“Prince Bassey Otu Of APC Could Never Have Employed My services. I Did So On My volution.”

–Obi Ojage

I Singlehandedly, by inner prompting, brought out a candidate in Prince Bassey Otu for Governorship two years ago, when he was never interested or had not made up his mind to run for that office, and started projecting him on all the platforms within my reach to date.

In a series of articles written by me with Senator John Owan Enoh as his proposed deputy, all of who are old members of the All Progressives Congress, (APC), in Cross River State, like me, who were to face extinction, but reluctantly been put in a scale for ratings to meet the standards for acceptance to run for any office by those who defected with the current Governor from the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, to join us in APC.

Amazingly, craftily, and with fierce maneuvering with some collaboration of old members who are in agreement, we took over ninety percent of the entire party structure offices from the ward, LGA chapters, and State executive committees with which they (the decampees) intended to do as they chose with it.

These were the forces I stood against in the course of my insistence of having Prince Bassey Otu as the anointed one, using all means available to me as an old member for someone who was considered the best amongst those hankering to be endorsed from the South as a candidate of the party.

So appalling.

It’s indeed a laughable thing for anyone to accuse me now of impersonating the office of Media Director of a candidate I persuaded to bring to the public for marketing and acceptance both in the media and in public discourses with those I now believe are hypocrites who challenged my convictions of a Prince whom they all have said was moral and financially deficit.

I pray the Lord would judge us individually, especially those who are fond of reaping where they did not sow in the course of which they have to undo others to take their place or take pride in telling lies to twist justice.

And those who show ingratitude to persons who help them on the path simply because they’ve found the way out. The burden is on them not me. There is always another time.

I do not look for earthly credit nor seek to undo people to attain positions undue for my capacity and endeavors.

But credit does not leave me, Obi. I am overly satisfied with how fair nature has treated me so far, to see myself among the living.

I needn’t ask for more than nature can give at a time. There is hope that something favorable will still lock at the end of the tunnel, if we stay and observe without compromising our resolve, something must give.

Let’s wait and see. I am a “knower”, not a believer. I know my Redeemer lives.

Firstly, I hereby withdraw my involvement in Prince Bassey Otu’s group in the areas I held sway in the public eye, to allow hawks, and weathercock to have their way, for me to gain back my sanity and compass to navigate in the direction of my destiny in politics, whether or not that suits the time and tide, we wait to see.

I wish all those involved, luck. And I do hope they would learn to keep my name out of their discussions and fears. I withdraw in peace. No hard feelings.

I can no longer stand the level of ingratitude that smashes down on my efforts and good intentions in projecting to my numerous audiences and ardent readers of my articles on social media platforms, a project I thought had the touch of the Lord of Host, but I lie as I can no longer substantiate such claims.

Where surrogates and embittered souls are now employed to pay for my good done with evil.

The counter statements both from one Ekanem Essien and Akiba who says he was Prince Otu’s media aid were to the effect that I was impersonating the office of the Director of media for Otu whom I have all along been projecting on the same social media known to all as his image maker, which they now claim I am not, over my rebuttal in a press statement which I signed for the first time in that capacity, against an unwarranted attack of the said Essien on Senator Sandy Ojang Onoh who is the gubernatorial candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party, the PDP, in Cross River.

The attack, in the nature, it was phrased seems personal and was unprovoked and especially coming from someone who had not identified himself with us in Prince Otu’s group to be engaged in such an incisive act contrary to our beliefs, which could have been carried out only by a malnourished insensitive attack-dog so-called, engaged usually by a losing political party in an election believed lost.

Coincidentally, that took place a few days from when Prince Otu and I had spoken on phone extensively where I expressed my fears concerning what was happening in the field to his image where they were numerous complaints by those who admire his candidacy amongst the voting public about his inability to take initiative to be seen as one standing on his own, to give them confidence that he would be himself should they vote for him to win and not one being teleguided or one poised to advance a failed project of the outgoing administration characterized by innuendos.

My good friend, Mr. Emmanuel Ironbar with whom we were working tirelessly has now graduated from one canvassing and arranging meetings of likeminded fellows to a Director General of “PRINCE IS COMING” and they’re going about inaugurating the group across the state, while the “one man rioter,” who was doing the whole media projection, propagation, arguments amongst a whole gambit who were opposed to the Prince, invoking of historical records of what the new deal entails and why it should be Prince Bassey Otu and not others from the South.

