Human rights defender and billionaire businessman, Chief Dr Patrick Osagie Eholor speaks about himself, family, his human rights battles and politics.
Excerpts:
Can you tell us about yourself?
My name is Chief Dr Patrick Osogiewangbon Eholor. I am from Oredo Local Government Area. My mother is from Ovia North East Local Government Area. My great-grandfather is one of the great prime ministers of the Bini Kingdom and my father is Chief Eholor, a very popular chief who would not agree with the most popular opinions.
My father was a very simple and friendly man. Most of the things I do are inherited from my father.
I have been in Canada for 30 years of my life, I was denied so many opportunities in Nigeria, and I struggled to even attend primary and secondary schools
which I couldn’t finish in Nigeria for financial reasons.
I went to an adult school and worked very hard before I invested in real estate. I followed a path in my life that whatever I suffered, I would not allow people to suffer it and that is one of the reasons why I came up with ONE LOVE FOUNDATION.
I feel people can be taught how to hate but they cannot bo taught how to love, and I feel the only way I can be happy is to love people or to prevent people from going through what I have been through. I have suffered a lot of injustice, if I dont have light, I don’t have good motorable road, if I can’t have proper education, they are all injustice.
It is not only physical assault that mean injustice to me. There are a lot of people who have been denied their rights, especially what is enshrined in our constitution.
When I went through these things in my life, I said to myself, whatever you have been through I will ensure that nobody else suffers it. It is an injustice not to have proper education.
For this reason, I opened One Love Foundation a registered organization. I have seen myself getting into unnecessary trouble, don’t have a problem with anybody but I always see myself in trouble with the government for one thing or the other and the press was not also friendly.
I believe because of the poverty and hardship the media often sells out. This is why I am now a publisher and also a writer. In a day I write so many articles and I don’t know how it happens.
It will interest you that about 20 years ago, I was the one that brought government attention to the Benin Lagos road. The BBC came in there and interviewed me and then the government spent over 300 billion and there was not much difference.
I have fought numerous anti-corruption fights. Talking about the tribunal judge Umar Danladi when he assaulted a security guard, I dragged him to court and that if a judge can act like this, if you can’t trust a messenger, you can’t trust his message so, he must step down.
It will also interest you to know that when Umaru Musa Yaradua was alive, may his soul rest in peace, I was the one who pushed for the passage of the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), that every government institution should be compelled to accountability and transparency on how money was spent. A few days ago, because of the accident that happened along Ugbor road, I took the state and federal government to court, complaining that a lot of people have died there, comparing how people died in Iraq, Afghanistan, Ukraine and Russia, there is loss, casualty there but over here, 40, 50 die in an accident and they are avoidable. I wrote Godwin Obaseki and told him, your condolence we don’t accept it anymore, fix the road. Invest in the government road, get the money back to them and that’s why I said I get myself into unnecessary trouble.
I have known you for at least 25 years, I know you not as a human rights activist but as a real estate investor, how do you combine being a successful businessman with being a human rights defender?
It’s easy, its very easy to combine both jobs. I am a humanist. it’s like when you hear someone say I have a calling from God, I am a pastor. I believe that your legal profession does not stop you from being a human. The hardest job anybody can ask for is to be nice and be kind. The job is available but nobody want to take it. I won’t to be nice, I want to be kind, I want to be good and became great. I don’t want to be great and become good. It became inborn in me as l am doing my real estate till today which I am known for, I still have the human face to people. I still feel that people have the right to have a tattoo on their body, it is your body, people have a right to own a laptop, and people have the right to own an iPhone 15 pro max if they can aftord it.
I recently went to China, and every little kid has this. My little son who is three years old is already learning to code because he is a privileged child, because his father can afford to buy him a computer, having a computer doesn’t know mean they are cyber-criminals, they are yahoo boys. Where are there no yahoo boys? There are Yahoo boys in America, there are thieves in America. If there were no thieves, there wouldn’t be police, if there were no migration, there would be no need for immigration if there were no drugs, there would be no need for customs. It has been happening before now and it will continue to happen. What we have to do is to try and see how the crime will not be more than the decency in the society, that is always the difference.
There must always be crime, there must always be drugs, there must always be prostitution, and there must always be the good, the bad, and the ugly so comparing my activism with my business doesn’t affect me at all.
What’s the percentage between your business and activism?
I think l can call it 50/50 because, over the years, it has not affected me, I have been donating money to the churches, mosque, in fact I am a free thinker. I know there is an omnipotent but don’t go to church like you do, I believe also there is a deity that we have neglected. We embrace foreign things, even Christianity, and the Islamic religion, are all foreign, I can categorically tell you that our Lord and savior Jesus Christ is not a Nigerian but from the Middle East Saudi Arabia just like Prophet Mohammed. Which then is an African God?
