Dickson And Governors Penchant To 'Retire' At Senate

Dickson

Governor of Bayelsa State, Serieke Dickson like many of the governors in this dispensation is believed to nurse senatorial ambition after eight years as governor of the oil-rich state. Until the return of democracy in 1999 Nigeria has never witnessed such a huge turnover of senators from the ranks of the former governors. Alongside their humungous pension benefits as former governors, these class of elite will not want to be outside the public office, they must move to the Senate where they would wish to remain in perpetuity or until a bigger masquerade emerges in their senatorial district to remind them that whatever has a beginning has an end.

Dickson, a former member of the House of Representatives, before President Goodluck Jonathan uplifted him politically by using federal might to dislodge the then incumbent governor, Timipre Sylva from seeking second term under the platform of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). It was at a time when PDP ticket is tantamount to having won the main election. While Jonathan was instrumental to his victory when he was President, Dickson won a hard fought second term especially with the All Progressives Congress (APC) federal might stack against him. He survived. Having emerged victorious even against the APC that controls the federal government, he perhaps believes that he has arrived as a political juggernaut in Bayelsa State.  He sidelined the leaders of the PDP in the state and when the PDP was to hold its primaries to select its governorship candidate, Serieke Dickson served notice that you have to belong to the “Restoration Caucus” to stand a chance to emerge the party’s candidate. This position resulted to the splitting of the PDP into two factions, one led by Governor Dickson and called “Restoration Caucus” and the other said to be loyal to former President Goodluck Jonathan known as “Non Restoration Caucus Members.”

Governor Dickson has never hidden his readiness to support his preferred candidate to emerge the next governor of the state while making it clear that if the party gives the ticket to anybody outside  “Restoration Caucus” the governor was not ready to support the party. Of course what the outgoing governor did not make public was that he is supporting the man who eventually emerged the PDP candidate Senator Douye Diri because he hoped to take over Diri’s Senatorial seat if he emerges as governor. Apparently blinded by his senatorial ambition, the governor failed to listen to the stakeholders who are insisting on sticking with the zoning arrangement in the state. Since the governor could not listen to the people and their leaders, they decided to get their pound of flesh on the Election Day even if their beloved PDP would suffer or die in the process in Bayelsa State.

And on Saturday November 16, 2019 governorship election in Bayelsa State there was a political shift of seismic proportion. Since 1999 when the country returned to democratic governance, Bayelsa State remained a stronghold of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). For good or for ill the people of Bayelsa see the PDP as their own. If Bayelsa is good today it is the handiwork of the PDP, and if it is bad the PDP is to blame. It governed the state for 20 years. It was the party that made it possible for one of its illustrious sons, Dr Goodluck Ebele Jonathan to emerge the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria through a democratic process. Hate him or love him, Jonathan remains a hero to Bayelsans and the people of Niger Delta Region that voted and supported him as President. He is revered in the Niger Delta Region, despite all the allegations of corruption leveled against his erstwhile government. He is also seen as the leader of the PDP in Bayelsa State even though these days he is more preoccupied with international engagements by the United Nations, African Union, ECOWAS and others.

When the dust eventually settled after the earthquake caused by Serieke Dickson’s senatorial ambition and disregard to party leaders in the state including former President Jonathan, it emerged that the candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in Bayelsa State, Chief David Lyon emerged the winner of the governorship election held on Saturday. Lyon won in six of the state’s eight local government areas thereby by defeating Dickson and PDP candidate, Senator Douye Diri who won only two local governments. It is instructive that in the former President Goodluck Jonathan’s Ogbia local government area, Bayelsa East, the APC candidate defeated the PDP candidate by garnering 58,016 votes while PDP’s Diri got only 13, 763 votes.

The lesson for all Nigerians is to stop this tradition that governors after spending eight years in powers must necessarily move to the senate. These senatorial quests often turn them to tyrants. The sacrifice that Bayelsans made to stop Dickson’s senatorial ambition even at the expense of PDP deserves commendation and should be emulated by other states where former governors are nursing senatorial ambition as if they are the only people that can serve their people even when their records at Government House is nothing to write home about.