Nwankwo T. Nwaezeigwe, PhD, DD
January 18, 2026
The death of Senator Peter Onyelukachukwu Nwoboshi came like an unexpected horrific movie scene. When my brother Evangelist Emmanuel Chime dramatically broke the news on our Anioma Whatsapp Group forum, it came as a trance to me. For a moment I found myself disconnected from even the source of the sad news. I then called Evangelist Chime to confirm and he said he died at Abuja. I then called somebody I considered a more credible source and another brother Mr. Vincent Okonwanji, who indeed is a second cousin to Senator Peter Nwoboshi and, the ominous news was the same.
The death of Senator Peter Nwoboshi might have pained me greatly on personal grounds but the greatest impact of his death was what I considered as its shocking immediate consequences on the lives of the throng of people who depended on him economically and for their political leverages; the dramatic political vacuum created in Ibusa by his exit and, the total reconfiguration of Anioma (Delta North Senatorial District) political equation.
Between October and November 2025, I had a number of personal conversations with Senator Nwoboshi. I could remember telling him to propitiate Oboshi Deity on whose river bank he built his country-home. I remember jokingly telling him that the greatest gift he would bestow to Ibusa would be becoming the Iyase of Ibusa when the time comes. Unfortunately the time never came. I remember telling him that with his status, it was time for him to write his autobiography or commission somebody like me to write his biography; as if I had a premonition of his death. He agreed but it never happened.
I knew he was constantly traveling to the State of Israel for medical attention and at one point I called him and said, Bros I am not comfortable with the way you’re falling sick because at the level of your spirituality and political stature you should be able to immediately define the source of any sickness that confronts you and handl it accordingly. The last time he traveled Israel to my knowledge was immediately after the burial ceremony of the father of Nigeria’s former Chief of Naval Staff Admiral Dele Ezeoba. Before then we had spoken and his last words was that he was with his doctors and that he had not seen Vincent Okonwanji and that he would give him one million naira to give me.
I became apprehensive of his health when Mr. Okonwanji could not pick my calls for almost three weeks, which was unusual. This was because for seven consecutive days, I dreamt constantly of the death of relatives and close friends and, as usual I relayed same to my elder brother in Lagos Pastor John Nwandu and, begged him to pray against the death of anybody close to us.
I know that once I maintain my normal spiritual equilibrium I don’t joke with my dreams; just as the death of my friend from the era of Social Democratic Party (SDP), the former Odogwu of Asaba Obi Nwanze Nwa Oduah was revealed to me. I know also that the final outcome of the present Federal Government of Nigeria under President Bola Ahmed Tinubu has been revealed me, but since I am not Primate Hezekiah Ayodele, I will not reveal it yet. So my premonition of the death of relatives and close friend came with the unexpected death of Senator Peter Nwoboshi, which was followed by the death of my cousin Onowu Obi Nwaezeigwe.
I never agreed in totality with Senator Peter Nwoboshi in every political issue because I am somebody who struggles never to compromise his principles. Yet there were common grounds of political interests that often kept us glued together after any disagreement. These common grounds of interest generally overwhelmed those aspects of our disagreement. I remember opposing his decamping from PDP to APC, but he soon vindicated his action.
He recalled me from Lagos when I was Personal Adviser to the erstwhile General Secretary of Nigeria Union of Petroleum and Natural Gas Workers (NUPENG) Chief Frank Ovie-Kokori to become his Technical Adviser when he was Delta State Honorable Commissioner for Agriculture; specifically to help him contain the rampaging political thuggery of Mr. Fred Ajudua and his Onu Anioma political hirelings; a task I diligently accomplished, leading subsequently to my later acquaintance with Fred Ajudua.
Senator Peter Nwoboshi was somebody whose outward rugged political carriage overwhelmingly contrasts his inner sublime mindset which is characterized by simplicity in accommodation, uncalculated and unadvertised large-heartedness, with undeterred humility in traditional commonness and, a patriotism driven by the force of Anioma political integrity woven in historical warrior instinct of Ekumeku tradition.
Senator Peter Nwoboshi had no personal enemies for personal political reasons. He might have had political opponents and detractors like Senators Ifeanyi Okowa and Ned Nwoko, but he never considered any of them as his enemies; because to him, after all disagreements over respective political ambitions, there must always be a common political uniting ground, which is the collective interest of Anioma people.
