The buzz of the moment is the general complain of fearsome rising insecurity in Edo State. But let us be frank. Since Obaseki decamped from APC to PDP in 2020 there has never been real, sustainable and enduring security in the state. What has been existing ever since under the PDP administration of Obaseki is peace of the graveyard foist on Edo people buoyed up by media propaganda as absolute security.

When discerning critics attack this claim, Obaseki modifies his statement clarifying that all he intended to say is that in the South-South the state is relatively the most safe and secure in a bid to attract investors. All this is balderdash!!

Citizens in the state are daily struggling to secure themselves and stay afloat in the sharky waters of massive insecurity in the state today. That is the true situation on the ground.

Who are to blame? Three persons. Obaseki. Obaseki. Obaseki. No other person. He is the Governor and Chief Security Officer of Edo State. In these two capacities, it is his constitutional responsibility to secure all Edo people rather than engage in the blame game of always accusing the APC of the rising insecurity in the state. He should stop behaving like Napoleon, a character, in the satirical novel ANIMAL FARM written by George Orwell.

He is the ineffective Governor of the farm wracked by insecurity. Rather than blame himself for the gatte, he attributes it to Snowball his enemy living outside the farm and who is not part of his administration. What I am saying in other words is that Edo people should no longer allow Obaseki and the PDP to fool them about insecurity in the state. They are to blame for insecurities on the increase today on two fronts.

In the first front, I will explain in sequence how insecurity in Edo State was cultivated, nurtured groomed and sustained by Obaseki.

See, it is Oba Ewuare II of the great Benin Kingdom who on being sworn in initiated the ban on the notorious Community Development Associations (CDAs) which activities are crippling property development as well as the real estate sector in the state. When Obaseki as new governor paid a "thank you" visit to him on November 21, 2016 the Oba officially announced the ban on the CDAs.

Obaseki agreed with the proscription and later signed into law the order banning the outfit.

Subsequently, the law was reviewed to specifically ban Okiagheles in the kingdom who were exploiting the lacunas in the law to continue the nefarious evils of the CDAs.

However, the political will to make as well as review the CDA Law was not put into implementing the law. Also, there is no sustained conscious effort to disband? disarm and neutralize the lethal private armies of the defunct CDAs which membership are drawn from dangerous and cult groups that permeate the rural and urban areas.

Leaders of these private armies are no longer able to maintain them with proceeds from CDAs. So, to keep body and soul together most of them have migrated to other lucrative dark areas of crime while still exercising command and control over their armies. Meanwhile, some foot soldiers of these armies have found their ways into the State government's own security outfits while the rest invade the streets committing crimes.

The result is insecurity all because Obaseki didn't embark on a containment policy of finding and recovering of all the arms and ammunition warehoused by the CDAs till date. How will there be security in Edo when free weapons are In the jobless cultists hands of pleasure-seeking CDA henchmen and their comrades?

To worsen matters, Obaseki, wife and his PDP administration have never made a deliberate effort to launch a full-scale war against illicit hard drugs which trigger and drive criminality. Obaseki or his wife don't see the war on hard drugs as a priority like growing the revenue and GDP of the state. Yet the state is in the top list of states which youths use hard drugs according to Vanguard of November 17, 2021.

The police, some DSS, NDLEA and NSCDC personnel know the areas where these destructive hard drugs are openly hawked by street children but only feast on them for private monetary benefits. Why? Because they have come to realise that the administration is not serious with providing the right, bonding chemistry with them on stopping the hard drug trade.

Sadly enough? The governor's wife, Betsy; only gives feeble attention to fighting the hard drug menace by a lacklustre interest in attending event associated with the few Drug Free Clubs in secondary schools. Her speech only counsels students to stay away from drugs snd urges parents to bring up good, drug-free children. A mere admonition full of sound and fury signifying nothing, to use William Shakespeare's words.

Her pet project is in the area of combating gender violence against women as well as preventing illegal migration and prostitution. She forgets that hard drug abuse can remotely contribute to broken marriages, demented families, gender violence, prostitution and irregular migration in that psycho-sociological linear sequential progression!!

Now, let me shock you. My discreet investigations reveals there is hardly any EDSTMA and PUWOV government official who undertook a serious hard drug test before recruitment. Furthermore, it has been discovered that EDSTMA and PUWOV employees belong to cult groups. Therefore, essentially they are security risks to society in themselves.

Of coursè, the government aware of these obtuse profile but it is 'helpless' about it since in Nigeria and Edo State of today, Obaseki realises that he needs strong men to aid him in governing a largely stubborn lawless citizens.
The drawback here is that a lot of security breaches occur on several occasions when EDSTMA and PUMOV staff are at work. In addition, because they have cultic brazenness, paramilitary expertise as well as diabolic endowments, the administration deploys them on the evil missions to supervise and help to rig election in its favour.

