Dickson and the Sylva lining in Yenagoa By Dare Babarinsa

Sylva

WHICHEVER way the election goes on Saturday,
December 5, Bayelsa State would end up with an
old face in the Government House. The two
leading candidates are the incumbent Governor
Seriake Dickson of the Peoples Democratic Party
(PDP) and his challenger, Chief Timipre Sylva of
the All Progressives Congress (APC).
Politicians live for elections and that is when they
have their periodic life and death experiences.
One of the two candidates would suffer political
death experience while the winner would have a
new lease of life. So is it with politics.
Sylva is Dickson immediate predecessor in office
and like Dickson he was elected on the platform
of the PDP. Since 1999 when Chief Diepreye
Alamieyeseigha was sworn in as the first elected
governor, no chief executive of Bayelsa State has
successfully completed two terms. If Dickson
wins, he would be on the threshold of history.
Alamieyeseigha won a second term in 2003 only
for him to be severed from power when he was
impeached in 2005 by the hitherto pliable Bayelsa
State House of Assembly over corruption charges.
His deputy, Dr. Goodluck Ebele Jonathan, won the
nomination to contest for second term in 2007
only for him to become the vice-presidential
candidate to Governor Umar Musa Yar’Adua of
Katsina State in the 2007 presidential elections.
Jonathan was our Vice-President for two years
and President for four years. He is home now in
Otuoke, Bayelsa State as the latest member of the
club of former Presidents. Sylva, who succeeded
Goodluck as governor, was not even allowed by
the party fathers to contest for the nomination of
the PDP in 2012. Now he is back trying his luck
on the ticket of the APC.
Bayelsa State prides itself as the home of the
Izons (Ijaws) who dominate the coastline of
Nigeria from the East of Ondo State to Akwa
Ibom State. Versatile and creative, they were
noted to be egalitarian in nature. Bayelsa State
was part of the old Eastern Region until 1967
when General Yakubu Gowon created Rivers State
as one of the 12-state structure on the eve of the
Nigerian civil war. An Izon from Bayelsa, Afred
Diette-Spiff, became the first military governor of
old Rivers State in 1967 and he was in office until
Gowon was toppled in 1975. He is now a
traditional ruler in Bayelsa. General Sani Abacha
created Bayelsa State from Rivers in 1996 and
sent in Phillip Ayeni, a naval captain, to be the
first military administrator. With the coming of
Ayeni, the capital Yenagoa, unprepared and
somnolent, was visited by the din of new
constructions and frenetic movements.
Now Yenagoa has put on a new toga and Creek
Haven, as the Governor’s Lodge is called, is
preparing for another tenant. If Dickson wins, he
would be the first ruler of Bayelsa that would
belong to an opposition party. The late Chief
Melford Okilo, who was elected first civilian
governor of old Rivers State in 1979, was a
member of the ruling National Party of Nigeria.
Since 1999 when democratic rule was restored,
all those who have governed Bayelsa, including
the two acting governors, were from the then
ruling PDP. Now PDP is in opposition and
Dickson is flying its flag.
The elite of Bayelsa always love to belong to the
ruling party at the centre. That is one of the
attractions of Sylva candidacy. He has fought his
way to win the party nomination against stiff
opposition from old members and returnees from
the PDP and disturbing debris from his last tour
of duty as governor. Sacked from power by the
Supreme Court in 2012, Sylva was hounded from
Yenagoa by loyalists of the then President,
Jonathan. Detained and then dragged before the
court by the Economic and Financial Crimes
Commission, EFCC, the former governor lobbied
hard to get a reprieve from Jonathan but to no
avail. The court later freed him of all charges,
citing tardiness by the EFCC. Now there is a silver
lining to his cloud and his rallies across the state
continue to attract new converts and old friends.