I remember when I disagreed with him while serving as his Personal Adviser over the issue of the re-election of the Hon (Dr.) Mrs. Felicia Nweze into the Delta State House of Assembly. I left him, took the official car he gave to me, a white Toyota Carina II along and became the Campaign Director of Hon (Dr.) Mrs. Nweze. Mrs. Nweze eventually defeated his emergency candidate of the Justice Party, my brother and friend Elder Charles Nwarache and Fred Ajudua’s candidate Hon Joseph Ijeh of an obscure political party I could not recollect the name.
But it is instructive to point out that without the dramatic intervention of Hon. Pascal Adigwe of Ogwashi-Uku that victory couldn’t have been so easily consummated. We met Pascal Adigwe, then popularly known as Pascal Adigwe Nwaoranine during the highly contested 2003 PDP Primaries and, soon built a common alliance with him. Both Hon (Dr.) Mrs. Felicia Nweze and Hon Pascal Adigwe were victorious in the Primaries. With the alliance we entered the 2003 General Elections.
Few days to the General elections, classified information came to Hon (Dr.) Nwaeze that Senator Peter Nwoboshi and Fred Ajudua had submitted their chosen names of teachers who would serve as Presiding and Polling Officers for the elections to the INEC Resident Commissioner in Asaba; in addition to Senator Peter Nwoboshi stocking seventy (70) Ballot Boxes and Ballot Papers in his house. Mrs. Nweze said I should immediately write a petition against the Resident INEC Commissioner to INEC Chairman in Abuja immediately. I told her first, that it was already late to do such and, second that such petition would embolden the Resident INEC Commissioner to work against us.
She then said, what then should be my suggestion and, I said a counter-bride of course; because she had more money than both Peter Nwobohi and Fred Ajudua at the time. We then consulted Hon Pascal Adigwe at Ogwashi-Uku who agreed to use his link with INEC Commissioner to facilitate our action. Through Pascal Adigwe, Mrs. Nweze reached out to the Resident INEC Commissioner who agreed and told Mrs. Nweze to provide her own list of Presiding Officers and Polling Officers to replace those of Senator Peter Nwoboshi and Fred Ajudua.
Hon Pascal Adigwe eventually provided the names of strong boys from Ogwashi-Uku who replaced the Primary and Secondary school teachers from Oshimili North Local Government Area with the mandate to deliver Hon (Dr.) Mrs. Felicia Nweze. So, on the election-day when those teachers came to check their names they found strange names taking their places. But still fearing the possibility of rigging through the use of thugs by Senator Peter Nwoboshi and Fred Ajudua and, the obvious ballot paper stuffing with the ballot boxes and papers in possession of Senator Peter Nwoboshi, we again, through Pascal Adigwe devised a much clever and sharper counter-strategy.
Mrs. Nweze had opted for a report to the Police for the Ballot Boxes in Senator Peter Nwoboshi’s house, but I disagreed because it would amount to making extra money for the corrupt Police. Reporting to the Police meant giving the Police extra money with their promise of taking action. The same Police would go to Senator Peter Nwoboshi and interrogate him over the report about the Ballot boxes and, Senator Peter Nwoboshi would give them another money and, the same Police would help him to escort the Ballot Boxes to another location.
So, after consulting Hon Pascal Adigwe, he helped us to apply for a lorry-load of Nigeria Mobile Policemen which is calculated at thirty Mobile Policemen and officers. Hon. (Mrs.) paid the required fee and on the election-day we found ourselves loaded with full confidence towards victory. On that day, fifteen Mobile Policemen cordoned off Senator Peter Nwoboshi’s house up to the Polling Station at Ogwa Isieke his Village. So there was no way the Ballot Boxes could escape his house that day. Indeed, after the election, he had to pay the Police to escort the Ballot Boxes back to INEC office at Asaba.
