Hon. Linus Abba Okorie is a chieftain of the Peoples Democratic Party and two terms member of theHouse of Representatives from Ebonyi State. He bares his minds on several allegations, including that he was involved in inciting and causing insecurity in the state. Benjamin Nworie presents the excerpts:
You have been repeatedly accused for complicities in some of the dire security situations in Ebonyi State, how do you consider the allegations?
I’m surprised that anyone can accuse me of insecurity in Ebonyi State. My response is that I have no hand in insecurity. I have no hand in any plot and I have no hand in any that has been plotted. Indeed, my track record especially, through Caring Heart is one who has the feelings and conditions and he who feels concerned about the welfare of the people. I wholeheartedly and openly affirm that I am not part of any crisis or insecurity in Ebonyi State. I have never been part except if anyone confronts me with any evidence, I want to let the whole world and Ebonyians know that I am not part of any insecurity in Ebonyi State.
It is argued that the animosity between you and Governor David Umahi was mainly, because the governor scuttled your third term bid?
Definitely not. Indeed, like I mentioned early, I don’t know where it all started. I have never risen against the governor. I have never spoken against the governor negatively. I even refrained from making critical comments on his projects and programmes for reasons that were personal, to give him absolute respect.
But when I saw that his aides, his commissioner had come out to name me as the mastermind of kidnap, that my home was used to torture a kidnapped victim, and the victim, who even at that point, it was in the public domain that an appointee of government was seen and identified positively as one of the kidnappers. It got me thinking and even at that, I held my beat. I was cool until I heard an audio circulating that trnor personally named me and was working hard to put me behind bars for reasons of what I didn’t do. In fact, no clear allegations at all. I bless my God.
When Umahi was in PDP, you and other PDP stakeholders expressed absolute confidence in his capacity and performance but the narrative has changed immediately he joined the APC. Why?
At every point in time, expression of confidence is the function of the time. And at that time, which is many years back, before 2019, when I spoke about the governor, he was on his first tenure and what he was doing at that time was all OK. But in governance, you must continuously improve. He has remained too long on one spot, building concretes and houses.
We had expected that in his second tenure he would have move strongly and forcefully to the terrain of human capital development. We wanted him to look into tourism to now link up and leverage on the infrastructure and roads he built. We had expected him to provide the enabling environment that will bring investors and turn Ebonyi from its current civil service economy to a private sector driven economy.
But what do we get? You set up a small business and you are taxed to death. They won’t give you time. They will just shut down your businesses. Its good to build roads. Nobody is taking that a way from him. You don’t just build road and believe you have just build a state. Or you have built an economy. There are things that must come together for those roads to function. You built ecumenical center. Beautiful! We are Christians. Then to what purpose now that u have built? Are u attracting the national Christian body for use. Now, it has become a government hall. That’s not what it should be. Nobody is fighting David Umahi.
Everybody is saying change methods. Factor people in every programme. We are not castigating him. What we want him to do is to move away from construction of concrete to building the people. The truth is that there is need whether in APC or PDP for the governor of Ebonyi State to know that what Ebonyi needs most is developing the people. Not sharing money for God’s sake. With education and health care, Ebonyi will be a great place.
But the governor had earlier raised the alarm after joining APC, that some stakeholders probably your PDP party men were plotting to destabilise the state just to discredit his administration. How true is it?
Well, if the governor raised the alarm that any person in any party or opposition was working to destabilise the state and he was doing that at the point he was defecting to APC, I am sure subject to providing conclusive and reliable evidence, that remains in the realm of politics. It means that from November till now, he could not provide a shred of evidence against any person, whether name or unnamed, it means he was playing on the realm of politics.
The question is: why will it be at a point of his defection that he suddenly realised that the people he was dining and wining with have suddenly become destabilisers? And these are people he has spoken gloriously about. People he had called fathers and brothers and mentors. That’s by the way, he is the Chief Security Officer, he has the information and he should provide it. It is shocking that the governor would want people to be arrested and charged for inciting bandits and killing.
