A gubernatorial aspirant on the platform of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Asue Ighodalo, who is believed to be the ‘anointed’ successor of the Edo State Governor, Godwin Obaseki, has declared he is a true Esan boy even though he cannot speak the local language.

We learned that Ighodalo stated this on Sunday while addressing his kinsmen in front of his family home in Ewohimi, Esan South East Local Government of the state.

According to PM News, the banker could not speak his Esan language as he communicated to the kinsmen through an interpreter, insisting he was an Esan indigene and had been on the state’s economic team.

Speaking through an interpreter, Ighodalo said: “I do things in Esanland because we are not noisy, my brother is here, I am here, my parents were here. I am a true Esan boy; I am not going to use Homeboy because they have used it badly. I am an Esan Boy.

“I am a true Esan boy. I am a true Edo boy. I am a true Nigerian. That is what I am. Since 2008, I have been on the state economic team, starting from the administration of Comrade Governor Oshiomhole. Since Godwin Obaseki came in as Chairman of the Economic Team, I have been coming to Edo state to support and advise the government.

“I have been advising since 2008, which is 15 years ago, which means that I came into Edo state five, six, so many times a year for government business, not to talk about my own business. So, people can say what they like.

“And this issue of an Edo boy, this issue of a true son of the soil, is in the heart. There are many of our brothers and sisters in the diaspora who are more Edo than many of them who live here.

“So it is in the heart, it is what you do in your heart, it is not how many pepper soup joints you go to. So all those of us in the diaspora, those of us in the diaspora in Nigeria, diaspora abroad, all the best hands must come to develop Edo State.

“Someone can’t sit in the village or in ‘mama put” and say the rest of us cannot come and develop our state; it is not done.