Obiano, Soludo And Anambra State

By Chuks Iloegbunam

Chukwuma Charles Soludo was the guest lecturer in Awka during the 3rd Anniversary of the inception of the Willie Obiano Administration. The renowned economist’s magisterial presentation was laced with numerous economic, political and social nuggets, all of which boiled down to his unequivocal endorsement of Governor Willie Obiano for a second term of office. His views make sustained interrogation imperative. But, some background information is apposite.

*Soludo and Gov Obiano

Professor Soludo is far from the first Anambra personage to endorse Governor Obiano’s bid for a second tenure as Governor of Anambra State. The impressive list contains such names as Dr. Chukwuemeka Ezeife, the first civilian governor of the new Anambra State; Dame Virgy Etiaba, a former Governor of Anambra State, and Chief Emeka Sibeudu, who was Deputy Governor to Mr. Peter Obi. Others include Senators Ben Ndi Obi, Annie Okonkwo and Emma Anosike, none of whom is of Governor Obiano’s ruling All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA), as well as Dr. Oby Ezekwesili, the former Nigerian Education Minister. Elder statesmen like Chief Alex Ekwueme, a former Vice-President of Nigeria, and Chief Emeka Anyaoku, the former Commonwealth Secretary-General, have equally thrown their lot with Governor Obiano. Non-politicians like Dr. Cosmas Maduka, the versatile industrialist, and Chief Innocent Chukwuma of Innoson Car manufacturers have equally given Governor Obiano the thumbs up.

Indeed, the support for an Obiano second term is gradually becoming a movement. It has gone beyond personalities and attracted the remarkable attention of groups that cut across socio-political, religious, and professional divides. In this category are to be found the Anambra North Peoples Assembly (ANPA); the Old Aguata Union (OAU); the Federation of Old Nnewi Division (FOND); the Anambra State Association of Town Unions (ASATU) and the Anambra State Markets Amalgamated Traders Association, (ASMATA.) Yet, that is not all because the Anambra state branches of Nigerian Labour Congress (NLC) and the Trade Union Congress (TUC); the Anambra State Traditional Rulers Council; the Traditional Prime Ministers Council, the Anambra state branch of Southeast Women of Substance and the United Anambra Youths Assembly have equally endorsed Governor Obiano to continue with his exemplary leadership.

All the endorsements are held by one powerful bond – the fact that Governor Willie Obiano has acquitted himself creditably in the onerous responsibility of directing the affairs of Anambra State. In unison they sing the joyous song of his achievements: Obiano has made Anambra the safest state in the country. He has transformed the Awka capital territory from a provincial enclave to a worthy state capital. He has revolutionized agriculture, making Anambra a rice-producing state of note and a leader in dairy farming. He has sustained the prompt and regular payment of salaries, gratuities and pensions. He has displayed an uncommon sense of empathy for the sensibilities and sensitivities of Ndi Anambra. For these and many other reasons, they have taken the attitude that a second term is the appropriate reward for Obiano’s services to his people.

Obiano And The Dynamics Of Governance

By Chuks Iloegbunam  

Take this to the bank: in the run-up to next year’s gubernatorial election in Anambra State, Governor Willie Obiano is countless strides ahead of the most determined of his opponents. Many reasons account for this. Foremost is that he firmly has the advantage of incumbency on his side. But this needs spelling out. The incumbency factor at play here is not merely the occupation of the seat of power; it is that the Anambra State Governor has more than delivered. He has surpassed the records of his predecessors.

*Gov Willie Obiano 

Since empiricism is in accent, readers are called to take notice of the following facts. Governor Chris Ngige was in office for about three years when the courts gave him the matching orders. Governor Peter Obi was through with the third year of his first term when he published a magazine entitled Three Years of Solid Accomplishments. Whoever reads the publication and also reviews Dr. Ngige’s achievements, will come to an inevitable conclusion – if they compared them to the astounding performance of Governor Willie Obiano. 

Such a reviewer would acknowledge that, in terms of achievements, Governor Obiano stands head and shoulders above his predecessors. But, there is need for clarity here. Many politicians and soldiers have governed Anambra State since its creation 25 years ago. Some lasted a few months and got redeployed, or sacked by military putsch. But political stability of sorts became apparent from the inception of the Fourth Republic. Dr. Chinwoke Mbadinuju served a single, four-year term. Dr. Ngige’s tenure lasted three years.

Peter Obi spent eight years, minus the three months that the distinguished Dame Virgy Etiaba ably governed, following Mr. Obi’s unjust and ultimately reversed impeachment by legislative hirelings intoxicated by intrigue. Obiano is close to completing his third year. The trio of Ngige, Obi and Obiano has imbued Anambra with a legacy of performance to be proud of. It was Ngige who first demonstrated to Ndi Anambra that human beings drove on tarred roads instead of through ponds and potholes. Peter Obi continued the road construction legacy, topping it with the Odo Bridge in Awgbu, which, in 2010, was the longest bridge in Anambra State.

