In a historic turn of events in the ongoing United States general elections, Nigerian-American Oye Owolewa has been elected into the United States House of Representatives as a shadow member representing the District of Columbia, making him the first congressman of Nigerian descent.
According to election results on the website of the District of Columbia Board of Elections on Wednesday morning, Owolewa garnered 81.59 percent of the votes, which represents 164,026 votes in total against his opponents, Joyce Robinson-Paul, who scored 18,600 votes, and Sohar Syed with 15,372 votes.
Owolewa, who ran as the Democratic nominee for Washington DC’s US Representative, broke the news via his Instagram account early on Wednesday morning saying, “In this role, I’m going to fight for DC statehood and bring our values to the lawmaking process. While today is a day for some celebration, the hard work also follows.”
Background
The Washington-based politician originally comes from Nigeria with his father from Kwara state and his mother from Oyo state. The Nigerian-American man’s campaign website reads: “In 2018, he was elected commissioner of his neighborhood in Southeast DC. Lastly, Oye has been an advocate for DC statehood, leading to his run to be your next representative.
“He launched TaxFreeDC as a movement to combat DC’s taxation without representation. TaxFreeDC declares that until DC statehood is achieved, DC’s tax revenue shall no longer go to the federal government. Oye believes our money belongs here for DC priorities instead of going to a government that fails to recognize us.”
What Does “Shadow” Member Mean?
Shadow, in this context, refers to “A person, body or campaign acting on the behalf of a group that does not technically exist.” Washington DC has been in a decades-long fight with the US Congress to become a state of their own. The elected shadow members are put into congress to lobby for their state’s independence.
Congressional elections held Tuesday with all the 435 seats in the US House of Representatives, and 35 of the 100 seats in the Senate up for grabs.
It is also important to note that Owolewa was not the only Nigerian-American on the ballot as there were nine others in Tuesday’s general elections in the United States.