For Fred Ajudua and his wife, nine Mobile Policemen were posted to monitor their activities from his House to the Polling Station at Omu Boys Anglican Primary School. His candidate for the State House of Assembly, Hon Joseph (Sir Joe) Ijeh was so disarmed with the presence of both the Mobile Policemen and strange Presiding Officers and Polling Officers that he desperately attempted to snatch the ballot box at Ogbeowele Town Hall Polling Station that he found himself beaten pulp, black and blue by Ogbeowele boys led by the late Omeogo Chief Jude Okonma. Four Mobile Policemen were assigned to Hon Mrs. Nweze for roving inspection with a Mitsubishi L300 mini bus, while the remaining Mobile Policemen were placed on stand-by.
Quite unexpected of a man well known for his rough-ride political carriage, Senator Peter Nwoboshi waited patiently till the final outcome of the election before asking in most elder brotherly manner to return the car to the Ministry of Agriculture. Of course I had my personal car at that moment, a sweet white Racer Daewoo, sweeter than the Toyota Carina II except for the Delta State Government plate number. So it was not a big deal to me. We just met on the street of our town one day after the elections and he told me in our dialect, “Dianyi buchiatalizim motor; election agwugaa” (My dear brother, return the motor for me; the election has been concluded).
No Ibusa person could have been as patient and accommodating to even his direct sibling under such a circumstance as Senator Peter Nwoboshi. When I confronted Fred Ajudua with such unspoken sublime inner mindset of Senator Peter Nwoboshi, he said for him, there was no way he could have tolerated my action, and that indeed, the moment I revolted against him, he would take the car from me by force. It took one to come close to Senator Peter Nwoboshi to fully understand his inner heart of compassion against what his outward political carriage erroneously tended to portray.
Senator Peter Nwoboshi had unquestionable confidence in me once we agreed on a common project. I remember when Fred Ajudua bought over the Police Office in charge of Ibusa Police Station and was constantly harassing and arresting his supporters in Ibusa and locking them up.
When Senator Peter Nwoboshi’s attempt to get them released and the Police Officer refused, vowing to charge them to court for thuggery, he came crying to me, saying, “Tony look at me, a whole Delta State Commissioner will be begging an ordinary Police Officer in my own town to release my boys and he will refuse, telling me that he’s acting from orders above.” I asked him, who were those others above outside the Area Commander and Commissioner of Police? Let’s go straight away to the Commissioner of Police and get the Police Officer removed from Ibusa immediately.
He said how. And I said, simple. I will write a petition in your name laying out your complaints against the Officer with your letter-head paper as Commissioner for Agriculture demanding his immediate transfer and, both of us would take the petition to him personally that day. I told him that if he did not know the powers and influence his office as Delta State Commissioner carried, I will teach him. So I quickly drafted the letter and told him to read through before placing it on his official letter-head paper for his signature.
After quickly going through it, he said there was no need for official letter-head and immediately signed it and told me to get up and go straight away with him to the Police Headquarters, then located at Odozi Obodo Church Housing Estate along Asaba-Benin Expressway. The Commissioner of Police then was Mr. John Ahmadu from Taraba State.
As soon as we entered the office and Police Commissioner’s Secretary announced our presence, he was ushered in. Within ten minutes he was out and commanded we should go. Before we got to his office, a signal had reached the Police Officer in charge of Ibusa directing his immediate transfer to Police Headquarters Asaba.
Peter Nwoboshi was a man of action and rarely procrastinated when action was necessary to confront an immediate danger. I remember during one of our Local Government Council Elections when Fred Ajudua and his group were bent on rigging PDP out from our Local Government Council through Accord Party. One of the targeted Wards was my Ward where the PDP candidate was my kinsman from Achalla Ibusa, Hon Hilary Nwokolo and, I was bound to deliver him against my cousin Mr. Ifeanyi Nwaezeigwe.
Fred Ajudua and his wife had flooded our town with political thugs and militants from Rivers State and, I was one of their major targets. On the day of the election, three of those militants were posted directly to monitor my movement. I watched them quite amusingly as they watched me through the window of my uncle’s upstairs, Ifeanyi Nwaezeigwe’s father’s house, just opposite my father’s house. I stayed a while back at home getting regular fed-backs from our Polling Station at Omu Girls Primary School. The point is that winning my Polling Station with its more than four thousand voters meant the outright victory of any candidate.
