It was a fixation to read in some of the newspapers of 6th April 2012 that
Governor Theodore Orji of Abia State had directed the National Poverty
Eradication Programme (NEPAD) coordinators in the 17 Local Government Areas
of the state to get on a project/programme that would be of profit to the
bucolic natives. What made it grubby was that the programme was tagged,
“Social Subsidy Scheme”. And that no fewer than 1,200 poor residents of the
state had been shortlisted for empowerment.
Orji, speaking through his Special Adviser on NEPAD, Prince Emeka
Nwachukwu, said that the aim was to ensure that the rural people felt
contact of governance. Ekputu! Imagine where a government is opening two
sites in Aba and Umuahia for an unbolt market where commodities, especially
food stuffs, fruits and crops, would be sold. Is this not laughable when
the people are not supposed to be pityingly treated as if they are beggars?
They said that they were opening the market to avoid the involvement of
market unions whom they believed influence the hike in prices of goods.
Humbug!
This project makes the allegation of the All Progressive Grand Alliance
(APGA) untouchable that Orji was commissioning non-existent projects.
Please see newspapers of Friday, 30 March 2012. The party described the
government of Orji as media government, where commissioning of projects was
not on ground and that one of such projects was to be commissioned in Aba
on Friday of that time. Was this the market?
Even though that the party made its claims on the ground of allegation,
some of us investigative journalists who have taken independent tours of
such projects, as the party called on us to do, have found out that the
party was not just making defamation of Orji-led government but rather, the
government is paper tiger indeed.
According to the Chairman of the party in the state, Onapuruagu Prince
Ukaegbu: “APGA, Abia State chapter, decry Governor Orji’s obsession with
the incident of February 28, at the Aba sports stadium and the attendant
mania to reverse the humiliation which he claimed he suffered as a result.
This has clearly led to governance coming to a halt in the state, as all
efforts of government have been concentrated at soothing the governor’s
bruised ego. It is this same obsession that led to the attack on our
liaison office in Aba and money meant for developmental projects has been
wholly consigned to one form of propaganda or the other with officers of
state struggling to outperform each other in this gory drama at
ingratiating self to the governor. APGA Abia State chapter calls on the
political editors, journalists and media practitioners who have been
contracted by the state government for the great makeover, to, while on the
assignment, veer off from the well choreographed route and go on their own
tour of vital roads like: Ngwa, Obohia,Eziukwu, Omuma, Uratta, Osusu,
Ukaegbu and Emelogu, just to mention a few. It is then that the true
picture can be ascertained.”
These areas and beyond are pits of hell! True. But it is only a buffoon
that chases the rat while his or her house is on fire. There is no sensible
person that would like to be identified with any case of shame be it
robbery, scandal, rape, etc., but Orji did. Please, see newspapers of
Sunday, 18 March 2012. Orji intervened in the shamefaced Oteh-Reps
face-off, whereas his state was crying of abysmal representation and
governance.
No one could tell what Orji wanted to gain in such intervention. Does he
want to choreograph it as well? Is this not the case of a man who has lost
focus to good governance? Whereas his people of Abia State wanted him to
wade into construction and reconstruction of the many decayed
infrastructures in the state, but cockily he was here engaging in the
rotten smelling face-off between the Director-General, Securities and
Exchange Commission (SEC), Aruma Oteh, and the House Committee on Capital
Market.
Either that Orji’s aides were not professionals or they wanted to be in the
news at every given bad or good opportunity, if not, how could in a
statement by his Chief Press Secretary, Ugochukwu Emezue, Orji was calling
on both Oteh and the Reps to embrace peace, whereas Abia State had people
representing them in the House, and was not at peace at home, either. This
is a case of overzealousness of a governor. In the Nigerian parlance, it is
called, Busy Body. Ho! Ha!!
Orji even insisted that Oteh-Reps face-off was the differences that could
be reconciled, whereas the act involving the Oteh was condemned by even a
neophyte in the discourse of Nigeria when properly explained to understand
what the problem was. A snake must beget snake!
It was only a governor like Orji that could have intervened in such
apologetic case of Oteh because she’s from Abia. Hear him: “Having watched
with studied silence the development, which seems to have created some
verbal exchange between the committee and the DG who is an Abian, it is
time to intervene”. You may call him a lawyer, when he added that if the
Oteh had made any distasteful proclamation during the scenario, “it was as
a result of the way the committee’s chairman handled the issues at stake”.Bad mouth on a bad case!
He even argued the idea of passing a vote of no confidence on the Oteh,
saying that she had a proven integrity. Hmmmmm! If Orji maintained that
Arumah Otteh was not the Director-General when the market crashed, then,
who can he say is the governor of Abia State that has crashed under his
stewardship. Kettle calling pot black? Bunkum!
We suggest Orji should learn from Dr. Orji Uzor Kalu, ex-Governor of the
state and his political mentor, whom many ndi-Abia have seen as their
choice. In an unconfirmed rating during Kalu’s presidential ambition in
2007, one observer said that we are hungry of Kalu ‘because of some
positive changes he had created in his rule in Abia State”, which the
observer said include: 1. Proven unity by demonstrating that Christians and
Muslims are brothers and sisters. In one of his posters, I saw him wearing
Muslim robe. 2. Proven he is coming to bring development in Nigeria by the
impact he has been able to create in his rule. 3. Proven he has the
knowledge to rule even the world by his involvements in making peace among
tribes, villages, countries and lots more. 4. He has proven that he is
kind-hearted by so many helps he has rendered to the needy in Nigeria (of
which Governor Orji was among the beneficiaries). 5. We know that “out of
the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaketh”, variably, he has made so
many promises which he will accomplish if voted for presidency. 6. He has
proven that he is a dynamic leader. He has touched many areas for
instance, in the development of infrastructure like free medical care, free
education in Abia State, even in football excerpt; leading Enyimba Football
Association to her great height.
Just imagine! This is to mention only but a few things that Dr. Kalu has
been doing for Nigerians. Kalu has been doing this for a better Nigeria,
which has given him a reputable image. Measuring his image with that of
Orji anywhere in the world is like measuring Imo Hill with Mount Everest.
Kalu represents the latter. What we have got under Orji is such statement
as “The state planned to set up three functional Skill Acquisition Academy
in each of the senatorial districts for training of unemployed in various
trades”. He wants people to go and trade (which is not bad), but only his
wards should go to school for hiking school fees in Abia State?
In earnest, Orji should stop maki
ng noise, upon noise and noise and maybe
corruption, without good governance. He was supposed to be a blessing in
that state, but badly timed, he preferred the opposite, expertising in
erecting bullet proof residences, which is not joyous in the real sense of
governance and democracy. His, is a bad image.