Challenges of this PDP role set will certainly come from the opposition. For this reason, insecurities occur at polling booths. Also, due to their withdrawal from their official duty posts for election work, a lot of Edo roads experience intolerable insecurities on the already unsafe roads. Such insecurities occur, too, when EDSTMA and PUWOV personnel flee into hiding during cult clashes to avoid reprisal attacks on them.

At this juncture, let us pause for a fleeting moment. Let us ask. Who is to blame for all these itemised insecurities in Edo State? Is it the APC or PDP? Of course, it is the PDP and Obaseki.

Another approach in governance by Obaseki and his PDP administration which create insecurity is his neo-liberal capitalist ideology. This in turn generated his overtly economistic vision of development which places much emphasis on growing the GDP to the detriment of meeting the social needs of the people.

To start with, let us look at his vision: "My vision is to make Edo State one of the 20 top African economies in terms of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) by 3025. We envisage an Edo State which will be the fastest in GDP growth in Nigeria and by 2050 it must be Top 3 in terms of GDP ranking in Nigeria", (Nigerian Observer July 24, 2021).

Obaseki made this statement when the United Nations Country team in Nigeria paid a working visit to him at Government House in Benin.

In pursuance of his neo-liberal ideology and vision, Obaseki adopts a policy of:

■ Privatizing and commercializing Edo economy which involves the removal of all subsidies from several services rendered by government.

■ Considerably, reducing the size of government and the civil servants since their core responsibility now is providing enabling environment to the private sector in other words, it is the private sector will take over job creation and other services at a profit it feels is appropriate.

Drastically cutting down on social welfare expenditure of Edo people. So, the days of Father Christmas of Christly government kindness, sympathy, generosity, empathy and compassion are over. Government will no longer consider it as a primary duty to help you in times of adversity.

Therefore, invest in the private sector's insurance schemes where help will come to you at a price for ýou. Nothing is free in Freetown.

A fall out of the foregoing Obaseki's neo-liberal capitalism is that he pays greater attention to creating virtual, digital jobs than real concrete ones yòu can see physically on the ground.

For instance, the 2017 Annual Report of Edo Civil Service Commission revealed vacancies of 11, 001 staff. Obaseki didn't fill all of them immediately through employment. What he did is to miserly and selectively fill a few of the vacancies at snail speed so that today a lot of vacancies still exist in all sectors of the civil and public service. Invariably, Obaseki deliberately refuses to give jobs to the restless, frustrated army of unemployed energetic youths roaming the streets in search of elusive jobs wearing battered shoes with gaping holes on their soles.

Biblically; uncaring de-fathering Obaseki is telling the youths: To your tents Oh Children of Edo State!! Government is no longer there for you. No more social cover for you. You either help yourself or join the morbid statistics of the living deads on the streets or go the uncharted way of the dead in the morgues!!

In response, some of the embittered, angry youths therefore take to crime, thus increasing insecurity in the land in a situation triggered by Obaseki and his bad PDP administration

Other policy fallout of Obaseki that promote insecurity include the following:spending heavily on digital technology so as to reduce employment, wasting funds on 'reforming' the civil service to drive privatisation añd commercialisation of Edo political economy which limit public jobs in the service; delay in the payment of contributory pensions to old, sick retirees as well as abandonment of their gratuity benefit payment; triggering or fast driving the incidences of broken homes and disoriented, fringe criminally-minded youths in such homes through neglecting to pay the itemised retirement benefits above; as well as a weak political will to revamp employment-generating Edo Line, Uromi Cassavita Plant, Bendel Brewery among others.

Due to the aforementioned context, the conditions for promoting insecurity are not only laid but continually strengthened each passing day.

Earlier on, I wrote that a cardinal vice of Obaseki's neo-colonial capitalist ideology is downsizing the public/civil service. Practical demonstrations of this case are the callous shutdown and retrenchment of over 200 staff of the colleges of agriculture and education. Also, 513 workers of Edo Sports Council were sent packing because of what the government called rationalization!

In 2022.. .Later, in 2023 using its remote Jacobian voice, the government got the management of the state-owned Ambrose Alli University to disengage about 22 academic staff at a time the bogus selective salary payment scheme was in vogue with some staff owed over 21 months salaries. Certainly the devil finds a job for victimized idle hands.

Expectedly, some of the sacked staff are predisposed to take to crime, thus adding to the heavy burden of insecurity in the state.

Take or leave it, Obaseki and his PDP administration selectively support cultists favourably disposed to it while hunting down opposition party cultists. Impliedly, the government usually works hard to free its arrested cultists using nolle prosequi.

Mr Solomon Arase, former Inspector-General of Police, said this much on one of his interview explaining that this government posture contributed largely to making the war on crime and insecurity to fail. Yet in iron deception; the Edo State Command and Control Center, Benin is named after Solomon Arase. How you are!