I immediately moved to the Polling Station when information got to me that my brother Ifeanyi Nwaezeigwe and some people under the protection of the militants were thumb-printing the ballot papers at both nearby Apple Club Guest House and in one of the classrooms. When I eventually got to the Polling Station, I saw about seven of those militants mounted with their weapons concealed under their jackets all ready for action in the event of any counter-action from me.
I looked at my brother Hon Augustine Chukwudi Nnabuife (Ojeogbua) the current APC Party Chairman of Oshimili North Local Government Area; his eyes greeted me with utter helplessness. I moved to him and he whispered me, “Odogwu the situation is bad.” I said, “don’t worry I will take care of the situation.” At that moment, I ruled out the possibility of a frontal confrontation within because of the strategic advantageous positioning of the militants and, instead chose the invasion option from without. I then proceeded to meet Senator Peter Nwoboshi.
As soon as I entered his sitting room with the crowd of supporters and thugs around him, I shouted, “Bros, things are going wrong in my Polling Station, I need thirty boys and Police men to put the situation under control.” He said okay and, called his Police Orderly, a tall handsome young man from Plateau State and told him to release the Hilux Truck with five armed Policemen, his Toyota Prado Jeep to me and called his main strike man, Emeka, the son of his cousin Lizzy Mafua to gather his boys and follow me immediately.
The instruction was, gather all the Ballot Boxes and other election materials and take them somewhere and thumb-print and submit accordingly to INEC officers. The Hilux Policemen demanded I should pay them thirty Thousand naira immediately or they would not go with me. I had my emergency election money ready and, without much argument, I gave them thirty thousand Naira. I entered Peter Nwoboshi’s tinted-class Toyota Prado Jeep with his Police Orderly and off we moved to the Polling Station with all the boys mounted on motorcycles moving behind us.
Hon. Mrs. Pat Adankele, Fred Ajudua’s wife used similar Prado Jeep to rove around the Polling Stations with number plate concealed like ours. So when we entered the Polling Station with the Toyota Prado at the head under my command, those militants thought it was Mrs. Pat Ajudua that was in the Jeep. But before they could realize the danger at their doorsteps, the Policemen with the Hilux van had dismounted fired three shots from their Ak-47 rifles and everybody including the imported militants fled on all directions and immediately the boys swooped on the ballot boxes and all the election materials and carted them away.
Thereafter we returned and I thankfully presented the report of the successful mission to Senator Peter Nwoboshi. With that danger out of the way, my candidate Hon Hilary Nwokolo was returned with overwhelming margin of votes.
There was also the situation when Fred Ajudua with his thugs ambushed us right on Isieke High Street by Mr. Mafua’s house close to Peter Nwoboshi’s house. When Fred Ajudua and his boys blockaded the road and surged towards us with gun-shots coming from every corner, all the people abandoned their vehicles and fled except Peter Nwoboshi, his Police Orderly, myself and his driver. We stepped out of the car telling the driver to bring the jeep later. With Peter Nwobosh visibly shaken, the Police Orderly and I escorted him on foot to his house daring anybody to touch us.
However, the most memorable task Senator Peter Nwoboshi entrusted to me was as the spokesman of the delegation of Oshimli North Local Government Area PDP leaders to the then Delta State Governor Dr. Emmanuel Uduaghan at Government House Asaba, over his vexatious closeness to Hon. Mrs. Pat Ajudua. Senator Peter Nwoboshi was then the Delta State PDP Chairman. During my speech I frontally accused Governor Uduaghan that the way Mrs. Fred Ajudua was getting close to him gave us the impression that there might be something suspicious between him and Mrs. Ajudua. Governor Uduaghan was forced to shift within his seat.
When he responded, his first statement was, “Dr. that impression was wrong. I had nothing suspicious with that woman, except that she is somebody who often likes to enter into somebody in order to get what she wants.” He warned me that the paper must never be sent out the Government House and, ordered me to tear the paper right there in Government House.
