One is always shocked at the barrages of obscenity coming from a section of the polity of Edo, the prided ‘heartbeat state’ of Nigeria. For I woke up again to the unwarranted verbal and written twaddle primitively meted out on Edo State State governor, Senator Monday Okpebholo and the Director General of the European African Chamber of Commerce and Industries (EACCI), Amb. (Dr) Kingsley Obasohan, who by coincidence is from the state. Also, Dr. Loretta Oduware Ogboro-Okor, Director General of the Edo State Diaspora Agency (ESDA), who is also an illustrous daughter of Edo, was not spared by the guileful hecklers.
Reasons for the undue attacks? Governor Okpebholo and Mrs Ogboro-Okor, are publicly assaulted because Dr Obasohan’s EACCI approved a $250 million worth of investment funding for Edo State. Whereas, the attackers without genuine reasoning, doubted the genuineness and propriety of the offer. The state government and the EACCI, were said to have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU). These happened at the just concluded Edo State Global Investment Summit, which was attended by the governor and others, as organised by Dr Ogboro-Okor and her ESDA, in Glasgow, Scotland.
Governor Okpebholo, Dr Obasohan and Mrs Ogboro-Okor’s attacks were spearheaded by a former commissioner under the immediate-past governor of the state, Mr Godwin Obaseki, whose era is widely upheld as having failed to provide the basic needs for the people, and his administration was marred by needless crises and anti-people policies. The same former commissioner, still want the new government of Okpebholo to continue with the disastrous policies of the government he had served. Now, he congregates his social media attackers to flare up public tension.
Indeed, I brought about the outcome of the $250 million investment fund, by bringing together Dr. Obasohan and Dr. Ogboro-Okor, in my continuous moves to attract external funding to uplift the Edos and Nigerians at large. The opportunity to broker the synergy for Edo, my state of origin, was only fueled by what I knew about the dynamic nature of these two illustrious Nigerians of Edo extraction.
Few decades ago, as an activist who built students watchdog-actions and civil society coalition outreach to university campuses, I met with Comrade Obasohan, then a committed activist, who was a lawyer-in-training at the University of Benin (UNIBEN). For decades, he furthered his education overseas, before serving in key positions at the United Nations (UN) and as Board Chairman of the National Agricultural Mechanization Cooperative of Nigeria (NAMCON) etc., before his appointment to the current position in April, 2025.
Miss Lorretta Oduware, as she was called decades ago, was a student conservationist, who made her marks, including winning a crucial national prize in environmental conservation, in a competition organized by the Nigerian Conservation Foundation (NCF), a foremost nature conservation NGO in the country. As one of the founders and a volunteer for NCF’s activities, Mrs Ogboro-Okor, had also gone through the mills, having been trained and had worked as a Consultant Gynaecologist. She is about concluding her PhD in Law and Criminology. Her flair for humanitarian work is noteworthy as she had given much to the Nigerian diaspora activities, which always gladdens the heart of Mrs Abike Dabiri-Erewa, the former newscaster diva, who has etched a name through her commendable activities as Director General of the Nigeria Diaspora Commission (NiDCOM)
Yet, these are illustrious Nigerians and Edos, who some ‘daylight witches and wizards of Edo’, want diminished because their preoccupation is to create wickedness and celebrate the bad news, where there are none. This will never be!
Interestingly, because I have been convinced that Senator Okpebholo is unassuming and naturally dedicated to a just-public-cause, I had moved several steps further to help the cause of his government and the people, in my own little ways. His current fight against unwholesome practices, with the relentless fights against cultism, kidnapping, land grabbing and other criminality, are some bold steps intended to soften that hardened society and usher in the needed foreign investments.
Ordinarily, the $250 million fund, provided by the EACCI, is meant to alleviate poverty, youth unemployment and enforce skill development in the state. It is to cover five key development areas as Agriculture and Processing, Mining, Technical/Entrepreneurial Education, Capacity/Skill Building and Safe Water Provision etc. The Chamber have similar ongoing projects in several African countries for a start, and other projects being initiated with the Federal Government of Nigeria.
Realising that some state governors and others have been scrambling to have the projects brought to their states and others, I had long started to work for a synergy between the Edo Diaspora Agency and the EACCI. No one in Edo seemed to have known or even cared about how the state could tap into such golden opportunities that could better the state. Yet, many are busy and happy to castigate those who now brought the projects to them. In Edo, partisan politics had gone beserk, as it it often defines and destroy everything that makes life easier.
Dr. Obasohan was to have travelled down to the Scotland summit as one of its keynote speakers, but had had to stay behind in Nigeria, to attend to several impromptu meetings with the Navy, ministers of Aviation, Arts and Culture, and Agriculture etc. There were on-site project visits with some of the Chamber’s local project implementation partners, that had just been inaugurated.
Obasohan was only restricted to participate in the summit remotely, via the Zoom. And why should he be chided for doing the right thing to announce the $250 million funding approved by his home-office? He is hardly aware of political developments in his home state, let alone taking a side. Why is he maltreated over their political differences over human development which knows no poilitical boundaries?
But in Edo, because some people are lazy and think no other way to meaningful life’s engagement than bitter politics and easy money, there is a frenzy and delusion that the $250 million was meant to be shared by politicians and civil servants, like in the pasts. But it can’t be so where this huge funding is for concrete investment, and the investors would insist that it meet the set targets.
Now, how did Governor Okpebholo, Dr Obasohan and Mrs Ogboro-Okor erred whereas their intent is to bail the hapless people from the manacles of poverty, deprivation and despairs? I ask because the appalling turn of event is where idle politicians and their goons, attempt to turn “heroes to hate”.
Pointedly, why would Dr. Obasohan be bothered that some jobless persons are sulking and cursing over some projects meant to ameliorate their own sufferings, when they are known to be the crocodile who eats her own eggs? Yes, he can’t look beyond the enormous work of ministering to the needs of the 98 countries of Europe and Africa, that are under his jurisdiction, to be bothered about the concocted battles waged from his birthplace that is a mere ‘semi-column’ in a large page of his official responsibility.
I am not an image maker for EACCI, nor for Edo State Diaspora Agency, nor Governor Okpebholo’s. I am not a politician neither do I have allegiance to a political party or their chieftains. I am simply a slave to my conscientious precepts and examples, knowing fully well that the worth of a man is only measured by what he does in the secret, knowing that he wouldn’t be found out.
Tony Erha, a development journalist and activist, could be reached at tonyerha@gmail.com
