A former Delta State Governor, Dr. Ifeanyi Okowa, has clarified that he never said that he regretted being the vice presidential candidate to Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, the presidential flag bearer of the Peoples Democratic Party in the 2023 election.
Executive Assistant to Governor Sheriff Oborevwori on Public Enlightenment (Projects and Policies), Olisa Ifeajika, spoke for Okowa.
He made the clarification at a press conference in Asaba, the Delta State capital, on Wednesday.
Ifeajika, who was reacting to a report credited to Okowa following an interview with Arise Television on Tuesday, said the reaction was to put the records straight.
He said that it was wrong for whoever put out the report to misrepresent facts, adding that those who took time out to listen to the interview would testify that Okowa never said so.
Ifeajika, who was a Chief Press Secretary to Okowa, said: “The immediate past Governor Okowa never said he regretted being on that ticket with Alhaji Atiku Abubakar.
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“He also did not say that he regretted being the vice presidential candidate of the PDP.
“When Okowa was asked the question of what happened to the PDP, particularly in Delta State as a vice presidential candidate, where it was expected that he would win, what he (Okowa) said was that it was discovered that southern Nigerians appeared to have resolved on having a president of southern extraction.
“And that was what happened.
“During our campaigns, we realised that that was what the people wanted and they got it.
“It was not as if PDP had bad candidates.
“That was why Senator Bola Tinubu won the election and the other person from the South that did well in the presidential election was Mr. Peter Obi.
“It was a justification of that resolve of the people of the south to have a president from the south.”
Ifeajika said that the PDP not winning many votes then from the south was due to a whirlwind, which was then known as “Obident Movement”, through the Labour Party, as the vehicle that came and took everybody by surprise.
He said the people got what they wanted, adding that the lessons learnt from that movement was the need to do some needs assessment on what the people wanted.
He noted that in spite of the discovery that the people of the South had resolved to vote for a southern president, Okowa, being a party man and having been duly nominated as the vice presidential candidate of the PDP, never backed out of the party.
He said though while the people of south were thinking of zoning and power shift, the PDP national opened the platform for all candidates to contest, which saw Abubakar and Okowa emerging as the flag bearers.
Ifeajika said: “Okowa met all the profiles as listed by Atiku and was duly nominated to run as vice presidential candidate in that election.
“As a party man, he could not have left the party.
“He had to work for his party.
“Like Okowa said in the interview, during the campaign, it was obvious that the people in the south had resolved in their minds that they wanted a president from the south.
“So, as much as we tried in our campaign to convince them, it was obvious that they wanted a president from the south.”
Ifeajika said that what was credited to Okowa in the media was most uncharitable and not a representation of what he said during the interview.
He said: “If whoever puts it out there was doing an interpretative reporting, that was a wrong interpretation of what Okowa said.”
On Okowa’s defection to the All Progressives Congress, Ifeajika said that it has nothing to do with the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission invitations and questioning.
He said that Okowa has answered to the petitions and since then the commission has not invited him again because facts presented were not contradictory.
He said: “PDP, if likened to a human being, is seriously haemorrhaging.
“Delta is a case of one family remaining intact.
“Everybody came together to look at the issues and it was agreed unanimously by all stakeholders that the vehicle called PDP at the National was faulting dangerously.
“What happened on Monday, April 28, is not done anywhere in this country and beyond where the entire people in a political party are making a move as a group.”
Ifeajika said that the relationship between the former governors James Ibori and Okowa remained cordial.
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