Apart from the Hon (Dr.) Mrs. Felicia Nweze election affair, there were two other minor clashes I had with Senator Peter Nwoboshi. One was at Eleme in River State during the funeral of Fred Ajudua’s in-law and elder brother to his wife Hon Pat Ajudua. There following a minor disagreement, Senator Nwoboshi attempted to harass one of my respected political god-mothers from Asaba Hon (Chief) Theodora Giwa-Amu, Adaora of Asaba and, nobody was bold enough to restrain him, except me. Although he was not happy with my intervention but he had no option but to retreat.
The other episode was after Chief Godwill Obielum appointed him the Director-General of his Governorship Campaign Organization in 2006 and, Chief Obielum instructed him to bring me to him to equally work for him, but he refused. It took Adaora—Chief (Mrs.) Giwa-Amu’s intervention to personally take me to Chief Obielum before I was finally recruited into his Campaign Organization.
Of course, I could remember riding with Adaora in her 505 Peugeot car to Chief Obielum’s house that day and, on getting close to his house, we saw Senator Peter Nwoboshi’s official Campaign Jeep, a blue-colored Prado Jeep parked in front of the house. So we had to park along the road patiently waiting for him to leave the compound. Not long after, we saw him drove out and because there was no way he could see us, being that we were on the right flank of the Asaba-Okpanam dual highway, we quickly drove into Chief Obielum’s compound where Adaora presented me to Chief Obielum with the simple sentence, “Your Excellency, this is Tony Nwaezeigwe” and, she immediately left us. I remember leaving Chief Obielum’s house that day with one hundred and fifty thousand naira.
In spite of these minor disagreements, Senator Peter Nwoboshi was a man always at the heart of any man or woman who had the opportunity of coming close to him. His large-heartedness knew no bounds and remained unmatched in Ibusa and Oshimili North Local Government Area till his death. He gave for the reason of the receiver’s needs and not for his own selfish ends or self-advertisement. When I was working with him anytime a lady visited me, once it came to his notice and without asking for his assistance, Senator Peter Nwoboshi would ask me, is it true that your girlfriend is around, and once I nodded in affirmation, he would give me some money to go and book a hotel for both of us.
When I returned to University of Nigeria, Nsukka in 2008 to teach and I had no money to pay for house rent and I told him, he simply without hesitation gave me a small note to somebody at Zenith Bank Federal Medical Centre Branch Asaba and, I was given the sum of one hundred thousand naira. Senator Peter Nwoboshi as Commissioner of Agriculture just called me one day and gave me a note to go and collect the sum of four hundred and fifty thousand naira in 2002 at Ozoro and, told me it was my share of a contract of 1.5 million naira he awarded to me to supply chairs to Delta State Polytechnic Ozoro and, that he knew I was not a contract person, so he had to commission somebody to execute it on my behalf.
Until his death, Senator Peter Nwoboshi was somebody I never asked for something and he had such without giving me. On three occasions, Senator Peter Nwoboshi gave me live goats in his house without any reason or demand. As Commissioner of Agriculture Delta State, I was so endeared to him that whenever his aids needed extra money they would ask me to demand on their behalf, because they knew he would not refuse. And Peter Nwoboshi knowing that I was not used to asking for money from him, would respond quite jokingly saying, I know you were not the person demanding this money but those thieves around me. That was Senator Peter Nwoboshi for you.
So I have every reason to totally mourn his death on behalf of myself and entire people of Ibusa. As Ibusa stands today nobody can carry Peter Nwoboshi’s heart of unsung philanthropy. He gave unannounced and without political strings attached. Bearing his humble beginning in mind, he never allowed his wealth and political attainments to detach him from the conscious stream of his native compatriots.
He was an inspiration to many of us, beginning as a Grade two Primary School teacher, worked from home to add both GCE O-Level and GEC A-Level to his academic kitty, studied History at the then Bendel State University, now Ambrose Ali University, Ekpoma; studied law at University of Benin and eventually called to the Bar as a lawyer. He later capped it up with a master’s degree in law. What could have more inspirational than his intellectual doggedness positively converted into political doggedness?
The lesson of the death of Senator Peter Nwoboshi is paradoxically anchored on the stream of human life-cycle that tangentially measures the importance of a man to his community based on the impact of his death on his community. So it is not just our impact on the society while we are alive, but what happens to the same community following our death.
