GDECONSTRUCTING EDO 2024 UBERNATORIAL ELECTION OUTLOOK

The joint ticket of Asue Ighodalo and Osarodion Ogie will be difficult to beat, reckons Austin Isikhuemen

To understand the chemistry of the Edo-based rare raw material with the chemical formular AiO2, I need to first elucidate characteristics of its analogous material called SiO2 or silicon dioxide. This material is made up of two elements – silicon and oxygen which in this combined form is called silica. It is the material that make up sand. A grain of sand is as hard as glass and, indeed, glass is made of silica heated to extremely high temperatures. Can you imagine our roads and building infrastructure without sand?

What are the characteristics of silica? Its colour varies from transparent to grey. It has extremely high melting temperatures of 1713 oC and can only boil at the almost impossible temperature of 2950 oC. These temperatures can only be attained in a furnace or molten magma! Compare to water with a boiling point of a mere 100 oC. Silica is insoluble in both acid and water, meaning it cannot be dissolved by them!

Silica is stable in water and at elevated temperatures and it is an excellent insulator. It forms a near perfect electrical interface with its substrate. Silica materials are hard and strong and fail to brittle fracture under an imposed stress! It is the material of which glass, electronic chips and abrasives like sand paper are made. It is clear that without chips there would be no technology as we know it today.

Now to AiO2. That is the joint ticket of Asue Ighodalo (Ai) and Osarodion Ogie (O2) who are flying the PDP flag in the September off-cycle Governorship elections in Edo State. That ticket has an uncanny resemblance to its analogous chemical counterpart called silica! The characteristics of this joint ticket have interesting parallels with those of silica described above. Like silica made up of hard silicon and gaseous oxygen, this PDP ticket is made up of two gentlemen – successful technocrat Asue Ighodalo and administrative expert Osarodion Ogie.

Asue, super technocrat comes with excellent and unbeatable curriculum vitae and a record of achievements as long as the second Niger Bridge! Urbane, streetwise homey who understands and has a clear path and feasible roadmap to Edo’s prosperous tomorrow. He has successfully created wealth in corporations and has guided governments at state and federal levels in waste reduction and revenue growth to meet development needs.

He looks at the rearview mirror and critically analyzes the present while designing workable strategies for the future. Could Ighodalo, his name meaning “I look to the future” have been more prophetic? The government that hands over in November 2024 gave him the role of leader of Ala’ghodaro summits which think-tank has been crafting impressive practical strategies that are moving Edo forward silently but visibly. Path. Path.

 He has seen a path and has created paths before. In Nigerian Breweries, Sterling bank, Sovereign Wealth Fund, Dangote Flour Mills and several businesses. Law is his tool for business and governance.

Ogie is a lawyer too. Like oxygen, he exudes the aura of a silent achiever and loyalist extraordinaire! Works behind the scenes providing effective covering fire to keep his boss safe and doting i’s and crossing t’s. Ogie is a continuity thread that weaves together the past and present in Edo Government in order to deploy resources that will deliver a future assured of economic growth and political stability. He will ensure, post November swearing-in, that Edo’s current growth trajectory is on course working in synchrony with Ai that he has known and worked with over the years. His remarkable ‘seen-not-heard’ noiseless solid loyalty, like silica, gives the ticket an impregnable interface with Edo South and the establishment and people.

This ticket, like silica that withstands high intolerable temperures and pressure, will remain unshaken even in turbulent winds and will not, in fact are incapable of, taking irrational decisions to satisfy primordial needs and whimsical considerations that put Edo’s future in shackles. The Asue-Ogie combination, like silica that is insoluble in both water and acids, will withstand any intrigues and stratagems designed by those who put their personal interest above those of the Edo collective. Their strategic focus will be as solid as the Rock of Gibraltar and Somorika’s Oriakpe!

What of other contemporary chemicals that can be found in Edo State? How do they perform when stacked against AiO2? They are ubiquitous but amorphous and mostly malleable.

It can be difficult to classify if they are solid, liguid or gaseous! What is agreed by many renowned chemical researchers including ‘Nobel Prize winners’ is that those materials abrade and sometimes degrade when in close proximity with AiO2. And like the silica of various colours, you only need to look at the complexions of the two gentlemen.

 Isikhuemen is a management consultant