Should people who aspire to lead the country and the states be a merchant of lies? Should a party flag bearer at the level of governorship blackmail to occupy the topmost seat? Should not his ways and manners, speeches and utterances be a standard which others should emulate? That the wrong people for one reason or the other have found their ways to top political situations where they did not merit to be is no reason that we should continue to lower the average thus spiraling down and down in the scale of honour.
On Sunday February 15, 2015, on page 54 of the Sunday Vanguard, one Charles Uzoukwu wrote in favour of Alex Otti and his gubernatorial quest. I wouldn’t have written because a lot of trash keeps dropping on daily bases but this case impugns on data and it is necessary for us to correct lest other unsuspecting members of the public take it as truth.
Oddly enough, this wrong statistics ought not to be bandied by Alex and his group as we assume that they know better. You don’t need blackmail as a tool if you have facts. Ordinarily, somebody at the level of Otti who stepped off a high stool in the banking industry where facts and figures are more sacred than other places shouldn’t be caught telling blatant lies and feeding the public with faulty data in today’s world of data super high way.
According to what Charles heard from Alex Otti, Abia is the least developed of all states with many years of failed promises from PDP, the same PDP that Otti first berthed and ravenously wanted to purchase the guber ticket. According to Otti too, ‘statistics show that mortality rate in Abia, particularly at child birth is among the highest in the country.’ These are white lies and I am sure that people who follow trends in Nigeria will attest that Abia even in the next two years without a single medical input in the health sector and without a new project be it in road, housing, education, human development that you call empowerment, Abia cannot fall into such degradation. That’s due to work already done, by the present administration. Abia cannot he the least developed. I will give instances.
Abia Health is the most robust and has gone through quantum changes. Ask Professor Onyebuchi Chukwu, former Minister for health who when in office visited Abia for not less than three times. In these visits, he commissioned one vital project or the other and suggested on areas where urgent attention were necessary. His Excellency Chief T. A. Orji took him seriously and carried out whatever suggestions as if they were laws. The Primary Health Centres have been updated to 710 which at the same time offer maternity services. He has equally updated what he met at the secondary and tertiary health sectors with dialysis machines, 10 new General Hospitals, Eye, Chest Centres and a place for ENT. To enhance healthcare, Abia pays the CONHESS and CONMESS, special salary scales for health staff.
In 2013, at the 37th AGM/Scientific Conference of National Association of Optometrists, [NOA] Chief Orji was awarded Prime Ambassador of the Health Sector. Medical and Dental council of Nigeria has approved Abia state specialist Hospital and Diagnostic centre for medical internship training. Could a state rated this high by a professional organ have high rates of mortality?
Abia State since 2007 has witnessed development in all sectors. More schools have been built, refurbished and re-equipped. More teachers have been promoted and schools enrolments have increased. For the seven years and more, no single student and pupil in primary and secondary has paid a dime in school fees rather the ones in Umuahia and Aba go to school on Government sponsored wheels. Abia could not hold high caliber conferences but now could do so with the multi-floored and multi-roomed International Conference Center accredited to rub shoulders with the ones in the top cities of South Africa. Abia has an 90% completed Government House, functional E-Library, new Civil Service Secretariat, new business Malls in Umuahia and Aba, power evacuated from the Ohiya power station which has improved energy supply in Umuahia, and neighboring towns like, Oboro, Obowo, Uzoakoli, Bende etc. Our youths have been empowered beyond expectations in all the LGAs.
The security situation that frightened the brave and lion hearted were handled with utmost dexterity making a police boss to admit that Abia is a case study.
There is gender sensitivity with more women appointed and elevated. There are policy overhauls that ensures the continuous existence of interventionist agencies like ASOPADEC, CSDP, ADP, ABIA LIBERATION FARM, ABROMA, that are concurrently carrying out projects in different parts of the state. Are these components of underdevelopment? That shows how ignorant and poorly equipped a man who vaunts to govern a state is. It practically means that if Otti is elected, he would invest public fund in the wrong sector as he does not know where the shoe pinches.
So many questions for Alex Otti. Outside his misinformation, there are many issues on integrity. He consolidated his Aro personality by building in Arochukwu. When the present policy insisted in zoning, he changed nativity with the speed of lightening. These are certainly no marks of greatness. Alex refused to respect equity. His ancestral home of Arochukwu, land of great men and his adopted home of Nvosi in Isiala Ngwa North are all not in Abia South which probably was the reason he skedaddled from PDP in a feat of desperation.
As a successful citizen from the banking industry, we expect more good examples from Alex on decorum not marginality. Let him too be careful of what he says today for these may come back to haunt him or his offspring tomorrow.
Eddie Onuzuruike
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