04/12/2014
1st December, 2014
Open Letter to my People
Governorship of Delta State
On Friday 31st October 2014, I formally declared my intention to contest the 2015 gubernatorial election of Delta State under the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). On the same day, I became the very first candidate to release a Social Contract with the good people of Delta State.
2. I am writing this letter to you to intimate you on why I decided to seek election to become the Governor of Delta State in 2015.
3. Being Special Adviser to President Goodluck Jonathan on Performance Monitoring and Evaluation exposed me to the efforts of government to improve the people’s quality of life through various programmes and projects. It also exposed me to the impediments to government’s plans and projections. Yet, the best lesson that I learnt as Special Adviser to the President is encapsulated in these words of a past American President, Theodore Roosevelt who says that “It is not the critic that counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, if he fails, at least he fails while DARING GREATLY”.
4. Yes, I have embraced those words to heart – to dare greatly as governor of Delta State and make it a SUPER STATE; fantastic, splendid, superb and really outstanding Delta State. Yes, I intend to make the state superior to others, and to give the people enough reason to actually and reasonably feel special.
5. From day one, Delta was built with the ingredients for greatness. So, luckily, I will not be starting from the scratch. At Independence in 1960, the area that comprise Delta State were just the Benin and Delta provinces of the Western Region – a region whose memories still provide a heightened sense of pride to many. Yet, the people of the two provinces needed more than what the Western Region could provide and so in 1963, they became the Midwest Region – under the brilliant leadership of the much respected late patriarchs - Dr. Dennis Chukwudebe Osadebay and Olorogun Samuel Jereton Mariere. When the Region became the Mid-West State, Dr. Samuel Ogbemudia built on the uncommon foundations he inherited, and made it outstanding. Thus by mid 1970s, things unheard of in other States were common fare in Bendel – inter-city luxurious bus service, a state-wide library service on wheels which covered the State every two weeks and from which people borrowed books and returned them, a “book depot” that was filled with books and which serviced the State, an array of respected secondary schools even in the villages and which brimmed with academic and sports competitions, that formed the foundation of a system from which world beaters sallied forth to challenge and mesmerize the nation and the world.
6. Delta has retained some aspects of Bendel’s glorious past. Here, the immediate past democratic administration and the present one continued to build on that glorious foundation, such that even now, the Dr. Emmanuel Uduaghan Administration has opened up a new route: “Delta Beyond Oil”.
7. My administration will further the manifest destiny of Delta State to lead the way for other States to follow. I will appoint as Commissioners, people who will be as earnest and sincere as an Old Testament prophet, imbued with quick intelligence, elevated principles, high social conscience, with active minds and proven abilities, realistic, precise (instead of wavering) and positively believing in the ability of man to transform a given society through ingenious leadership. I will search out the best and the brightest who will appreciate the urgencies of the moment and prove themselves as crisis managers. Yes, managers in the crisis of under-investment in education, housing, health, recreation, community decency and order, to help bring the needed focus on the scandal of great deprivation amidst plenty and thereby mount a charge against poverty.
8. The focus of my admiration will be the man or woman in the dusty village byways. For him or her, I will provide opportunities for mum and pop small-scale businesses to fire the economy, improve the internally generated revenue base, provide employment, and restore dignity to many. For their children I will retool the entire school system and dignify public schools by raising standards across board. Schools will be subjected to strict inspections to maintain acceptable standards. I will reintroduce school sports competitions and enhance the ones, such as soccer, which the Uduaghan Administration has introduced – so that tennis (lawn and table), basketball, etc, will have yearly state championships. In sports, I will further equip the stadiums the Ibori Administration built in the Local Government headquarters, making them natural hosts of the various inter-school competitions. Education will not only remain free but it will be made really compulsory and parents who keep their wards off school will be prosecuted. No child will be left behind.
9. The Local Government councils will be made to matter in the lives of the people; they will be designated nuggets of developments in the State and should enforce some minimal accepted levels of hygiene in the markets, villages, etc and thereby reduce sources of disease infections. My Administration will place a strong emphasis on primary healthcare delivery and make hospital treatment free for pregnant women and children, and for everybody in school uniform.
10. No, this is not an attempt to reproduce my Social Contract with Deltans; no, I have just given you a glimpse of it to show the seriousness of the quest to which I am humbly inviting you to accompany me – by your understanding, goodwill, advice and support.
11. Millions live in Delta State. Through purposeful leadership, I will raise the quality of their lives tremendously. The State not only possesses the ingredients for greatness, the foundations for such greatness actually exists; the all-conquering will of the people and unalloyed pride in their glorious Bendel State. With such a State made up with such a people, all it takes to arrive at a super State that will beat out a path for other States to follow, is just character, good governance and accountability in leadership. These are the fundamental principles upon which my aspiration is anchored.
12. And it is to provide such leadership that I am seeking to be the next governor of Delta State. I crave your support for this noble quest in the coming days and weeks.
13. With my warm personal regards.
Professor Sylvester Monye, MFR
