THE TIME TO BACK ESAN IS NOW: A CALL TO IZE-IYAMU AND DAN ORBIH
By Henry J.
It is a well-known fact that among the political sons of Late Chief Tony Anenih, are Pastor Osagie Ize-Iyamu (POI) and Chief Dan ORBIH ..
Pastor Osagie Ize-Iyamu (POI) who is from Edo South has gained a tremendous unalloyed support from the Edo Central Senatorial district while he was contesting for the Governorship election under PDP.
Pastor Osagie Ize-Iyamu (POI) was endorsed by the heads of the Party Structure when he came to declare his Political Ambition in *Esan West* in his First outing.
Again, even when he moved to the All Progressive Congress APC, the Edo Central also supported him when he was endorsed by late Capt. Hosa maternally from Esan and Prince Tony Omoaghe…
It should be noted that Pastor Osagie Ize-Iyamu POI has gained the support of Edo Central and *He Should Drop His Ambition and support Someone from Edo Central for the Governorship in Edo State come 2024.*
_The question is, what has Pastor Osagie Ize-Iyamu POI done that he has not gotten the Support of the Central?_
*On the other part, Chief Dan Orbih(Edo North)* is a thorough bred politician and a chip of the old block, following in the footsteps of his father, the late Chief MCK Orbih, who was a frontline player in the politics of the old Bendel State.
The pedigree is therefore writ large.
But then, there was a deliberateness from the outset by Dan Orbih to connect with and sustain the father’s political memory and ethos, having understudied him.
*The glory of Orbih’s political indoctrination belongs to his father, but the grandeur of his immersion in the politics of leadership in party administration belongs to the inimitable political leader and strategist, the late Chief Anthony Akhakon Anenih, the Iyasele (Prime Minister) of Esanland.*
And through the influence of Anenih, who had taken him as his political son, he was appointed into the Board of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC).
Today, Orbih, without a doubt, has become a formidable leader of the PDP in Edo, honchoing the activities of a closely-knit family that the death of Anenih has thrust on his shoulders.
Having been well groomed by the late political icon, Orbih has become the natural leader of Edo PDP. Like Anenih, he is a pacifist and believes in party unity. Also, like Anenih, Orbih believes in “101 percent” loyalty to both leadership and followership. He gave it to Anenih and the Leader acted in reciprocity.
This is the tradition that has defined the administration of the PDP in Edo State.
When he stepped aside as State Chairman, the mantle of leadership fell on a former member of the House of Representatives, Dr Anthony Aiziegbemhi, another loyalist of the late Iyasele of Esanland.
The Esama Gburugburu, leveraging his wide political contacts in the South-South zone in 2020 emerged as the National Vice Chairman (South-South) of the PDP.
With that, he became the leader of the PDP in the zone. It was in that capacity that he deferred to the request of the party to accept and support the movement of Governor Godwin Obaseki and his deputy, Phillip Shaibu into the party and the emergence of their governorship ticket after they were barred from contesting the governorship primaries in the All Progressives Congress (APC).
As a new political father of the PDP, he overlooked the past and invested time and energy into the electioneering for Obaseki/Shaibu’s re-election.
Whereas, he is at home with political accommodation, believing that the constitution and guiding rules of the PDP would kick in to moderate all tendencies, the new entrants from the APC, led by Obaseki, have pulled all political stunts to upstage the applecart of Orbih’s overarching leadership in the PDP.
Obaseki was shown on a TV news channel, some time ago, where he was boasting to be the leader of the PDP and that anybody who was not comfortable with that would have to leave the party for him.
That combative disposition by Obaseki has become characteristic of his self-seeking politics of survival.
He fought Comrade Adams Oshiomhole who made him Governor in the APC.
At a point, he was almost politically deuced; the PDP came to his rescue.
See how he is paying the party back, wanting to edge out, midstream, leaders who had been constitutionally elected to serve for four years in the State Executive Committee of the party in the guise of harmonization of structures.
The greed of the Governor is accentuated by the fact that he had single-handed filled the critical positions in the government with his loyalists who came with him from the APC.
The scenario supra is what Dan Orbih and the original PDP family are working round the clock to stop.
That is the sin, for which the Governor had instigated a preposterous and outright illegal process of suspension of Orbih and ten other significant leaders of the party in the state.
Obaseki is using the same method he deployed in terminating Oshiomhole’s chairmanship of the APC against Orbih.
Whereas, Oshiomhole did not initially take the move serious even after the group had proceeded against him in court, Orbih has launched a rearguard action to push back the “insurgents” and “bandits” in Edo PDP by quickly heading to court to stop the shenanigans.This is where his fighting spirit as the Oduma (Lion) has crystallized.
He would not sit back and watch the fort that was painstakingly built under the leadership of the Iyasele of Esanland and which was left in his hands be assailed unconscionably by desperate carpetbaggers whose sole aim is to take over existing PDP structure and expand their frontiers of control and manipulation.
Orbih is certainly giving the battle to defend and secure the original PDP’s political heritage from slipping into the hands of strangers.
Orbih needs all the support by well-meaning Edolites to ward off the predators for Esan Extract as Governor 2024
A win for Extract as Governor 2024 will be his best gift ever as he will help to advance the political frontier of the Edo people.