Right now, the person has been framed and kept asunder ascribed to the Lord’s doing. And Ironbar is waxing. It is truly marvelous in the eyes, isn’t, it?

Simply because that office will soon attract a budget with a certain amount allocated from the pool to it for operation when the campaigns start in earnest.

Therefore, Obi Ojage, the man in the eyes of the storm, must not be the one who should handle it.

It should be but an Odukpani person or the numerous ladies bidding for it, forgetting that without the first accomplishment of being the party’s candidate, all of these misjudgment and fanfare wouldn’t have happened.

Prince who is now the candidate for governorship on the platform of the All Progressives Party, APC, in Cross River State, never employed me.

His was a project we both agreed to embark on, a few of us, the majority of who were those he gave names to the governor to be made SA’s, like Emmanuel Ironbar whose responsibility was to reach out to those who were his supporters during previous elections.

All of us were rooting for him as the candidate suitable for the job.

For me, I have a small office annexed to the uncompleted compound I built with my own money, where I stay in my village at Ediba, Qua town, in Calabar municipality, to practice my devotion to the Lord my God and engaged in rehearsals over my profession to make perfect what I do.

And I am doing great. I am never a lazy mind. Whatever I get as proceeds for work done, I take and thank the Lord and life goes on.

Those who are capable of being my helpers are usually open to gossip from my enemies and rivals who run faster ahead of me to feed them with a series of blackmails against my radical posturing and term that for weakness.

My initial ambition was to be made a Cabinet Minister in the current administration of General Mohammadu Buhari or a member of a viable Federal Board, just the same as I was during former President Olusegun Obasanjo’s regime, which failed after all I did in my defense of the President, General Buhari.

As my contribution to stabilizing his government. Those usually who show, such extensive commitment and inside as I did in defense of the president and his programs against those of his unfair critics of both his person and policies get compensated adequately everywhere in the world where government or democracy exists.

Barrister Festus Keyamo (SAN) for example is now a cabinet minister, who got a ministerial appointment in Buhari’s Government, didn’t display as much outburst in defense of General Buhari as I did to get himself appointed as a minister.

Tribal sentiments were brought in, in my case by the handlers of the President’s image at the presidency, encouraged by a few jealous elements from my state who were preview to it, who deliberately refused to draw the President’s attention to my activities carried out in his favour, because I was not from a certain tribe.

All the so-called big political gurus in APC here in Cross River State have their help from outside the state, less they brag.

They all go to Chief Rotimi Ameachi either for financial help or Federal appointments, name them.

But I refused to visit, text, or call the former minister as of right as a citizen and party stalwart.

Ameachi is General Buhari’s arrowhead any day, whose phone numbers I have, yet I possess the most credible documentation to show Chief Ameachi of my commitments as an ardent General Buhari person, what many describe as BUHARIST.

I am acclaimed, so far, to be the most vociferous defender of Chief Ameachi’s principal General Buhari, in this part of the country, with numerous published articles to my credit in the social and traditional media outfits, where I challenged personalities who take to malign the President’s hard-earned reputation to please members of the public that they mean well.

Those I joined issues with for heaping insults on Mr. President were Bishop Matthew Hassan Kukah though of my Catholic faith, Governor Samuel Ortom of Benue State, Chief Femi Fani-Kayode, Reverend Father Ejike Mbaka, Chief Dele Momodu, Chief Mike Abu Ozekhome (SAN), Mr. Omoyele Sowore, the foolish fugitive-rascal called Reno Omokri, and a host of others too numerous to mention here.

The articles are in the public domain if one googles it.

I deliberately refused to go to Chief Rotimi Ameachi for assistance or a federal appointment in his office, abode, in Abuja or Port-Harcourt whom I hear has been very generous to our people who seek his help, to avoid the situation where these hawks and chop alone, from Cross River wouldn’t go there to block Obi Ojage, using blackmail to get more favours.

