By Titus Oise
Special Correspondent, Benin
Kenneth Imansuagbon, a member of the All Progressives Congress (APC) aspiring to be the helmsman in Edo State, has dismissed Governor Adams Oshiomhole’s protege, Godwin Obaseki, as the weakest of all the aspirants.
“Mark what I am saying. Unless they will kill all of us in the stadium that day, I know that Obaseki will come last in the primary. The people are ready. We are ready. Let’s pray that all of us see that day,” he said in Benin City.
“You’ll remember today as the day that I said that Obaseki will come a distant last. I have been in the business of creating jobs for the past 25 years since I left the university. Let Obaseki show me the job he has created.
“I have been paying different kinds of taxes to the state and federal governments. Let Obaseki show us proof of any tax he has paid to either the state or federal government.
“His company, Afrinvest, brokers borrowing of money for which it is paid. It is a proxy and is paid agency fee. Is that an achievement? Is that a scorecard? Let him go to Samorika in Akoko Edo Local Government Area whether he’ll be recognised.
“Let him take a walk around Ring Road (the commercial hub of Benin) whether the artisans and traders will know him.
“But I have had ties with the people for the past 13 years in Edo. Ties of scholarship being given to their children by me; stomach infrastructure by sharing bags of rice to the people every year; yearly widows’ empowerment programme, etc.”
Imansuagbon said Oshiomhole is right to say that his successor should have the ability to create jobs and not to always run to Abuja for money from the federal purse.
But he faulted Oshiomhole for saying that it is only Obaseki who has that quality, because “I have that quality better than Obaseki. My antecedent makes me the most qualified of the pack.
“All the other aspirants have benefitted one way or another from the government either through contracts or appointments. I have never done contract for any of the three tiers of government viz the local, state and federal.
“Rather, I have given to the government and to my people in Edo State. On this basis, the people of the state are eagerly waiting to compensate me.”
