this state are favourable to him. All the political blocks, and the first thing he did in this state; he is a unifier, somebody with a personality that can unify everybody. And that is what we have found in Reuben Okoya and he moves around all the political gladiators in this state freely. And he has the ability to be a friend to all of them. That is his best characteristic. If you watch well, any other person is in a way divisive. Some people, if they become governor today, there is a section of the state that will be sidelined. Reuben is a man that cuts across party lines, as they say in America, across the aisle. He is a man that both the PDP and APC need. Because of what? He is going to create the kind of development that all of them will benefit from. That is his first quality. His second quality is he is a man that likes working. You know that Okoya is a hard worker. He works to make something tick. Number three, he is a man that has overcome greed and self-aggrandisement so to speak. He is a satisfied man. For the first time, we are seeing the person that wants to be governor from the positron of advantage. He doesn’t need to travel to anywhere he has not been before. He does not need to drive the kind of car that he has not driven before. So to speak, a man that is full, you put him in charge of food. When you put a man that is hungry in charge of food, you have a problem. So, from ’99 we’ve always had problems. We had people coming and wanting to acquire. When you find a man who is already satisfied, what he needs to do is to work and give back to the people. So, with these kind of qualities, he is a man that is kind-hearted, a man that is generous, a man that feels what the people are feeling and a man that is very, very simple. These qualities are the qualities that he has and understands what development is. These are the qualities that we want in a leader and we have found these qualities in him. So, we see it as a very rare privilege. Somebody like Reuben Okoya is presenting himself.
There is something about politicians. While you are doing your calculations, he is also doing his. Are you sure that his calculations will not include trying to satisfy some godfather somewhere because that is the bane of Nigerian politics?
He is going to satisfy the Bayelsa people. As we speak right now, he is a product of the Bayelsa people. He is not being sponsored by any individual. I know where he is coming from. He is a product of communication between him and Bayelsa people. Nobody is sponsoring him. Today, every one Naira he spends is the one he gets. He is not going to satisfy any godfather. And so, every other person is looking at him to organise himself and he is doing his best to organise himself.
We know that CDDB is not a political party and for Okoya to run, he needs a political party. Of all the political parties, looking at their antecedents, which one will he run on?
He is a full-blooded member of PDP. But I know as we speak, close to 40 political parties have adopted him. But he is a full member of PDP. He is going to ply his trade in PDP. And I don’t see anybody beating him in PDP.
You are sure he will run on PDP?
Yes. No second option. No option B. He will emerge candidate. You know where my calculation is coming from? One of the things that I know Dickson is concerned about is who takes over from him. Who will protect his legacies? Who can protect the little achievements he has made? Who can build on the foundation he has laid? Dickson has carried out some revolutions in the state even though we have very poor media managers. There are some things he is sound that people are not reporting that today if somebody builds on, the person can build a giant superstructure. He needs somebody that will come with knowledge to build on it – not a neophyte, not somebody that will be there, but be needing some kind of directive. Dickson does not want somebody to control after he leaves office. He wants somebody he can confidently trust so he can enter this state and be safe, be comfortable and be honoured. It’s only Reuben that can do that, only Reuben. Any other person he brings or that comes will mess him up and create problems for him by being ineffective and incompetent. So, he himself knows that the only man that can make sure that he rests and sleeps isReuben Okoya. And I’m very, very sure Dickson is thinking in that line.
Apart from choosing him, what else do you need to do to ensure that he emerges governor at the end of the day?
Mobilising. The sensitisation, mobilisation and networking for Reuben Okoya has been very, very unprecedented. Unprecedented. Beyond anybody’s imagination. Sometimes, we feel like shedding tears. The kind of people that come to us and some will say ‘I know this man. I have worked for him. Bayelsa is going to be blessed’. So, beyond endorsing him, we are his foot soldiers. After endorsing him, we have become his foot soldiers. We have hit the ground running and by this weekend, we are moving, going to places. Why are we going? We are going to tell them, help us. Let us collectively make this man our leader so that he can come and serve us. And that is not difficult. Not difficult.
