E.K. Clark, his politics

From Ndubuisi Orji, Abuja

Former Federal Commissioner Chief Edwin Clark’s political odyssey was one characterised by candour, audacity and relentless advocacy for equity and justice in the Nigerian polity. The late elderstatesman could be described as a “brutally frank” politician.

His political engagements, in and out of partisan politics, was anchored on the quest for the political emancipation of his Niger Delta region, and equal treatment for the southern part of country in the Nigerian state.

The late Clark was different things to different people. He was like the proverbial elephant encountered by seven blind men. To the Ijaw nation and Southern Nigeria, in general, he was a relentless crusader for an equitable society. But to some others he was an “inconvenience” they loved to hate.

Eminent lawyer, Mike Ozekhome, SAN, in a tribute to the late Ijaw leader a few years back, had described him as a man, who “takes the battles (even wars), to his intellectual adversaries. He seldom loses. He never retreats. His mantra is, no retreat, no surrender. A true leader that he is, he leads from the front, never from the rear. He commands utmost respect, even reverence. But he loathes bootlicking, sycophancy and servile fawning. You either love him passionately or hate him malevolently. There is hardly a middle course.”

Clark’s foray into politics started when he joined the Zikist Movement, prior to Nigerian’s Independence, on October 1, 1960. From there, t mhe Ijaw born elder statesman, having  tried out his hand in the plough in partisan politics, did not look back, until his retirement from active politics in 2015. For 52 years, Clark, would swim through the murky water of politics, making friends, foes and taking no prisoners in the Nigerian politics.

During the First Republic, the late elder statesman was a member of the National Council of Nigerian Citizens (NCNC). After the First Republic was truncated in 1966, Clark served as commissioner in the defunct Bendel State, during the military administration of the late Samuel Ogbemudia. The politician, who started as a councillor in 1953, had a brief stint as a senator in 1983, as a member of the National Party of Nigeria (NPN), in the short-lived second republic.

At the dawn of the Fourth Republic, Clark joined the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and became one of the leaders of the then ruling party in Southern Nigeria and at the national level, playing key roles in the affairs of the party in Delta State, zonal and national levels. In 2005, during the Political Reform Conference, the elder statesman as leader of the South-South delegates led the zone on a walk-out from the conference, over the rejection of 25 percent derivation fund proposed by the delegates for the oil producing states.

Clark, at various times, crossed sword, with different politicians, including Niger Delta governors Ifeanyi Okowa, over the management of the 13 percent derivation accruing to their states. The politician had admonished the Federal Government to stop paying the 13 percent derivation directly to the state governments.  The PANDEF leader, in an open letter to President Olusegun Obasanjo, in 2021, accused the former President  of alleged disdain for the Niger Delta.

The Ijaw leader’s  finest moment, in the agitation for the political emancipation of the Niger Delta, was perhaps in the period between May 2010 to May 2015, when President Goodluck Jonathan, held sway as President.  Jonathan, who was elected as Vice President, in 2007, assumed the presidency in May, 2010, following the death of his principal, President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua.

The former Federal Commissioner for Information was at the forefront of the push for President Jonathan to remain in office beyond 2011, when the latter’s quest to seek the PDP nomination for the 2011 presidential was challenged by Northern leaders, in the opposition party, who insisted that the party must field a northern candidate to complete the two terms of the region, at the time.

Prior to the 2015 general election, when there was controversy on whether or not Jonathan, who had won the 2011 presidential election, should contest for a second term, Clark told anyone who cared to listen, that it is the constitution right of President Jonathan to seek a second term in office, like any other president in the history of the country.

The Ijaw leader had stated that “Jonathan will contest in 2015 because of two things; one, he is qualified to do so under the law and secondly, he has performed well to the extent that those who voted him in 2011 are willing to do so again. Nobody has a right to stop him from contesting.

“Every President who has ruled this nation spent two terms. We voted for Alhaji Shehu Shagari as President in 1979 and 1983 respectively. Everybody in this country is created equal, no matter the tribe, gender or background as long as such person is a Nigerian and educated.”

After Jonathan’s loss at the 2015 presidential poll, Clark announced his retirement from partisan politics.

Jonathan had lost the keenly contested election to President Muhammadu Buhari, of the All Progressives Congress (APC), dashing the hopes of the Ijaw leader to have a son of Niger Delta serve two terms as President like people from other parts of the country.

Nonetheless, Clark’s retirement from politics did not mark the end of his advocacy for justice and equity in the affairs of the country. In the intervening period, he continued to make critical interventions in the politics and governance of the country; both as leader of Pan Niger Delta Forum and Southern and Middle Belt Forum.

Prior to the 2023 general election, the Ijaw leader, in keeping with his age long agitation for equity and justice in the polity, in an interview with a national daily, said that the South-East should be allowed to produce President Muhammmadu Buhari’s successor, in the interest of justice and equity.

In marching words, with action, Clark, in January 2023, openly endorsed the presidential candidate of the Labour Party (LP), Mr Peter Obi, describing him as “our best hope for Nigeria of peace, stability and progress.” Obi, a former Governor of Anambra State, hails from the South East, which has complained of marginalization in the country, in the aftermath of the Nigerian civil war.

Clark will be remembered for his many interventions in national politics and his ability to speak truth to power, at every point, as well as his desire for the Niger Delta to be given its fair dues in the Nigerian state.