So let me come to the issue you have raised now, do you believe that there is heaven?
No. I don’t want to believe in heaven and hell, there is none. It might sound crazy but what is heaven? White people have been able to tell us that when you don’t behave yourself,you will go to hellfire after death. Those who died along Ologbo road, because of explosion, because they went to siphon fuel, they burnt to death, was that not what thay told us that would mako us behave ourselves? Which other heaven or hell are they going to after roasting here like corn, are they now going to enter heaven because they roast themselves? For me, I dont believe in heaven or hell but I believe that one day we will die, whether we are going to meet our maker, I am not experienced to tell you that but l don’t believe in heaven or hell.
Do you believe there is a soul and a body?
I believe there is a soul and I believe the soul will depart from us one day and that’s why even if you cannot believe in anything if you wake up, you must know that there is a greater being and I believe in that greater being, that architect of the Universe, that when we sleep, somebody own us and one day, that person that own us will take us back.
Whether he is putting it in hell fire and crushing it or putting it in heaven and giving it chocolate milk I don’t know, I can’t tell you that.
After the local govemment election, you addressed the media that you were harassed and you went further to mention names, how far has that gone?
I am somebody who doesn’t stop when I am fighting. I fight for good reasons The first election we did for local government in 1999, Idahagbon won in Egor, and Lucky James won in Etsako Central because it was conducted by an unbiased umpire, which was the INEC, not because they were good, the were not perfect, but Lucky Igbinedion and the rest of them connive that they connot allow the INEC to continue to conduct local government election because they didn’t want the local government to have their autonomy to treat them as slave.
If you have a judge in your court and you are a judge in your court, there will never be justice that is why they always say they win 18 over 18. Immediately ofter that election, I wrote a petition to the Senate and House of Representatives that we must amend our constitution
In Canada and America, the people that gave us democracy, state or federal don’t conduct local government because local government is very close to the people.
It is the local government themselves, Oredo, Ovia North East and Ikpoba-Okha that will conduct their local government but they will be supervised by the state and federal umpires. That means there will be a local government independent electoral commission.
That is how it is supposed to be. The state will have their own the federal and the local government will have their own, and that is true federalism. It will also interest you to know that l have been fighting local government autonomy, and judicial autonomy when I am not a lawyer, I did it for them and those are the things I have done. You can go and confirm because they are all in the public records.
You released a video and you stated that the Chief of Staff and the Secretary to the Edo Stato Government are harassing you. What is the update?
The SSG did not harass me or assault me physically or otherwise, the truth is the truth, and if the truth shall kill let them die. The SSG was my lawyer a master is a master. The Chief of Staff senior brother Tony is my friend
They are both friends and family I expected them to have respect for me as a Father or an uncle, that is why I called them out. The harassment was attempted by the Chief of Staff, I only added the SSG to it because I reported Osaigbovo Iyoha (Chief of Staff) to Osarodion Ogie (SSG)before this local government election and he didnt do anything which is why I combined them.
To be truthful, Ogie did me no wrong it was Iyoha who was secretly raising boys to humiliate me but it was revealed to me. The police investigated my allegation of threat to life. I just wanted it to be out there that my life was being threatened, and in case anything happened to me, he should be held responsible.
What is the state of Human Rights Defenders in Edo State?
There have been issues among lawyers and they have not been representing themselves well.
When Douglas Ogbankwa was arrested, I submitted a petition with the DSS and also with Human Rights Radio (Brokoto). My argument is that if a lawyer who has the right to defend his client said
“My client cannot make a statement without my presence that is what Douglas did and he walked out and they descended on him and arrested him.
They beat him and I said that if you can beat a lawyer then we cannot trust a suspect in your custody and that is where I have been interested because you can also beat me because I am always in trouble, I pack my brush, towel when I am leaving the house, I don’t know if I am going to jail because of the kind of work I do. But lawyers must wake up. Lawyers are not waking up. Lawyers are also law enforcement officers, they are supposed to be enforcing the law, but some of them have reduced the bar, that is why the police don’t have respect for them and it ought not to be so in an ideal society.
Is it the gap created by lawyers that has given you so much to do and tell us about your ongoing fight with the Benin Bar Chairman of the NBA?
I don’t have an ongoing fight with him, I think he was misguided, lawyers are supposed to be role models in our society. What happened was that there was a scheme going on with the Commander of the EFCC, who has some selective lawyers, I don’t want to mention their names, about 6-8 of them including two women. If you go there as a lawyer, they will disrespect you.
