Dr. Orji Uzor Kalu, former governor of Abia State, is not a controversial
man, but due to his larger-than-life personality in Nigeria and around the
world, people associate controversy with him, at any slight move he made.
Evident is his return to the People’s Democratic Party (PDP), which
primarily took place in his Igbere country home on January 16, 2013. He was
issued with a membership card, supposedly emblazoned with the number –
9787945. Since then, opposition to his sparkling political philosophy has
used the event to cause unnecessary attention to their ill-fated politics.
Conversely, when it comes to controversy, we know the real controversial
politicians in Abia State today. And they cause the unnecessary
controversies in the political theatre of that state, because of their
self-seeking purposes. We shall unveil them as we progress in this
treatise.
In politics, Kalu is one politician who hates to destablise the peace of a
people, but has never run away from confrontations. What would he get if
was like those who cause conflict among his good people of Abia State? He
wouldn’t think of doing that, let alone, harnessing it. But it is obvious
that his return to the PDP has continued to jitter certain politicians in
Abia State, so they are fanning the embers of political narrow-mindedness,
which they are hatching, and when they must have lighted the inglorious
light, they would say that it happened since Kalu returned to the PDP. This
is just a case of giving a dog a bad name to hang her!
To make home that point, since the return of Kalu to the PDP, the Abia
State Government and the state chapter of the party have been causing
uproar where none should have existed. They have said many unprintable
things against the dude, but in Kalu’s mature disposition in handling
issues like this, he has refused to join them. Being a very amiable
politician who believes in the Igbo philosophy of Biri Ka Mbiri (Live and
let Live), Kalu has done sparkling things for those who are bald-facedly
calling him a political orphan and want him dead.
But who could believe that almost all the people that went to the PDP
national headquarters in Abuja to block what they thought was Kalu’s
intention to return to the PDP, Kalu in his benevolence and sparkling
politics of Live and let Live brought them back to the PDP one time or
the other. For example, Prince Vincent Ogbulafor was a member of the ANPP.
He once contested gubernatorial election against Kalu, but was made a
Minister of the Federal Republic of Nigeria during Kalu’s reign as Abia
State governor, in the event that Kalu opened his hands and performed all
inclusive government. Ogbulafor later joined the PDP; it was Kalu who
opened doors for his rejoining the party.
Kalu was also happy to take Senator Enyinnaya Abaribe to the PDP and
received him, after the later contested election on the platform of the
ANPP in 2003. Senator Nkechi Nwaogu was in the ANPP, it was Kalu who
brought her back to the PDP. What of Senator Uche Chukwumereiji who had
been a political prostitute – once in ANPP and the other in APGA and all
that? The unabashed Governor of Abia State was a political neophyte who did
not know anything about politics all his life; it was Kalu who made him
join the PPA. By this hint, would it be necessary to ask where Kalu
offended these people who today do not want to sight him? Against this
influence, many Nigerians had and have been doffing their caps and headtie
for Kalu, as a sparkling politician, who is ready to die for those, who may
not attend his funeral, because of their sheer prejudice.
Kalu’s return to the PDP was his fundamental right, no matter any contrary
opinion. He did not cause any bridge to his sparkling personality nor that
of the party. Remember he once said that the PDP was not for him if
ex-President Olusegun Obasanjo was still the BoT of the party. Now,
Obasanjo is not the BoT of the party, and Kalu deemed it right to walk his
talk by going back to the PDP he was founding member in 1998. One salient
comment that Kalu made in contradiction of those in the Abia State chapter
of the PDP calling for his head about the authentication of the celebration
of his return by the party in his Igbere country home is: “How can the
whole executive of two wards resign? What was the reason they gave for
resigning… Emma Nwaka (the Abia State PDP chairman) should take time. He
is not the owner of PDP. We have come back to take over our party.” So,
from where did those who said that Kalu was rejected by the party get their
nosedived news from? It has become palpable that infinitesimal individuals
in the Abia State chapter of the PDP had held the party down, so they were
afraid of how Kalu rejoined with the PDP through a very lucid process,
which they had found very hard to thwart.
What many of us had thought that these people fighting an already lost
battle against Kalu could been doing was to find out how the allocations
from the Federation Account to Abia State Government were expended, but for
the lucre, they won’t. If not for their self-seeking purposes, they would
have been expressing their lack of comfort in the Governor T.A Orji
administration that has deprived the good people of Abia State the
essentialities of democracy by his incessant imposition of anti-people’s
policies. How could a governor of a state also operate as a contractor? Is
it not only in Abia State that government award contracts without due
conscientiousness? Are the major recipients of government contracts in Abia
State not Governor T.A Orji, families and chronics?
Before T.A Orji and his bunch of yesmen kill Kalu (which of course they are
brats to Kalu), can they tell us who the real owners of the following
companies are? Investigations allegedly reveal that the companies lack both
the financial and technical capacity to deliver the many projects that were
awarded them, yet the government in Abia State still award them contracts
without bathing the eyelid. Can Governor T. A Orji tell the good people of
Abia State what he knows about the following companies that are alleged,
are linked to him and family and cronies (directly and indirectly) and are
being used to siphon the states funds?
Investigations alleged that (1) NGAME NIG. LTD is allegedly (working for
the wife); (2) GLANO CONSTRUCTION is allegedly (owned by his brother in
law); (3) CIREO NIG. LTD is allegedly (owned by his in law); (4) BENICOUX
NIG. LTD, allegedly, bought Empire Hotel as BENIS HOTELS and allegedly
(siphoning for Governor and Son- ikuku); (5) OKEY TECHNICAL LTD is
allegedly (milking ASEPA for Orji’s Son, Ikuku); (6) SPRING INVEST AND
PROPERTY CO. LTD, is allegedly furnished the Governor’s office with 56
million naira; (7) CHARBEL LTD, is allegedly (Lebanese constructing the
conference centre and working for the Son, Ikuku); (8) NEW IDEA, is
allegedly (the master agent of siphoning); and (9) SEAMARK ELECT. CO. LTD
is allegedly (Son’s).
If the claims above are anything to go by, could this be the reason
Ogbulafor, Abaribe, Nwaogu, Chukwumereije and the arrowhead, Governor T.A
Orji do not want Dr. Orji Uzor Kalu sighted around the business of
governance in Abia State while claiming that PDP said this and that?