He actually said these are the killers of your men, security men on the basis of such frivolous reasonings as heard in the audio recording. Let him be open and provide his number, I will provide mine. Other PDP members will provide theirs. Let us hand them to, maybe, the National Security Adviser, maybe DSS, let them screen and see who has been talking to the right and wrong persons and will now know who is the one instigating crisis or insecurity in Ebonyi State. So, there’s no evidence, not even one bit of it in all the governor has said, when he decamped, after he decamped and today while he is still in the APC.
Interestingly, peace is gradually returning to the state shortly after the Ebubeagu Security outfit started work but PDP members in the state alleged they are personal militia to fight the opposition members. Is this not alluding to the governor’s claim that insecurity has been politicised in the state, probably by your party?
It is a thing of great joy to learn that peace is gradually returning to the state. We all need peace. We all condemn insecurity. I still condemn any form of insecurity or crises. I condemn it wholeheartedly. But if peace is returning to the state, it is the greatest thing we can get.
Be that as it may, while we pray and I pray for peace and calm to return to the state fully, I disagree completely that any return of peace to the state has any attribution at all to the launch of Ebubeagu. I have not seen any evidence of special efforts made by them. But, first of all, why is Ebubeagu a problem to we in the PDP? It is not a problem to us at all because its a local vigilante.
I have always supported State Police. Indeed, I voted for State Police as a member of House of Representatives during the constitutional amendment. But I hold great exception to the form and structure of Ebubeagu that has been launched hurriedly by Governor David Umahi in Ebonyi State.
He is the chairman of the Southeast Governors Forum. His elder brother is the security consultant in the South east. This Ebubeagu was launched as Southeast security structure but as the driver of the Southeast group, it meant one thing: that there was going to be an understanding, it means there was going to be a law passed in each of the states as announced, or existing ones amended to accommodate a common structure, a uniform, an operational modality, even deployment.
But only two days after, Governor Umahi, without any form of structure, without publishing any law that will guide it, without naming what the structure of Ebubeagu will be in Ebonyi State, without saying who is the Commander General, and so on. He as the governor, rolled at people in a certain uniform and said they were Ebubeagu.
There was widespread outcry saying they look more like the Assemblies of God warders. And he said that has been dissolved and pulled back. Only a few days later, we saw a group of people he said he has launched Ebubeagu in Ebonyi State and suddenly armed. Ebubeagu is not a problem to PDP stakeholders. But everything must be done in a clear and transparent plan.
What law is guiding Ebubeagu? What is their role? If I have a complaint against Ebubeagu, where do I go to complaint? Who is the Commander General? What is the command structure? How are they recruited? What is the vetting process to ensure that those Ebubeagu are not criminals, cultists or past convicts? How did they acquire arms? How are they certified to bear arms? To what use can they put their arms to? These are the issues PDP is talking about. And the governor chose not to answer these clear public interest questions.
You don’t hide the law. You and I should have the law, read it and know when Ebubeagu has violated anybody’s right and know where to report or even go to court. Where is their office? The governor should provide answers to these questions, provide clarification so that people will stop seeing it as his personal militia, that is there to hunt his enemies and opposition. PDP has no problem with Ebubeagu if it is well done.
There is this fear that crises are imminent in Ebonyi PDP ahead of 2023 general election over varied interests especially, as the party has no definite leader that can take or veto some decisions?
Any party that’s a big party that doesn’t have varied interests is not a party. Any large family must have varied interests. But nobody should be worried about our varied interests in PDP. We are more than capable to harmonise our interest and come out stronger and better. The truth is that if we don’t have this varied interests, we will not be able to build a kind of coalition that we need to take back our mandate that was stolen and taken to the APC.
We are on rebuilding struggle and when the time comes, we shall come together as a body of people,who are concerned. We get the result Ebonyi people want. We shall present a candidate in harmony and that candidate shall be our candidate and Ebonyi people, who are PDP will vote that candidate as their candidate and we shall continue from were stopped from the stealing of our mandate to rebuild Ebonyi in the greatest.
Rebuild Ebonyi in the security and welfare of the people and take their interest at heart. And start to provide project and policies that are people-driven. We shall not be a government of deceit. We shall not be a government of promise and fail. It shall be a government, whose word is a bond.