Within both Igbo and Christian cosmological concepts of life-cycle, death is not only inevitable but a continuity of life within the unseen atmosphere. In fact, once an individual enters the spiritual conscious stage of his life, he or she begins to experience what death looks like by way of dreams.
Therefore what matters to the spiritually logical-minded person is not about dying because death must definitely come, but the legacies such an individual leaves behind for the living after death. In other words, how does the death of a person affect those he left behind, both intimate and general? How much did the death of such a person impact on his immediate family, extended family, his village, his town, his State and the nation in general?
The most lasting impact of the death of any person on his family, his village, his town, his State and his nation is when such death is considered irreplaceable. Of course nobody by both cosmological and temporal conceptions of life and death is replaceable because of the uniqueness of every individual as a created entity of God. But the question is how much does your irreplaceability directly affect both your immediate and wider communities?
Looking at it from the pedestal of national politics, we could see how the death of such people as Sir Abubakar Tafawa Balewa and other victims of the January 15, 1966 coup d’état; the death of Major General Johnson Thomas Umunnakwe Aguiyi-Ironsi and all the victims of July 29, 1966 counter-coup d’état; the death of thousands of Igbo and other Eastern Nigeria ethnic minorities during the September-October 1966 pogrom; the death of General Murtala Muhammed during the February 13, 1976 abortive coup d’état; and of course the death of General Sani Abacha on June 8, 1998, dramatically changed the political landscape of the Nigerian nation in their respective standings both positively and negatively.
Also within the micro-political entity of Ibusa town, there have been quite a number of people whose death brought dramatic changes to both the traditional and political settings of the town. Among these people were Dr. (Chief) John Asikaobulu Anaza, the Owelle of Ibusa, a yet to be matched grassroots political mobilizer in Ibusa, a foundation-philanthropist and former Chief Economic Adviser to Governor Felix Ibru of Delta State and; Onowu Bialonwu Okonta, publisher of the once popular but now defunct Ibusa Pathfinder tabloid, a rare and unmatched Ibusa patriot whose office in Ikate Surulere Lagos was once the gravitational center for Ibusa affairs in Lagos State.
We had also Obi (Prof) Patrick Chike Onwuachi, the Oza Ji Ani of Ibusa, American-trained Pan-Africanist, civil rights activists, traditionalist Africanist par excellence, former Director-General of Nigerian Institute of International Affairs (NIIA) and the contraptor of the concept of Obuzor traditional institution; and Chief Willy Ukadike Ikolodo, the Uwolo of Ibusa, former member of Federal House of representatives, a native-grounded philanthropist and political bulldozer of no mean stature with the instinct of conquer or destroy, a man who created the logical concept of “if your problem is too small to be noticed, make big.”
Ibusa had had Obi (Hon) Vincent Ngadiolu Obieke, a retired Assistant Commissioner of Police, a man who blended his unmatched psycho-detective unpredictability as a Police Officer with his grounded knowledge of Ibusa customs and tradition in his audacious grip on Ibusa traditional polity, a traditional patriot to the core with unequalled passion for the protection of the core values of Ibusa customs and tradition; and a man whose more than two decades of traditional political influence in Ibusa bestrode a mixed sense of strong patriotism between those who allied with his audacious stance on the maintenance of the core values of Ibusa customs and tradition and, the nouveau-riche who subsequently succeeded in imposing the now highly detested Obuzor traditional institution.
And of course, we had Chief Patrick C. Okolie, Ochuba Dike Osha of Ibusa, a school-master par excellence with an unrepentant instinct to war against anything obnoxious in both political and traditional terms, a pen-pusher and instinctive petition-writer who never feared to thread where even lions fear to gaze at, a man whose Marxian bearded personae instilled fear on first appearance, yet he was a man with unequalled passion for beautiful women.
Obi (Senator) Nosike Ikpo, the great Ibusa and Anioma patriot who bestrode the traditional political terrains of Ibusa for more than fifty years, rising from the noble role of a Traveling Secretary of Ibusa Union Nigeria (IUN), the precursor of the present Ibusa Community Development Union (ICDU), to becoming a two-time Senator of the Federal Republic of Nigeria and, of course one of the pioneer Anioma statesmen who not only created the present enigmatic Anioma identity that has become the jealous of our Southeast Igbo kinsmen, but as a Senator of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, who introduced the first motion for the creation of Anioma State.