The cartel takes the cars, and jewelry bought with criminal money, they will sell, share with the EFCC and they will take their own. When I got a hold of it, I wrote about it, instead of the NBA Chairman commending me, he made a mistake and told my family that l am a litigant who has never won a case and I said no, you cannot attack me, the last time I know, he has never won a case in a
Magistrate court or High court or Appeal Court, he has never been to Supreme Court, he is only there because his father was the owner of a Hotel and he cannot even manage it as a prodigal son besides he has no wife at home and the last time I know.
Someone was sleeping with his wife at Akenzua after which she ran to America with his children but l am married to a supermodel.
By the grace of God, I didn’t go to a four-corner world of institution,none of my children are B-graded,they are A and A+, so I am blessed with that. He has since apologized but I refused the apology and flew to Abuja to complain to the NBA president that he must resign from the Committees he belongs in the Edo State Government.
He is a Benin man, I don’t bring people down but I cannot allow you to bring me down. He said he didn’t do it that the P.R.O.did because he was overzealous and then got him into trouble. He swore that he never did but are you going to allow me to fold my hands to allow someone to insult my beautiful wife and beautiful children? No, I would rather defend.
What is in your tool kit for the lawyers/defenders association?
1.Lawyers must know the essence of why they went to school.
2. Lawyers must also know that people hove the right not to make a statement.
3. And the lawyer also has to do something for the sake of justice, every divisional police in the state is supposed to be visited by a magistrate judge to see if anybody is being unlawfully detained
for more than 24 hours. The lawyers if they are champions of justice, must monitor compliance.
4. Speak against lawyers working with EFCC to extort yahoo boys or criminals.
What is in your tool kit for humanrights defenders?
You know there are people who can do more than what I am doing, fortunately for me, I have been consistent and I have not been lazy, I have never been a government apology or relied on the government. By the grace of God, this place I am living in now was bought 28 years ago for seven thousand naira that will tell you for how long I have had money. When Oshiomhole came here when he wanted to be the governor, he was amazed that someone could have so much influence and wealth, and yet he was humble. The reason people are deprived and are sold out easily from activism is stomach infrastructure, the Edo people say “Elephants are crying that the hunters want to finish us, the children of the hunters are also crying, daddy, where is the meat?
Most of the human rights defenders supposedly want to build houses and buy cars, they are speaking grammar but their children are hungry. If the human rights children are hungry,they sell their rights.
What is your advice for Edo state as it concerns the upcoming election?
My advice for the governor of Edo State, who is my brother, my friend, whom I have not seen face to face for seven years but we have been writing and talking in the face of newspapers. I am not going to say he is doing well when he is doing very poorly.
My advice is that he has one vote, he might not be able to complete all he started but for the soke of God, fix our roads because he is going to bo remembered for two things, what he broke or what he made, that is my advice for the governor.
What is your advice for public citizens?
For our citizens, who are clapping for governors who dug boreholes for 250 thousand naira and commissioned it with 8 million naira, it is your money. For you who have the right to vote, but not exercising it, you cannot complain. For those who voted and it did not count, dont give up. We shouldn’t give up, we should continue to press further. Things are no longer the way they used to be, we are evolving and we will get there but we shouldn’t give up on ourselves There should be consistency, perseverance, speaking truth to power, live free or die.
Edo 2024,What do we expect, what should the citizens look out for?
What you look out for is a change. The PDP and APC have failed abysmally. We should not be loyal to our party, we should be loyal to our country Nigeria, and our conscience because Usman Dan Fodio once said, that conscience is an open wound only the truth that con heal it. We should be the change we are asking for. We should ask ourselves, the party PDP we want to vote for, what has it done for us, and the party APC I wont to vote for, what has it done for us lately? If the answer is nothing, then when we continue to do the same thing, we will continue to get the some result. We should try the Labour Porty and see what they can do.
It is not a perfect party, you cannot be perfect than the creator, the Almighty GOD but if you do one thing continuously and you are gotting the same result, you must try somothing else and that is why the English say you should get out of that box and do something.
Edo 2024, Edo Contral Zoning —what is your take?
My take is that we talk about equity and justice, I don’t have a problem with equity and justice but I have a problem with ro-ltation. I don’t care whether the Governor of Edo State 2024 is Etaoko, Esan, or Afemai,so long he is an Edo citizen who has competence and character, who can govern us as Edo governor not as Esan or Benin or Ekpoma. Don’t forget that some of the best governors we holad were Samuel Osaigbovo Ogbemudia and Ambrose Ali, may their souls rest in peace We have about 68 percent of the vote from Edo South, we voted for Ali and we voted for Osariemhen Osunbor, even though his tenure was short.
The idea of it is Esan’s turn, with respoct to my Esan friend, with respect to my Etsako friend, Idon’t buy it at all, I buy into character and competence.He who the cop fits, let him wear it.