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PDP’ll lose miserably –Bashiru

Senator Ajibola Basiru is the Director-General, All Progressives Congress (APC) Campaign Council in the 2022 governorship election. He spoke with BIYI ADEGOROYE on the chances of Governor Gboyega Oyetola in next week’s election

 

What are the major challenges of the job that you hold now – DG Campaign Council of an off-cycle election?

 

I think it is more of the fact that the whole country is looking forward to the election and that you are under some form of pressure to deliver for the candidate whose campaign you are leading.

 

And of course, it’s been a lot of multifaceted activities, managing human beings is equally a challenging job. I’ve been used to some aspects of the job, but sometimes you have to work round the clock which may have its toll on your health.

 

All the same, it has been very thrilling that we are doing so much for this cause, more so when we get a good feedback from the public that Mr. Governor, who is our candidate, has done tremendously well and he enjoys a lot of goodwill. That makes the challenge less burdensome.

 

Did you see the job coming? You are spokesperson of the Senate. So, did you foresee that you will coordinate this kind of process along with your duty?

Not really. You should know that a lot of people believed that I was an antagonist of the governor, that I was having an ambition to contest against.

 

But the governor was able to see the fact that I’m a party man and I believe in the leadership of the party. I believe the leaders of the party felt that I have been involved in almost all elections since 2011, though not necessarily in the capacity of Campaign DG.

 

In all of these elections, we have had a very good measure of success except for the 2017 rerun of the senatorial election. So, I believe that the governor and the leadership of the party felt I have the necessary cognate experience to coordinate an effective campaign and election management structure that will ensure the victory of the candidate.

For those watching from the media industry and from afar, the candidate of the PDP seems to remain a formidable opponent, and he is not hiding the fact that he is very confident?

I don’t think he is confident. I think people are still appraising our party based on its 2018 posture and using it to draw assumptions. The last contest we had with the PDP in 2019 was a route because out of three senatorial positions, our party won two.

 

Of the nine House of Representatives seats, we had six. Of the 26 State House of Assembly seats, we won 23. So, we are going into this election with the upper hand. Secondly, in 2018, both our candidate and the PDP’s candidate were freshers, and their campaigns were based on hope and a narration of their abilities.

 

But now, our candidate has an edge because he has been in the saddle in the last three and a half years and has been able to show that he is capable of delivering what he promised. His track record has shown us beyond any doubt that the progress and development of our state are guaranteed with such an ingenious leader.

In the last three and a half years, he has been able to show a very good working relationship with the public sector workers to the end that there has been not a single strike or industrial action.

 

He has been able to do a lot of work in the area of education, health, infrastructure, commerce, development of the informal sector, security, and social intervention programmes especially in the area of school feeding, food support for not less than 30,000 challenged citizens in the last 14 months, and the Health Insurance Scheme has been well funded.

 

So, basically, the edge we have going into this election has given us a lot of confidence. Again, when you see the way the PDP handlers are now sounding like broken record, insinuating that our Party is trying to use unorthodox method to win the election, it only shows that they are jittery and not really confident of success.

 

You should also note that the PDP has metamorphosed from a political party into a family business, and in that regard, most of the founding fathers and people who are real politicians and gladiators are no longer within the fold of the PDP.

 

Some of them who are still there do not have any confidence that our state be handed to someone who has no cognate experience in any field whatsoever.

Now, is the threat of Pounds Sterling, Dollars and Euros going to make any difference in July 16?

I think something is wrong with the message of the PDP. At the same time their candidate was boasting of having foreign currency to buy votes, some of their handlers like Odeyemi, were pointing fingers that it is the APC that has the financial muscle.

 

So, you can see a cacophony in their message? What we know is that Osun people are sophisticated politically to know that what they need is a leader that cares for them, for their development, and a leader that knows how to ensure that their lives get better.

That leader is Governor Isiaka Gboyega Oyetola. Whatever boast they are making is empty.

 

In fact, they even made a very unintelligent explanation of the ‘dollar’ and ‘pounds’ statement to have claimed that he was referring to foreign investors. Contextually and in terms of the meaning, it shows that they don’t even know what message they want to pass across.

There has been politics of defection on both sides. Which will you say is having the greater impact?

PDP will be able to announce the result of the census they conducted to ascertain how many people defected to their party. But what I know is that no serious politician of note has left our party for the PDP. The characters they claimed defected have actually left our party a long time ago, to the best of my knowledge, because they were the ones who constituted even greater opposition to our government than the PDP. So, it’s like good riddance for bad rubbish. As to the quality and content of those who have joined our party, we can know from their pedigree. The person who was the deputy governorship candidate of PDP in 2018 is now in our party. We also have Wale Ojo, former Acting Chairman of the PDP in our fold. We have Hon. Soji Ibikunle, and the leading voice of PDP in Ejigbo, Hon. Asaolu, also in our fold. Quite a number of grassroots politicians have also joined us. So, when you look at the political pedigree of those who have joined our party from the PDP, and you compare with those they claim have joined their Party and have even been endowed with top hierarchy in their campaign structure, you will discover that they have dearth of quality people in their party.

But whatever the case, July 16 is just around the corner, and the massive defeat that the PDP will record will leave them with no choice than to concede easily and humbly.

 

So, you are absolutely confident that this going the APC way?

 

By the grace of God. It is not just coming the APC way, but massively coming through APC way.

 

Why has Governor Oyetola been paying salaries as against what happened in the past?

 

I think it is a function of the content he has in terms of his experience in governance. He has been in the financial sector for more than 30 years, and of course, he served in the previous administration. I will say that one critical attitude we must cultivate as individuals is the ability to learn from the mistakes of others so that we don’t commit the same mistake.

 

So, I believe that he has learnt from the previous administration and has been able to effect necessary corrections and then put up a better showing. I think some of us who were part of the past administration and who are his associates now, are very proud of what he has been able to do. He has a very keen sense of public finance management, and when you look at the way he has been able to do the budgeting of the State, it should be a model for other States when you have the capital expenditure far in excess of the recurrent expenditure.

That is like an aberration in Nigeria where the recurrent expenditure far exceeds the capital expenditure. Of course, he is someone who also closely scrutinises not only finances but every other proposition that is brought before him. He certainly will not embark on a project if he is not sure of the details.

Creatively too, he uses the contractor financing model for financing capital infrastructure, and what that does is that the cost of funds is lower than when you get a facility from the government and only serious contractors who are confident of the quality and timely delivery of their jobs are able to partake in the methodology.

 

Also, one of his major supporting bases to becoming governor was the labour force, and he has ensured that he never disappointed them for one day.

 

This explained why even at the times when the State had negative allocation, he was still able to meet up with financial obligations of the public sector. Knowing the effect of the public sector finance on the general economy, he has also been able to have a qualitative positive effect on the general atmosphere of commerce and trading in the state

How will you describe the leadership of Governor Oyetola in Osun vis-a-vis the disenchantment in some other parts of the country with the APC?

I do not agree with that assumption. Majority of Nigerians know that our party is trying its best to ensure that the damage that has been done to our country in the 16 years prior to its advent is corrected. The damage is monumental. The treasury of the country was practically depleted particularly to fund the 2015 election. We also have a government that is challenged not only by the global economic problem occasioned by COVID-19 but also by the present Russia-Ukraine war which has equally affected a number of countries across the world. So, I will say that Nigerians are lucky to have this kind of government at this perilous time because it would have been more terrible if we have had a profligate government like that of the PDP. Be that as it may, one of the good things that have come to Osun is to have a good manager in charge of its affairs, one who believes that governance should be for the purpose of advancing the people and not for self-aggrandizement.

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