There is therefore no denying the bitter truth that contrary to the expectations of his political opponents who might be jubilating over his untimely death, the exit of Senator Peter Nwoboshi from the political terrains of Anioma land has created a provocative political imbalance that only requires an astute political personality to gather the pieces together.
In this respect, even though I am not a fan of the present APC Federal Government led by Bola Ahmed Tinubu, neither am I optimistic of 2027 General elections, but whichever way the political pendulum of Nigeria swings before, during and, after the 2027 General elections, Anioma people still need a well-articulated disciplined, focused and non-sectionalized political leader, particularly with respect to the matter of who becomes the Senator of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
Photo Combination of the Late Senator Peter Nwoboshi and Chief Godwill Obielum
In this respect, the man who readily comes not only to my mind but the minds of majority of the people of Delta North is Chief Godwill Obielum, the astute well-cultured and unassuming grassroots political mobilizer of Delta State from Ushe in Ndokwa East Local Government Area. Since the history of Delta State, Chief Obielum has remained the only politician who enjoyed convincing total grassroots support across not only the three Senatorial Districts of the State but among all the ethnic groups. He is the only person if he declares his interest to contest the 2027 Delta North Senatorial seat, majority of Anioma people will heave a sigh of relief.
Neither Senator Ifeanyi Okowa with his one term-Senator and two-term Governor credentials, nor Senator Chinedu Munir Nwoko with his yet to be completed one term-Senator credential, can match the overwhelming popularity of Chief Godwill Obielum. Senator Ifeanyi Okowa, right from his role as a Senator to being the Governor of Delta State for eight years saw himself fundamentally as the representative of his Owa Alero community.
He is somebody who cannot be trusted with his penchant to change in chameleonic style. Moreover, with his moral vulnerability arising from his corruption trial with EFCC, he faces the possibility of being schemed out by Ned Nwoko using his Islamic solidarity connection to entrap him with frivolous court judgment as he did to Senator Peter Nwoboshi.
Senator Ned Nwoko on his own account, has proven that he has nothing positive to offer Anioma people as a Senator elected by them, except attempting to sell them to Southeast, weaponization of Anioma State creation against the exclusive identity and unity of Anioma people and, impudent display of his instinctive insatiable characteristic primitive libido driven by malignant polygamy. Senator Ned Nwoko does not represent the collective historical interest of Anioma people; rather he plays the role of an agent provocateur through his attempt to lump Anioma people into the Southeast geopolitical zone to serve the interest of Biafran agitators who want more land for their invidious secession project.
Moreover, Ned Nwoko is a Muslim and his position as a Senator representing a Senatorial District composed of 99.99 percent of Christians only adds to the false ratio of Muslim domination of Christians in Nigeria. To have him continue to represent Anioma people as their Senator is like electing a Christian as a Senator to represent Zamfara State.
Finally on the matter of the logic of equitable demographic representation among the three sub-ethnic units of Delta North—Enuani, Ika and, Ndokwa, the right people to present a Senator for Delta North in 2027 are Ndokwa people. The reason for this adoption is clear. Enuani has produced Senators Dennis Osadebey, Nosike Ikpo, Dan Azinge, Peter Nwoboshi and now Ned Nwoko, making it a total of five Senators. Similarly, Ika has produced Ifeanyi Okowa as Senator, Ifeany Okowa as Governor for eight years and, Hon Samuel Onyeka Obi as Speaker of Delta House of Assembly and Constitutional Acting Governor of Delta State for three months.
On the other hand, Ndokwa has only produced one Senator, Chief Patrick Enebeli Osakwe. There is therefore no debating the fact that Ndokwa people are grossly marginalized in the distribution common elective offices among the people of Delta and deserve better treatment. They are therefore rightly and strongly entitled to produce the next Senator for Delta North and, there is no better candidate for such noble patriotic assignment than the indomitable Chief Godwill Obielum.
Dr. Nwankwo Tony Nwaezeigwe is currently the Odogwu of Ibusa & President, International Coalition against Christian Genocide in Nigeria (ICAC-GEN). He is currently in exile in Metro-Manila, Republic of the Philippines.
