-By Zik Gbemre
The events of May 18, 2026, across Delta North and Delta Central did not represent a political contest; they were a total farce. The viral video footage circulating across social media shamelessly shared by Dr. Ifeanyi Okowa and his band of supporters presents a disgraceful spectacle that should offend the sensibilities of anyone who believes in true governance.
What took place was not an exercise in democracy, but a blatant mockery of it. Simply put, *there were no valid APC primaries in Delta North and Delta Central.* Instead, the state witnessed a nonsense exercise and a highly coordinated charade orchestrated to bypass the electorate entirely and rubber-stamp predetermined outcomes.
*1. Delta North: The Disgraceful Okowa Video and the Hijack of Democracy*
The visual evidence being proudly paraded by Okowa and his supporters is an absolute embarrassment. To watch political actors celebrate these “victories” while the process itself is clearly compromised is nothing short of disgraceful. A democratic mandate is born from the free will of the people, not from a rigged, manufactured theater where state machinery is weaponized to write lopsided results.
The circulating videos do not show an empowered electorate; they show a deeply flawed process where structural control is used to crush competition and stifle any real opposition, such as the complete sidelining of alternative voices in Delta North. For Okowa’s camp to share these clips as a sign of popularity is a testament to the delusion that currently plagues the state’s political class. It is a complete mockery of democracy.
*2. Delta Central: Hangers-On and the Myth of Professional Leadership*
Nowhere is this democratic decay more apparent than in Delta Central. Senator Ede Dafinone, despite his elite UK-trained chartered accounting pedigree, has allowed his political survival to depend on the very structures that hold the region back. *The imagery of Ede Dafinone being held by his hand by a flock of political hangers-on is entirely disgraceful.*
For a man who has experienced first-hand how functional public institutions operate in developed economies, relying on a crowd of dependent sycophants to validate his standing is a massive regression. True leadership does not require a human shield of professional cheerleaders to prop it up. Instead of utilizing his global financial expertise to build structural independence, establish economic frameworks, and create job markets in Delta Central, his political machinery remains tethered to a massive structure of dependent followers a regressive phenomenon completely absent in functional societies.
*3. Career Politics vs. Genuine Statesmanship*
The continuous recycling of career politicians who have dominated Delta State’s governance since 1999 represents an absolute refusal to allow the political landscape to evolve. Public service is treated not as a temporary sacrifice, but as a lifelong entitlement.
When a political class treats electoral offices as personal property, inclusivity is destroyed, and alternative leadership is completely choked out. True statesmanship requires knowing when to step aside from active electoral politics to invest directly in the community from the outside.
*4. A Demand for Tangible Legacy Over Empty Politics*
If these political elites truly care about the welfare of Deltans, they must realize that a legacy is built through concrete societal impact, not through writing results in lopsided primary elections.
Instead of fighting tooth and nail to occupy legislative seats through questionable processes, true leaders should be building institutions that outlast political cycles. For instance, addressing the massive deficit in local healthcare by establishing state-of-the-art medical facilities—built to global standards, complete with emergency helipads for rural evacuations would do far more for the people than any number of compromised terms in the Senate. Such projects would:
* Deliver high-quality primary and emergency care to vulnerable rural communities.
* Provide legitimate, sustainable employment for thousands of unemployed local youths.
* Create a lasting, unassailable monument to public service completely independent of shifting political tides.
The May 2026 Delta APC primaries were a nonsense exercise that completely degraded the concept of popular sovereignty. It is an insult to the intelligence of the electorate to label these staged events as “democratic.” If the political elite of Delta State wish to be taken seriously, they must abandon the optics of manufactured crowds, stop sharing disgraceful promotional videos of a sham process, and end the reliance on parasitic political hangers-on. True leadership cannot be bought, coerced, or staged; it must be earned through transparent processes and tangible development.
Zik Gbemre
May 19,2026
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