Sometime last year, my friend Ejituru Daniel Oti alerted me to the need to pay closer attention to the joke going on in Abia State, but in which major actors willfully brand governance. He had just returned from the state after spending a reasonable part of his annual leave in Aba, the once major commercial nerve centre of the South East and, frozen into mute incomprehension of what had gone amiss, insisted I must tell the world how Mr Theodore Orji, the state governor, has worked steadily to strip the state of any jot of mark of a modern day state.
Sometime last year, my friend Ejituru Daniel Oti alerted me to the need to pay closer attention to the joke going on in Abia State, but in which major actors willfully brand governance. He had just returned from the state after spending a reasonable part of his annual leave in Aba, the once major commercial nerve centre of the South East and, frozen into mute incomprehension of what had gone amiss, insisted I must tell the world how Mr Theodore Orji, the state governor, has worked steadily to strip the state of any jot of mark of a modern day state.
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I was too angry to oblige Dan. I told him I wasn’t going to honor the governor and his band of bumblers with my criticism. His is a pathetic case, I had argued. I thought we could try first to avert a major disaster at the national level than descend into time-wasting with the aberration of governance going on in Abia State. My friend insisted, arguing that the situation was terrible, and that I needed to see Aba.
“It reeks of filth. No road anywhere. Poverty has soared to an alarming dimension. And yet you see mind-boggling profligacy in government,” He said.
I reluctantly agreed, but because I wasn’t so convinced, it fell victim of more pressing demands and was pushed down my scale of preference as time passed.
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The signs are too ominous today to keep mute and carry on as if all is well in Abia State. All has gone wrong!
At inception, Abia was nicknamed God’s own state. But it is arguable whether angels still find there conducive let alone God the almighty. I like to think God has long departed that place. Abia is one of the most unlucky states – with governance - in Nigeria. It gets worse governed with successive governments, increasing the army of the poor, the hopeless and the disenchanted. Yet it hasn’t ever been this bad under any administration. Governor Theodore Ahamefula Orji, its current governor, has reduced the state to a mini theatre of the absurd.
The news that Theodore Orji just sacked the 17 Local Government chairmen of the state “for matters relating to local security” is plain ridiculous, and speaks of the weight of pettiness the man has brought to a task as serious as governance. Pray what has a local government chairman got to do with security? Is Abia state practicing state policing and/or local government policing? Is the governor saying that there is a recent surge in armed robbery or kidnapping, and that the Local Government chairmen are guilty of complicity in those acts?
It is instructive to note that this sack is coming just a few days after the governor was booed by Abia residents in Aba during the lying in state of Odimegwu Ojukwu. Vociferous sections of the crowd were reported to have hauled sachets of pure water at the governor. Apparently, Mr Orji is angry with the local government heads for not renting the right crowd to grace the occasion. The right crowd here means those who will close their eyes on the sorry state he has brought the state to and rain praises on him instead. He didn’t get that. That’s the source of his anger.
Last year, Mr T. A Orji did the unthinkable. He ordered all non-indigenes under the employ of Abia State Government to leave. He was sacking them, not for their incompetence or incapacitation, but plainly because they hailed from other states. The victims of this 17th century policy of a 21st century governor included even people from neighbouring Imo, Rivers and Ebonyi states. The affected are people from the same region and ethnic group with the governor. Some –or all -of those people governor Orji sacked are people who may have spent a better part of their lives in the State. They were sent into the cold, back to a world they weren’t used to, and in which they knew nobody.
Recently, Mr Orji jacked up the tuition paid in the state university, ABSU, by over a hundred percent. Students in the school now pay as much as N100,000 per academic session. This came at a time when neighbouring states were slashing tuitions paid by their students in tertiary institutions. In fact, Imo State – whose governor was as much hailed as governor Orji was booed – has gone from tuition slashing to total free education. You want to know his source of funding the laudable programme? Security votes!
Now that is the paradox. The man in Abia who greedily pockets over N5billion per year as security votes has sacked his Local Government chairmen for insecurity related matters.
But I also like the name the governor and his team gave the scenario: insecurity. He should know that poverty and hopelessness breed insecurity. And since he has been working hard at creating the two elements for insecurity in the state, he should be willing to reap that which he has sowed. Interestingly, he started reaping the fruits on February 28 at the Aba township stadium where he prepared to share in the glory of Ojukwu, the man who, unlike himself, gave money its place in his lifetime – despite being born into wealth.
At the occasion, the long-suffering people of Abia served a notice to the governor. The message was loud and clear. They told him in words and in deeds that they understand what good governance means, and that the length is limited to which the lies broadcast daily on state radio and TV can travel. By pelting him with pure water sachets, and urging Rochas Okorocha to address them instead, they made a clear difference between light and darkness, and went ahead to choose the former.
Being part of a tribe of Nigerian rulers who have stripped politics of its colour and public speaking its content, we would soon be hearing him come out to accuse “detractors” of being behind his travails. One sure figure he’ll point at is his predecessor, Orji Uzor Kalu, whom he has accused of everything bad with the state. But each time he does that, he ensures he leaves out a mention of the influential role he played in that regime as the Chief of Staff. I hope it doesn’t get as bad as someone trying to accuse Rochas of being tacitly behind the Aba debacle. In this part of the world, anything could be grabbed as an alibi.
But in a way, I wasn’t expecting any stellar performance from governor Orji. From the wonder of winning election while in Kirikiri - where he had questions to answer about his role in the massive plundering of Abia state resources - to his becoming a member of three political parties in less than two months, the governor’s true identity and what he represents remains a puzzle. He claims he runs a poor state, but his son, Chinedu, lives in opulence. He goes on convoy and harasses citizens in public places. And there are reports of how he has practically bought all the choice properties in Umuahia, the state capital.
Four days after the Aba incident, the governor took a full page of a national daily to advertise his achievements in the state. And interestingly, the advertorial began with these words, “Abia Is Better”. That was a statement of relativity. He is comparing the state with what it used to be, not what it ought to be. That’s mediocrity.
One of the projects advertised is a skills acquisition centre in Umuahia. Even if we assume that this claim is true, how many people can that acquisition centre accommodate for a state with a population of over two million? Of those roads listed, why weren’t we given their lengths? What kilometers of roads were built, within what period and at what cost? But I also have heard from a couple of those who visited the state recently that some of the roads claimed to have been fixed by the governor are still in bad states.
The lure of money is such a powerful thing. It erases the pages of our rulers’ history books, leaving them unable to recall what happened to those whose footsteps they follow. Governor Theodore Orji wants to go the way of Chimaroke Nnamani of Enugu State. Let me be one of the first people to wish him well.
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