The Kogi State governorship standard bearer of the Congress for Progressive Change (CPC), Barrister James Ocholi, SAN, is confident of winning the forthcoming election based on the fact that Kogites now vote for personality and not political party.
He believes money and party will fail to win the December elections as electorates are tired of bad governance.
To buttress his conviction, he pointed at the change in voting patterns as witnessed during the last general elections in Kogi State.
“In Kogi, a sitting member of the House of Reps, for instance Aro, Yagba Federal Constituency was on the platform of PDP, he had the support of the governor, but his people overturned him and brought in a novice who did not have money, clout or the structure on ground.”
“ACN did not win any seat in Kogi prior to that time, but they returned Karimi and he is currently in the House. In the same constituency within the same period, when they had another election, they threw away the same PDP man who was an incumbent House of Assembly member, brought in ANPP, Barrister Henry Ojuola from the same constituency within a period of few weeks.”
“So they were not looking at the party, they were looking at the personality. That was the trend in Kogi West and Kogi Central. Buba Jibril who won on the platform of CPC from Kogi and Lokoja constituency was a PDP person. He left PDP primaries, in fact he did not contest the primaries because he saw what was coming. He left and went to CPC and contested. PDP took the incumbent Chairman of Kogi local government at that time to contest with him. This same chairman had the local government money with him; his elder brother was the secretary to the state government of Kogi State.”
With all the paraphernalia of government around them, they lost because of the personality of Buba. I am delighted to note that the trend of voting in Kogi State is shifting from party to personality and I believe that in the next two months, you will see the turn of events.
“In the last election, if you like find out, the gentle man in the House of Reps now from Yagba Federal Constituency did not have a dime. Yet the PDP guy who was in the House and was seeking to return was loaded and the governor supported him with money, he still lost.”
“Look at Senator Smart, the governor did not want him to come. They fought against him from the primaries, did everything to make him lose, they sponsored a commissioner in Ibro’s cabinet against him, but Smart won. Kogi is suffering bad administration and the people have resolved for a credible change. If you visit Kogi, you will feel it.”
