Why we formed governorship candidates forum –Ufomba

[SunNews]

By Vincent Kalu

A political group, Governorship Candidates Forum of Nigeria (GCOFN), has berthed. All Progressive Grand Alliance (APGA) Imo State gubernatorial candidate in 2011, Ochiagha Reagan Ufomba, spearheads this forum. He spoke with Daily Sun. Excerpts:

What is the idea behind the Governorship Candidates Forum of Nigeria?

The idea is to associate freely in line with the Nigerian constitution, under a body of candidates who participated in previous elections, so as to get involved in the political equation of Nigeria.  There is a lot of redundancy in the rank and file of governorship candidates, amounting to non utilization of human capacity in the Nigeria project. You run an election with your vision, manifesto, support and maybe you come second in an election and we know there is no second position – it is the winner takes all.

Of course, history vindicates me that it has been a case of winner takes all. The Nigerian state doesn't care how much this man spent to run this election. It doesn't matter what vision he has and how he can contribute to the development of the state, or the country. Nobody cares about him and in most cases most of our colleagues don't even care about themselves. We think that at this point it is necessary for us to come under one umbrella to articulate a common position, common agenda and most importantly, to contribute our quota towards the political development of Nigeria.

What do Nigerians stand to benefit from the forum?

Greater participation by men of vision and character in the political affairs of Nigeria. What they get to benefit are numerous. For once, people who supported you would be given a sense of belonging; they would get to know, hear and understand that all the candidates they supported are now having a say in their affairs, in what concerns them, in the political development of Nigeria and so, we didn't lose everything.

After all, we can be heard, and this leads to greater loyalty and patriotism to the Nigerian nation.  We are not going to be beggarly about this. We have a stake in the polity of Nigeria. We should take advantage of our numerical strength and if possible, control the temperature, the pulse and even the political flow. In every state where you have a governor, you have over 20 governorship candidates and we want to harness this to our advantage.  Politics is a game of number and if you have good 20 political heads with 20 good structures in a state I think we are a force to reckon with, and the Nigerian state will be better for it.

You talked about a state having about 20 governorship candidates. Out of this number only about three are always serious contenders, the rest are pretenders.

You definitely cannot beat this by semantics or certain presumptions. I do not know what you mean by pretenders, but I know for any man to wake up and say that he wants to contest for that exalted position of governor means first, he must have the political will, he must have the political base and some political, economic and social vision.  No matter the way people look at it, you can say that some are in a better position to win, while others do not have that capacity to win.  However, whatever that motivates ' A' must be different from what motivates ' B' and that is the difference. If you ask me further, the motivation should be altruistic sense of service.

Are you clamouring for an all-inclusive government, that is, if a governor emerges, he should carry all the losers along?

No, that is a secondary issue. No, we are talking of the Nigerian state though not a bad idea. Primarily, you see that the country is drifting. A lot of political talks, upheavals and crises here and there, we want to lend our political voices. We have people of substance who have aspired to contribute their quota in the political firmament of Nigeria and the voices of these men no matter how laudable or credible are not heard. We want to tell Nigerians that things can be done differently, that we can have a crisis free society, a society free from kidnapping, a society that is secured, prosperous, a society that provides for the youths, the unemployed and the aged. That is what we are clamouring for- a better Nigeria. It is not about some selfish interests. It is about a society that must not run you down if it cannot lift you up.

All these things you are clamouring for how do you go about them without executive powers?

What I like about Nigeria is that we do not run a dictatorship. Nigeria is a democracy and democracy is a game of numbers and as such, we have the numerical strength to determine the political flow in every state.  That is our strength and we are going to utilise that to the fullest. Thank God, that the response has been so wonderful. So far, we have over 500 politicians that have enlisted and more are still calling and sending their details and with time, we are going to determine the temperature and the political pulse of Nigeria.

Some of the candidates may already be working with their respective state governors. For them, would it not be the case of being for the governor in the day and GCFON in the night?

We do not want to be misunderstood. We are not out to fight our governors or anybody. You see, people try to see politics as a clandestine thing, something that you are either a winner or a loser.  That is not the intention, the intention is that we should have an umbrella that can serve as the mouthpiece for all such people that contested election who lost either fairly or were rigged out. For us to have a prosperous Nigeria, every Nigerian must be a winner at all times.

Most of our members today who are not in government houses are the right people to occupy those places but because we have a flawed society, flawed administration and flawed INEC, leading to flawed elections, the people's wish and will didn't prevail.

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