Instead, I decided to retrieve to vie for the post of National Publicity Secretary of the party on merits which came up in a convention at Abuja and had worked assiduously towards that, only for the state again, this time it is the state government, who surfaced in the most inconsiderate manner, took to the spotlight to scuttled my efforts in broad daylight for something I have been working towards way back before the defection of the current state governor and those he came over with from the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), who insisted on having the position of National Women Leader from amongst those he came with in place of National Publicity Secretary of the party zoned to the South-South, which is made up of Cross River, Rivers, Akwa Ibom, Bayelsa, and Edo states.

The All Progressives Congress, (APC) to which I have been a loyal member from when I joined it, sorry to say, does not reward loyalty or those fervent to its course as it has turned out to be for those of us who have lingered to the end of Buhari’s tenure with nothing to show for it, but are bystanders to those indolent blackmailers living big, especially those who come under the endorsement of alleged corrupt men and women who adorn the whole space feigning to be supporting President Buhari whereas they are those who disrespect Mr. President and the law the most; rendering those of us who have his course at heart, foolish, frustrated and bewildered the way things are.

They do things that bring public opprobrium to his humbleness and love for the country, being innocent of their dereliction and perfunctory.

All of that is now playing out in the country before our own eyes.

Laughable as the statement was, where I was accused of impersonation and sent to all the local platforms to disconcert my person, I tried to ignore it hoping Prince Otu whom they said authorized it, or those around him like Emmanuel Ironbar, who know my involvement in issues relating to Otu’s image and publicity, would call them to order, but none of that was done.

It means they agreed with it because I was not from Odukpani.

It was the height of idiocy for one to accuse me to have impersonated an office where none was in existence nor anybody acting in that capacity anywhere but me, who has all along been doing the job of a publicist of Otu’s image, and who is known to the party and the reading public of being the media-personified for Prince Bassey Otu’s aspirations, even when he had not decided on running for Governor.

Even more worrisome was the fact that Prince Otu made the pronouncement to an audience during a dinner organized in his honour in Calabar recently, which he invited me to attend.

They’re witnesses to attest to that incident. I can’t imagine what this portrays, honestly. If you do not show somebody true love, you can’t know the person deeply enough to differ from the general opinions held of him by the public or experience the other side of him unknown to people.

All the attacks on Prince Otu by those opposed to his aspirations had my prompt reply to them, including the recent attacks on him regarding the certificate issue taken to court and the news being re-amplified as a stunt by Owan Enoh’s men – all had counter-responses by me with painstaking rejoinders with convincing facts that were admired by all.

My responses were published in over 13 social media/online platforms across the country where I used my money to do that, including but not limited to the AYADE ADVOCATE, a platform where I feature as a regular writer, columnist, if you like; for free, all to the admiration of Otu himself.

Nobody else was doing that but Obi Ojage.

Those articles are all there on the internet. Let every one of those party men and women generating a hell of a noise, pandering today for Prince Otu, come over with whatever they wrote either in support of Prince Otu’s candidacy, before and after the party’s primaries or present arguments put in writing or interviews rendered, where they had stated his suitability for the job exclusively.

They all were rather busy trying to squeeze money out of either Engr. Ben Akak, Mr. Asuquo Ekpenyong, Arch. Etubom Bassey Eyo Ndem, Engr. Nsa Ekpenyong, or the other aspirants from the South.

They dared not go to Senator Owan Enoh who had a mass following of die-hards. Or to the Chief Chris Agara, who had money enough to keep, aside from what he could afford to lose, even when it was alleged that he complained bitterly to the party authorities conducting the primaries about the absence of the delegates list which was not made available to contestants at the venue.

He however was ready to use that to pay for delegates’ votes whoever they were worth to win, as is the tradition.

There are no pranks. We are politicians. Doors are opened to those with a capacity and zest, not complexities.

Very few persons can endure the conspiracy, backbiting, and blackmail I go through in APC because of my uprightness, seeing white as it is not saying it is black.

And my insistence to have those who are credible and resourceful come on board to enable us to win, not like those looking for what to “chop” first. That will be done, when the deed is done.

It is not over, not until it is over and the deed is done, talk is cheap.

Galvanizing all over the places, adorned by shylocks and wolves, is only one step; the matter is more than just an assumption, I bet you. I have seen the worst, anything can happen.

End Time Message!

GOD WITH US…

PART 2 CONTINUED HERE

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