Timing may work in Sylva’s favour. If the
governorship election had been held a year ago,
the outcome would have been more predictable
in favour of Dickson. Then Jonathan was in
power, the PDP was a formidable party and
Alamieyeseigha was alive. Dickson, unlike his
three elected predecessors, now has to contend
with a divided house of the PDP. Unlike past
elections since 2003, PDP is no longer in power in
Abuja. Therefore, the influence of Abuja on
Bayelsa politics in favour of the local branch of
the PDP has diminished. Indeed, Abuja, now in
the grip of the new ruling APC, is in favour of
Sylva. The giant umbrella of the old PDP has
shrunk with the diminished influence of its Abuja
godfathers and many of its old faithful are
looking for shelters in another direction.
I believe it is the now modest influence of the old
Abuja godfathers that accentuated the divisions
and infighting within the PDP. This is affecting
the speed and potency of the Dickson campaign.
The PDP at the centre also seems to be seething
from its defeat in the presidential election. No
longer could the leaders of the PDP in the South-
South like Chief Tony Anenih and the self-style
“father of the President,” Chief Edwin Clark, be of
any significant help.
One deciding factor, too, is the reluctance of
former President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan to join
and lead the campaign train of Governor
Dickson. Jonathan has left no one in doubt that
Dickson is his favourite candidate. He has openly
endorsed him and has spoken at every
opportunity in support of his candidacy.
However, he has rarely moved out of his
retirement lair in Otuoke to campaign for
Dickson. Yet, Jonathan needs a Dickson victory to
confirm his continue relevance and dominance in
Bayelsa State politics.
But even if he chooses to join the campaign, as he
did recently during the mega rally in Yenagoa,
his loss of the presidential elections this year has
robbed Jonathan of the halo of power. Somerset
Maugham once stated: “A general without an
army is a tamed hero of a market town.” No
longer could Jonathan’s whispered command
move an army into battle. He is learning, like
American President John Kennedy did after the
Bay of Pigs fiasco in Cuba that “failure is an
orphan, but success has a thousand fathers.”
One key ally that is also missing on the campaign
train is Alamieyeseigha. Despite his disgrace from
power, he has been sufficiently rehabilitated and
his influence was far reaching. His sudden death
this year robbed Dickson of a key ally who would
have been critical at campaign rallies. It is
significant that Dickson gave him a hero’s burial,
for despite his public transgressions, the late
governor was genuinely loved by the people who
once dubbed him the Governor-General of the
Izon Nation. But the dead don’t campaign.
Therefore, Dickson is facing his assignment like a
powerful orphan.
Dickson’s greatest obstacles, however, are his old
friends. When Sylva was ousted in 2012 many
people who participated in his government were
ostracised by the new administration. For a civil
service state where politics is the only viable
business, this is regarded as a gross error on the
part of Dickson. Most of the exiles have now
gathered themselves under the banner of Sylva
and made his army formidable. Therefore, they
regard Sylva’s ambition as an opportunity for
them to have a second chance.
For the people of Bayelsa State, the road to the
future also leads to the past. When Goodluck
became deputy-governor in 1999, Dickson was
the chairman of the opposition Alliance for
Democracy, AD. He was a bitter opponent of
Alamieyeseigha who regarded the AD as an “alien
party.” After Alamieyeseigha was impeached,
Dickson moved over to Jonathan, joined the PDP,
and became the state’s Attorney-General and
Commissioner for Justice. When Jonathan became
Vice-President, Dickson went to Abuja as a
member of the House of Representatives. He
returned to Yenagoa in 2012 in triumph as the
governor beloved by the President. He acquired a
gold tipped walking stick and a gubernatorial
swagger.
Sylva too had maintained a fitful love affair with
Jonathan. When Jonathan became governor after
Alamieyeseigha was impeached, Sylva was one of
the leaders of the opposition to him within the
PDP. He contested for the governorship
nomination of the party for the 2007 elections
and came a distant second to Jonathan. When the
latter was summoned to Abuja by then President
Olusegun Obasanjo to become the Vice-President,
Sylva automatically became the governorship
candidate of the PDP. By the time Jonathan
dispatched Dickson to Yanagoa as governor in
2012, Sylva was sent to political Siberia where he
was consigned to the Land of the Dead. Now he is
back. With the scenario in Bayelsa, Sylva may
prove that in politics, there is life after death.