The Peoples Democratic Party on Wednesday alleged that Edo State Governor, Adams Oshiomhole, had begged to join the party.
The spokesperson for the PDP, Olisa Metuh, in a statement made available to journalists, said the governor, on several occasions, begged the leadership of the party to let him defect to the PDP.
Metuh said the governor was, however, consistently turned down by his party.
He urged Oshiomhole “to be bold enough to tell Nigerians how many times he begged to join the PDP but was turned down.”
He added, “The same PDP which Adams went on all fours, begging to join on several occasions has suddenly become the ‘party of rogues’ because of his desperation to justify the massive rigging and democratic aberration that was local government elections in Edo State.
“In 2007, Adams (Oshiomhole) begged to be given an opportunity under the Umbrella but we considered his governorship aspiration an assault on the existing zoning formula in the state and quietly turned him down. Again in 2012, Adams once more came cap in hand and our great party again rejected him.
“Is Adams just realising how bad our party is and was all the while begging for membership?”
Metuh, in the statement, alleged further that rather it was Oshiomhole’s Action Congress of Nigeria that had emerged “the real brood of rogues”, going by its actions in the conduct of local government elections in Lagos, Ogun and Edo states.
He added, “First, Oshiomhole is governor primarily because of the unflinching commitment of the PDP to the rule of law and credible elections. No amount of falsehood by the ACN can obliterate this. Governor Oshiomhole therefore carries a huge moral burden when as the biggest beneficiary of these democratic values guaranteed by the PDP-led Federal Government, he went ahead without scruples to deny his people the opportunity to elect the leaders of their choice.
“It is very needful to remind him that corruption is home to the states under the ACN.”
“Without guessing the disquieting cases of corruption in Edo State, we wish to ask Governor Oshiomhole to explain how less than a seven-kilometre Benin Airport road fraudulently awarded at N6bn is yet to be completed after four years and how N600m was used to change the roof and repaint the walls of Idia College in Benin.”
But Oshiomhole has described the allegations as a lie.
When contacted, the spokesperson for Mr. Oshiomhole, Peter Okhiria, denied that the governor ever tried to join the PDP.
He said, “It is just a big concocted lie. Even if Governor Oshiomhole had contested as an independent candidate, and not on the platform of any party, he would have won; so he didn’t need to join the PDP.”
On the seven-kilometer Benin Airport Road project, Okhiria said the contract got stalled, which forced the governor to revoke the contract. He added that it had since been reawarded to another contractor, who was already working fast to complete the project.
He said, “The project is beyond what people see as it has a lot of underground components which took a lot of time to undertake”.
He also said, “The PDP was also wrong with regards to the collapsed building at the Benin Central Hospital.
“It is not the whole building that collapsed but a small part which has not affected the project at all, but has already been taken care of,” he said.
He however, said he could not confirm if the hospital project was awarded at N2bn as alleged.”
–
Source: Punch
