The race to occupy Rivers state Government House come 2019 has just began and serious politicians are working day and night positioning their chosen candidate for their political party Governorship primary election and subsequently for the eventual General elections come February 2019. In light this seasoned politicians like chief ALLWELL HEANACHO ONYESOH of All Progressive Congress-APC is a man many Rivers state citizens and residents fear most in ability to predict accurately who wins what political positions and who gets what electoral votes in a Free and Fair electoral Poll cum contest, hence his nick name “OCTOPUS”. Since he participated in the 1993 National Republican Convention-NRC Etche Local Government Area Chairmanship position and won and his ability to have won Etche State constituency 2 Rivers state House of Assembly election and won under United Nigerian Congress Party-UNCP in 1998 prior to the death of late General Sani Abacha, Chief Allwell Heanacho Onyesoh is a Household name in Rivers state politics.
His participation in the 1999 Civilian political activities led to his pitching tent with Dr Peter Odili’s RESTORATION TEAM a political pressure group which metamorphosed into Peoples Democratic Party-PDP and this graduate of Communications Studies from University of Jos 1982 had served as Rivers state Commissioner for Education from 1999 to 2003 and Rivers state Commissioner For Sports from 2003 to 2007 with proven laurels and legacy projects executed under his watch in the various Ministries he had headed.
On Tuesday, 14th November, 2017 he played host to TOWNCRIER.NG
QUE: How do you look at APC in Rivers state in 2019 where PDP is in power?
Very dispassionately PDP is strong in the state and APC is equally very strong in the state and in 2019 victory will go either way. The party that realizes the importance of victory will win. And what do I mean by that you will allow internal democracy and you must allow people to come out and express their views as too much of manipulative tendencies will spell doom for either of these parties and that is what will determine who wins. So, for me without being a party member now being me and being a Nigerian and being a political Analyst Rivers State can go to either APC or PDP depending on how things play out and depending on how people manipulate or otherwise.
QUE: Let us talk about the Governorship position and internal democracy in selecting who will be flag bearer for the political parties. What is your take on this?
Well, PDP I guess would not have any problem because there is an incumbent who I believe for them and for most people believe has done well so he stays, You want to know who will be Governor, I am coming to tell you how the Governor will emerge so there is one already standing for PDP and waiting and if you come to APC this is a personal view we do not have a good standing party executive because we were a party that was to absolve people leaving another party it was like to serve as the platform for people who were about leaving a formidable platform like PDP, it has to house us so very little consideration was given to picking up appropriate individuals to run the party and so somehow we got individuals who did not know how to run party in fact not individuals we got the leadership especially the top echelon who were running political party for the first time and if you ask me it could have been better. And how that had faired, I could have preferred I leave that for the party and the public to look on between the periods they assumed office and now I leave that to the public to look at. I believe that a lot more will need to be done and I also believe that good spirited people in the party are working dispassionately to ensure that the party wins while others are playing politics with victory some persons have positioned themselves for offices without working hard. And somehow some individuals or individual who claims to be Leaders of the party is busy weakening the party by removing strong Leaders and putting Kindergartens as Leader a few months away from the election. How that will also play out we will find out.
QUE: You said For the Governorship election in 2015 APC put up a weak candidate, due to lack of internal party democracy as somebody was picked based on consensus. You have never supported any candidate that had lost election. What is your take on this?
That is where I am coming to. Now having all of that now we have lost. The few things that came to us they have shared it among themselves as one is Minister, the other one is Director General and another is Executive Director and all of that and they have all retired to Abuja and Lagos respectively and they are playing big Boys and they are using it to do some manipulative activities and tendencies in the party and we felt that that will never grow the party and it will not grow the party. The next thing is the public spirited ones from the party those of us who would want the party to win we have decided and looked at the whole thing dispassionately and work for the true success of the party without anybody coming to tell us that this man is going to be this or that man is going to be that …the days for that are gone and forever it will never come back. And we no longer want any man to come and appropriate my Party membership Card, where I own the Card, but you will decide what my card should represent it won’t work we want a situation where if you think that you are strong go and back somebody and at the end of the day if he gets the nod of the party we will back him up. But if you think that you can sit somewhere and meanwhile the one you have made us fail the last time and you are busy enjoying the profit of what the other members of the party from other parts of the country brought on board and you have lost your state that you are busy enjoying that and you are still thinking that you are a good politician… some even think that they are Lions. Time for that is gone we want to be authentic; we want people to come out and show working what they say in local parlance. And for me I will think that we have a candidate but for me I will go for Senator Magnus Abe.
QUE: What are the qualities that you see in Senator Magnus Abe that you are insisting…are you not dictatorial?
No, I am not insisting, I said that I will vote, so, that is not dictatorship and I am entitled to have an opinion and if other people come and join me to have the same opinion of course we will win. The question in Politics is that it is not like Football where you say there is a draw Algeria scored 1 and Nigeria scored 1. No drawn Game here somebody must win. So, if I say that Magnus Abe is good and in a properly organized free and fair Governorship primary election and he comes up and wins so he goes. So I think that here in Rivers state Magnus Abe is so exorbitantly experienced as I met him first in Politics when we were elected during late General Sani Abacha’s UNCP he was elected to Represent Gokana into Rivers State House of Assembly we became friends and I noticed that he was intelligent and he is still intelligent. During the one that General Abdulsalami Abubakar dissolved he was so sparkling in his contributions as he later on went and contested election in 1999 I went for PDP and he went under All Peoples party-APP and he became Minority Leader in Rivers state House of Assembly. He was so nice and outstanding so much that Governor Peter Odili went and hunted for him and we got him to PDP and Odili went on to make him Commissioner For Information. And how he also performed as a journalist in this state, you can judge him as he performed creditably very well. He went on to become Secretary –To- State Government-SSG during Governor Amaechi’sfirst administration and before you know it they retained him and some of us the brain Boxes of that administration. That he was chief brain box of that administration. And he went on to the Senate at a time the Petroleum industry was having a problem and he sat over the sanitization of that Industry and today he is back there and they have given him The Road Maintenance . He is square peg in a Square hole if you give him any role he plays it well. He is very humble. His level of humility is very infectious. That shows you how diverse the man is. He is extra ordinarily popular and his area remains the only area where APC won all the seats except one seat.