By Ikhili Ebalu, Benin City
The Edo State chapter of the Peoples Democratic Party, (PDP), on Wednesday, laid to rest the tensions generated by the appointment of the Secretary to the State Government, (SSG) Osarodion Ogie Esq by the governor, saying it was his own prerogative to do that.
Chairman of the party, Mr. Anthony Aziegbemi, said this while briefing newsmen on his party’s assessments of the governor since he pitched tenth with the party.
He said the appointment of the SSG was the best choice made by the governor and that there could have not been other persons fit for such position.
“It is not in our brief as a party to appoint personal aids to the governor. It is his prerogative. Even if he briefed us or not, they are his personal aids.
“We think he did the right thing by appointing the person he appointed.
“You will agree with me that Osarodion Ogie, the SSG Esq is perhaps, the best person for that job and we should trust that the governor will bring the best people to fill positions and so we don’t have any issues whether we were consulted or not and that is not the point.
“We are not interested in rumour mongering, petty talks, cheap talks. We will not do that, we are focused on allowing the governor to deliver the dividends of democracy to Edo people.
“That is our concern and not about what will come into my pocket”, he said.
Mr. Aziegbemi also refuted the claim that the governor has dissolved the party’s structure with the view of instituting his own.
Aziegbemi said he has not been briefed about that by the governor and that such claim should be disregarded.
“We have been hearing that rumour, and I can tell you authoritatively and you can take it to the bank that the governor of the state, His Excellency, Godwin Obaseki is not desirous of dissolving any of the existing party’s structure in the state.
“He has not told me that, when I asked the last time, who has he told? Nobody would tell me but that they are saying is that they said. At this level, we don’t deal on rumour but we deal with fact”, he added.
He said PDP as a party, is ever ready to give the governor the needed support politically to succeed and will not allowed him to be distracted in order for him to deliver on his electioneering campaign promises to the people of the state.
“From the political front, we want absolute quite. Absolute quite is what we want in our political front. We don’t want the governor to be distracted.
“We want him to focus on governing Edo State, on giving Edo people the dividends of democracy that they deserved and so, we have guaranteed him absolute quite on the political front so that he will have all the time in the world to do all the things that he wants to do for Edo people and that is in the interest of the PDP because we want PDP to deliver on the promises we made during the campaign and distracting him with the political games and political distraction, that is not what we envisage by going forward”, he said.