A former chairman of the Delta State Board of Internal Revenue, Hon. Joel-Onowakpo Thomas recently emerged the candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC) for Delta South Senatorial District.
In the party primary, Joel-Onowakpo, who was the sole senatorial aspirant, polled a total of 285 votes to emerge as the candidate of the APC at the primary election held at the Oleh Civic Centre, OlehIsoko South Local Government Area of Delta State.
Chairman of the electoral panel, Sir John Ebireri, who declared the results, gave a total number of delegates as 360, adding that Hon. Joel-Onowakpo polled 285 votes with 75 invalid votes.
Speaking to newsmen moments after his declaration, Hon. Joel-Onowakpo Thomas thanked the leadership of the party and the people of Delta South Senatorial District for making him the party’s senatorial flag bearer.
He called on the people of Delta South Senatorial District to be ready to put their hands together to make sure they deliver him adding, “there will be marked differences in the way legislative duties will be done in the National Assembly as soon as I step into the red Chambers”.
He said Delta APC was poised more than ever before, to win elections in the state as they were now very united and vowed that they are going to win the next elections come 2023.
According to him, “Today, APC is more united more than ever. The APC we have today is poised to win elections and it is hungry for power and success. So if anybody is telling you today that we are not united, if you had not asked me today in public, I would say let it be like that so that we will surprise them. We are very united and we are going to win this election by God’s grace”.
The Delta South Senatorial District candidate noted that if elected into office he was going to work together with his colleagues to ensure that the issue of primary health care services was addressed.
“The primary health care services need to be addressed because we have come to realize that the things that kill Nigerians and take them out of the country are little things – high blood pressure, malaria and the rest of them. So along with other of my colleagues, if voted into power, we will be able to manage those problems and see that those ailments are tackled at the root.
“Another thing I want to do together with my colleagues at the National Assembly if voted into power is that we will ensure that there are sustainable ways to assist the state governments to reduce poverty in their environment.
“The greatest thing that can happen to any man is poverty and once there is poverty this can lead to poverty of the mind and once there is a poverty of the mind, there is nothing you can do to correct the human race. That needs to be addressed in a sustainable way”.
The senatorial candidate said though the Buhari government is on the matter, more needs to be done.
“The current president is doing so well to reduce it, but we need to find a sustainable way of doing it so that we will know that it’s established like every other thing.
“I am someone with wide experience in governance, I am someone with experience in both private and public service and I will bring in all these experiences to bear in the National Assembly together with my other colleagues,” Joel-Onowakpo stated
On the issue of factions in Delta APC, Joel-Onowakpo said, “There are no factions in APC. I want to say this today, the APC we have today is far better than the APC we had in 2018. Today, those that were disagreeing in Delta have collapsed their structures to work together as one united family”.
