Essential Ndubuisi
The concluding part of Obi’s glorious term as a governor presented Anambra people with a period of getting another person who could be at par with or better than the transiting governor in the pace of work. Many options were set on ground in the number of people who threw in their towel in the ring. The atmosphere came replete with very beautiful manifestos and campaign. But, the history and precedence of politicians in Nigeria have in a great way made the voting masses acutely sceptical in their dealings with them. There’s the big wall of trust strongly standing between the masses and the politicians.
In most cases, the masses resort to various factors in considering a candidate they can gamble on. And this could take the shape of sentiment most times.
That was the case when Obi marketed Obiano to Ndi Anambra. The prevailing sentiments was having been certified by a working Obi, he could be another Obi in the area of performance. Also, another sentiment was that of preserving Ojukwu’s legacy and by extension, Igbo party.
So, a literally unknown and wingless Obiano would end up flying on the wings of those two major sentiments into the seat of power.
However, Obiano’s disastrous performance ended up exposing the unreliability of sentiments and emotions. The belief that Obiano would make a good governor having been projected by Obi ended up being heavily dealt.
Obiano from his first term started manifesting his terrible governance but he was shadowed by the solid structures Obi left in place. He spent much of his first term glorying in another man’s legacies and using all the available propaganda he could muster to mask his failings. And luckily, this strategy came to his favor.
But, just like they would always say “deceive me once, shame on you; deceive me twice, shame on me” Obiano having succeeded in deceiving many people once with the first term propaganda and lies is now faced with the battle of deceiving the Anambra people again. With everyday passing, the incapacity of Obiano has been manifesting in many folds.
The usual propaganda of Anambra being the safest state has lost steam with the increasing level of insecurity in major cities of Anambra. This is worsened by the fact that many of the urchins causing security nuisance in places like Onitsha are agberos allegedly working for the government.
Our roads are witnessing the worst regime under the watch of Obiano. A state that was once remarked as having the best road network is now competing as one of the worst in poor maintenance and potholes.
In continuous show of bad governance and apathy to the plight of the masses, Obiano has introduced so many tax regimes in Anambra. In a chat with a Keke rider recently, he revealed to me how the average Keke rider pays as much as 3k on daily basis to all these agbero planted in all the nooks and crannies of Anambra State. Business owners and even hawkers are not left out in these lamentations and ugly experiences.
For a state Obiano met as debt-free, it beggars the mind how and why he brought so much debt on it with nothing in terms of infrastructure to show for it. The major work he has so far done marvelously well is employment of a legion of young persons as SAs to help push out lies and propaganda for him.
Furthermore, Obiano did not just fail in governance, he also failed in keeping the legacy of Ojukwu which was one of the sentiments that worked in getting him into power. Obiano made a great effort in ridiculing the Ojukwu family just to see how took over the party structure. At a point, he, unsuccessfully, engaged in an act of taking out of anything that has to do with Ojukwu in APGA.
As the next election approaches, one question comes to mind: on what ground would Obiano stand to talk and sell his candidate to Ndi Anambra?
Onyedikachukwu Anambra .