Well, in case you don't know, some of the idle, improperly socialized and deviant out-of-school children at home and on the streets come from the homes of such Obaseki retrenched public workers sent packing from their jobs to await their benefits in eternity. Hunger, poverty and a feeling of an unsecured, hopeless future by dependent children of sacked staff without immediate benefits are sociologically prone to a life of crime according to criminologists.

Insecure people create insecurity for others in society. The rich with full stomachs all day long would never be able to sleep when hunger and poverty keep broken children awake.

Sacking of public workers recklessly to cut costs by the uncaring,-anti-people Obaseki administration is not the only issue. When you observe closely, you will also notice that it only pays lip service to taking care of the fragile, vulnerable members of our society already plagued by the anomie.

For instance, several states no longer tax the poorest of the poor working as hawkers, vulcanizers and wheelbarrow pushers among others. But here in Edo State, they are even double taxed with devilish delight. For example, in Oredo Local Government Council Area, a wheelbarrow issued a ticket to operate in the general business environment.

If he bring in load for a passenger to the Central Motor Park in the same jurisdictional council area, he nust buy another ticket before he enters the park. As if this is not enough, on a bad day different non' state actors still forcibly collect revenue from these vulnerable groups sometimes in toxic situation that lead to chaos, inter-community clash as well as general insecurity to which the APC did not contribute. So, why is Obaseki now blaming the APC for insecurity in Edo State?

Another scenario. The misernomics and neo-liberal capitalism of Obaseki prevented him from implementing his promise on the 2020 ENDSARS Panel Report recommendation "to work out a students' loans snd scholarship scheme to assist indigent, vulnerable group to enable them to access education cheaply."

Don't forget, too, that Obasekinomics led to a drastic cut in social spending on Items 1, 2 and 3 of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) which will end poverty and hunger and low quality education by 2025. Once again, this can lead to insecurity in Edo State caused by Obaseki and the PDP certainly not the APC.

Remember, the first security apparatus that Obaseki put in place in 2019 called Operation Wabaizigan. It was destined to fail from the start because there was no foolproof arrangement to repair and replace its operational vehicles as well as pay allowances to the personnel. Furthermore, Obaseki promised that in six months the Command And Control Center for Wabaizigan will be ready even though it would have been launched at the same time as the personnel and vehicles of Wabaizigan.

The outfit went into extinction before the center came on stream in 2023. You see why Obaseki could not fully fight insecurity with Wabaizigan?

Edo State strictly only bubbles with business from 6am to 6pm. No night life exists in the whole state excerpt at Benin Airport thanks to Obaseki's diagnosed pathological fixation for potential revenue drive from investors and tourists. So, when he came up with Operation Light Up Edo beginning from Benin City people jubilated. They reasoned that if light comes at least it wil help to provide security at night. Unfortunately, this was not to be because it wasn't so successful.

Insecurity continued spilling into and growing in astronomical intensity in the 2023 pre-election period and thereafter. Why? Because of these reasons:

■ The setting up of a 'war machine' by Obaseki and the PDP to rig all elections henceforth in retaliation for woefully losing out in the presidential as well as national assembly elections in 2023.

■ The dismal rigging of the Edo Assembly and local government elections by Obaseki so as to avoid impeachment and 'finish strong'.

■ The restoration of godfatherism by Obaseki to enable him recruit Asue Ighodalo for the governorship race in Edo State. This singular act led sequentially to a dialectic crises between Obaseki and his deputy Philip Shaibu resulting in his impeachment. Ever since, peace has further eluded the state. More anarchy and insecurity took hold of the state one of which happened on July 18th, 2024 along Airport Road, Benin. There was broad' day shootings during which a mobile police officer Akor Onuh was killed in cold blood.

■ The diabolical introduction of the 1979 Traditional Rulers and Chieftaincy Law in Edo State after a dormancy period of 45 years in a bid to divide and rule the Benin Kingdom as well as Edo South Senatorial District electorally.

■ The public statements of Olu Martins, Odion Olaye; Anthony Aziegbeni, other chieftains and Obaseki himself advocating do-or'-die politics have worsened the state of insecurity in the state
Non-state actors in the PDP and the 11,000-strong Edo State Vigilantes have become the foot soldiers of mad violence on the state.

■ Finally, Obaseki today has added hydrochloric acid to insecurity weeping wounds by appointing nèw traditional heads for South-Ibie and Okpella kingdoms in controversial circumstances. Behold, the relative peace in the two kingdoms has been disrupted leading to some deaths in Okpella
recently.

Now, can't you see that it is Obaseki and his PDP members are largely behind all the problems of Edo State now blamed on the APC?

Methinks, it is a new normal thing for Obaseki and the PDP to dig pits of insecurity all over the state for its people. But, don't worry, Bob Marley says that, pit diggers are those who fall into it.