DSP OVIE OMO-AGEGE : Is this Insurgency, Hypocrisy Or A Conflation Of Urhobo Progress Goals?

1. The Deputy Senate President, Senator Omo-Agege began his speech well when he was invited to speak at a recent shambolic event to address Urhobos at The Urhobo Cultural Centre, Uvwiamuge-Agbarho on Monday 29th November 2021.

2.He began by highlighting the goals of the Urhobo Progress Union which which are ; to promote socio-cultural, economic and environmental development among Urhobo people. In particular at paragraph 18 of his speech he pointed out a key objective of the Urhobo Progress Union, namely, to “preserve and promote Urhobo culture, language and traditional institutions”.

3. However, at paragraph 38 of his speech, he then veered off completely, conflated and contradicted this fundamental goal by stating that “an insurgent group is laying claim to the leadership of the UPU, while himself and others have moved on with the impostor Olorogun Moses Tiaga-led “Executive” of the UPU. What a tragedy and shame to the Urhobo Nation, that a self-confessed ljaw man is now parading himself as “president” of our umbrella Urhobo organisation.

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4. While we credit the Deputy Senate President who is learned, a Lawyer and law-maker in Nigeria as a member of the Senate, he should have been guided by the goals of a Union that he had enunciated earlier in his speech before terminating in incongruent conclusions. Besides, the subject matter is subjudice, given that judgment is expected to be delivered on the issue by a federal High Court, in Warri. Why therefore should a lawyer of his mettle refer to a party who has submitted to the authority of the Law to determine the merits of the matter as an “insurgent”.
In addition, as a prominent Urhobo leader what steps has Sen. Ovie Omoagege taken to address the lingering crisis brought about by an impostor, an ljaw man who is parading himself as an Urhobo leader? Representing Urhobo interest in matters that may sometimes present with conflicts of interest with is actual ancestry.

5. “Insurgency” according to the English dictionary suggests, a revolt or rebellion from an accepted norm or governance framework. If as he elucidated from the outset, that the UPU was formed to preserve Urhobo Culture and heritage, how is it that an insurgency to reject the imposition of an Ijaw-led leadership on the pre-eminent Urhobo Progress Union inconsistent with the stated goals of the UPU?

6. The over-whelming majority of Urhobos at home in Nigeria and in diaspora agree with our resolve upon the realization of the facts through a written book by Olorogun Moses Taiga himself, hence they also have rejected the Moses Tiaga led UPU.
We have nothing against Ijaws or Taiga for being an Ijaw, and are not the people that labelled him an Ijaw man, it was Moses Tiaga himself who endorsed the funding for the writing, publication and dissemination of a biographical work, titled “Olomu And Development of Urhobo Land & Western Niger Delta” in which his patrimony and genealogy was traced to an Ijaw father not an Urhobo father.

At page… of the biography, It was stated by Moses Taiga himself that his father ” Joseph Taiga Zeze was said to be 106 years old when he died in 1994… From the Matolo family in kiagbodo in the ljaw area of the Western Niger Delta” . That is the true history of Moses Taiga. Although many credit his love for Urhobo activities with much regard. This undeniable fact has been further confirmed with the revelation that Olorogun Moses Taiga is the only one among his biological siblings that is claiming to be Urhobo while others are ljaws. Is this not curious? Having conducted such due diligence and established without any doubt that indeed his ancestry was doubtlessly as contained in his biography, the mere fact that he has been honoured with many Urhobo titles does not entitle or qualifie him to assume the leadership of the pre-eminent Urhobo Progress Union. He may be honoured in many ways and justifiably so in Uhobo land, but not with the leadership of the UPU.

7. Therefore, my leadership of the real UPU and firm resolve that an ljaw cannot be a leader of Urhobos is not a revolt but a fundamental preservation of the heritage and culture of the Urhobo people.

8. The Deputy Senate President may be used to making compromises in order to survive the inclement climate of the Nigerian political culture, but Urhobo culture does not admit such facile vacillations. If the gatekeepers of Urhobo Culture, our foremost leaders like Chief Mukoro Mowoe, Chief Salubi, Chief Benjamin Okumagba had been so fickle in the preservation of the heritage of Urhobos, the current generation of Urhobo people will not have much to celebrate, and future Urhobo sons and daughters will have nothing worthy left to celebrate in their time.

9. The definition of insurgency as the Deputy Senate President conflated in his speech is therefore an expression of mischief, founded on a misguided foundation of political expediency. A man who has no solid roots in a household will think nothing of selling the family escutcheon for a mess of porridge, and not surprisingly, that has been the fate of the UPU under an impostor, a gun-for hire leadership which the Tiaga led group symbolizes.

10. If the legitimate and genuine leaders of our umbrella body is opposed to the repugnant use of the UPU for partisan purposes at the expense of respect for a body that should be an umbrella for all Urhobos and their interests, irrespective of their political leanings, then to be so revolted is a necessary and acceptable revolt. The real insurgents are those promoting an insurgency on Urhobo Culture and heritage, by imposing on the Union, a man who paid for a publication that documented his paternity as an ljaw man, which by implication means a renunciation of Urhobo paternal parentage, if he is an Urhobo man, which he is not. This is also not because he hates Urhobos, but the fact of his origin as an Ijawman, selected to lead Urhobos, to make the UPU vulnerable under a vulnerable leadership.
11. The DSP calling us insurgents didn’t come to us as a surprise because he has been an ingrate to his friends, leaders and party members who worked for him. The man who brought him up politically was a good Boss and because he,the boss give him the governorship ticket when he was leaving, he became a bad man. The man who also made it possible for him to become a Dist Senator and later the DSP that he is today, was until yesterday a good man but today a bad one. What about we in the UPU that endorsed him? He was then full of praises for us but today we are insurgents. Virtually all the APC members in Mosogar have decamped to the PDP recently because all the appointments he gave were given to a PDP chieftain here to give out to his PDP people. His projects are the same too. Of course we can’t repeat our mistakes again.

Chief Joe Omene
President-, General