Political strategist and member of the Delta State APC Campaign Council, Kenny Okolugbo, says the party is focusing on issue-based campaigns and grassroots mobilisation to secure electoral victory for President Bola Tinubu and Governor Sheriff Oborevwori.
Speaking during an interview on ARISE News on Tuesday, Okolugbo said the campaign council was concentrating on delivering its candidates, while acknowledging the challenges posed by dissatisfied party members and opposition figures.
“Personally, the campaign council is not taking the elections for granted. That is why I said, for now, we are concentrating on that first election.”
He said the party was aware of the influence of former APC members contesting against its candidates, noting that their political experience could not be dismissed.
“Victor Ochei has been a former speaker in Delta State and has been a three-time member of the House of Assembly. So you can’t wish him away in terms of his campaigns. Senator Ovie Omo-Agege, I talked about, has not only been deputy senate president, he has won elections twice as a member of the senate. And so you just cannot wish him away.”
Okolugbo said the governor was addressing concerns about dissatisfied party members who might not support APC candidates in the National Assembly elections.
“But you see, what the governor is saying here is that, look, let us focus on all the APC candidates. We don’t really like the fact that a lot of people are there who are dissatisfied, who would not maybe want to vote for the candidates of the party at the senate or the House of Reps. Those are the issues the governor is dealing with at the moment.”
He said the campaign council was urging supporters to concentrate on delivering the president and governor, while taking their campaign activities to the grassroots.
“I just want to vote for the president and vote for the governor.”
“I can’t be sitting in Abuja and expect that I’m going to win my unit. You must go back to your unit. You must go back to your ward and tell them what you are doing.”
Okolugbo said the campaign would also highlight projects and government interventions in communities, citing his own efforts to attract federal government projects to his area.
“For example, I will tell you that in Delta, I for one, just sitting down here, I was able to attract a federal government presence in my own community of over three billion Naira. And some of them have been completed. And I have the facts to show.”
He said the campaign council was encouraging supporters to showcase government projects and explain their impact to voters.
“Those are the things the government is asking us to showcase. When I sit with my people, I will showcase those things and ask them, have you ever seen this before? So why would you want to go to the poll and expect that you feel the same man who was able to bring in these things?”
Okolugbo also cited the Niger Delta Development Commission as an example of projects the campaign could highlight, saying the current administration was driving its activities across the region.
“Yes, NDDC was brought in by PDP, which was my former party. But Samuel Ogbuku, who is doing so well in NDDC, that has ravaged the whole of the Niger Delta State project, was appointed by Bola Ahmed Tinubu and is an APC-led government that is driving the NDDC that is doing all they’re doing in Delta and in Bayelsa and in rivers and in Akwa Ibom and in every other places.”
He said the campaign would use such interventions to promote the administration’s agenda and its candidates.
“So such things are the things we are going to campaign with. The government says it clearly, and I believe him, that if he starts commissioning projects, he will keep commissioning projects up until December.
“I don’t take any contracts from Oborevwori. He doesn’t pay me. But it is the things that we have seen that he has done. Those are the things that have driven us to support Governor Oborevwori and the vision he has had to continue the MORE agenda based on the support of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu.”
Faridah Abdulkadiri
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