January 15, 1966 Was Not An Igbo Coup (2)

By Chuks Iloegbunam

(click here to read part one of this article)

The object of this second half of my article is to challenge Nigeria and Nigerians: Please make an honest effort at determining the truth of Nigeria’s contempo­rary history! It is the sure way of exorcising the demons need­lessly thwarting every chance of Nigeria attaining nationhood. If Nigeria refuses to confront the truth of its history, it will con­tinue to tug at centrifugal forces guaranteed to eternally forestall any contingency of mastering the contradictions that dog every centimetre of the country’s path.

 

*Reuben Abati 

The 50th anniversary of the January 1966 coup d’etat afforded the country a golden opportu­nity to turn its back permanently against historical lies, especially lies of the variety that inflame passions and further entrench the existing divisions between the disparate peoples forged into one country by the sleight of British colonialism. Unfortunately, revi­sionists seized the public space, retold falsehoods previously dis­credited and, thus, blew the op­portunity.

Reuben Abati is one such revi­sionist. In the first half of this article, we exposed his lies in an article he entitled Armed Forces Day: January 15, Remembering Where We Came From. Abati had claimed in that article that “An Igbo man, Nwafor Orizu, the acting President, handed over power to another Igbo man, General Thomas Aguiyi-Ironsi.” We proved that this was blatantly untrue. He had also downplayed Aguiyi-Ironsi’s central role in putting down the coup, for which we pointed out that he was being disingenuous.

There are two other distor­tions in Abati’s article that must be discredited. He wrote that (1) Aguiyi-Ironsi treated the January coup plotters with kid gloves, and (2) Aguiyi-Ironsi imposed Igbo hegemony on Nigeria. Whether in scholarship or in journalism, whoever made claims such as these, would be expected to de­ploy empirical evidence in sup­port of his assertions. But not Abati. We must dismantle his fab­rications, of course. Before doing that, however, some background information is imperative. Fif­teen years ago, Abati wrote a two-part article entitled Obasanjo, Se­cession And The Secessionists (The Guardian on Sunday, December 16 and 23, 2001).

That article contained all the lies that he regurgitated in his lat­est piece. It elicited a lot of reac­tion from observers of the Nige­rian condition who believed that Abati should know better, and should wield his pen with some circumspection. We will return to this. Let’s first reexamine the facts. Abati said that Nzeogwu and his cohorts were treated with kid gloves? In Nzeogwu: An Inti­mate Portrait Of Major Chukwu­ma Kaduna Nzeogwu (Spectrum Books, Ibadan 1987) Olusegun Obasanjo reproduced copies of handwritten letters from his friend, Nzeogwu, which detailed the ill-treatment they suffered in detention. But far more impor­tant is the fact that Aguiyi-Iron­si’s Supreme Military Council (SMC) took a decision to subject the coup plotters to public trial.

After The Onitsha Massacre

By Chuks Iloegbunam

One of the stories out of last week’s massacre in Onit­sha had to do with a uniformed man who sud­denly paced a few steps ahead of his cohorts, raised his as­sault rifle, trained it on Nkiru­ka Anthonia Ikeanyionwu, a 21-year old undergradu­ate, and pulled the trigger at pointblank range. Red-hot lead homed into her chest. The impact flattened her.

*Nkiru­ka Anthonia Ikeanyionwu: Shot dead by 

security agents during the pro-Biafra peaceful 

protests in Onitsha 

Blood spouted immediately, turning her light-blue dress crimson. She died instantly. She was armed – with her cell­phone! Her scandalized com­rades raised a concerted voice of protest but colleagues of the cowardly shooter covered him with their outstretched arms and led him to their backward formations. Some others re­portedly shot dead in similar circumstances were named as Chima Onoh (Enugu State), Kenneth Ogadinma (Abia State), Angus Chikwado and Felicia Egwuatu (Anambra State).

There was one weapon wielded by almost every par­ticipant or watcher of the demonstration that blockaded the Niger Bridge. That weap­on was the mobile phone. This has heightened incredulity re­garding some other stories in circulation. Since every mo­bile phone has a camera and a cine-camera, was it possi­ble that major aspects of the Onitsha demonstration could have passed unrecorded? How come that, of the thou­sands of photographs taken on the bloody day, there was no single frame and no sin­gle clip that captured a single demonstrator who was armed with a bludgeon, a machete, a gun, or an explosive device? Some were armed with the Bi­ble, singing Christian hymns. Some were armed with the Biafran flag. Most were armed with mobile phones. Yet, their members were rewarded with hails of gunfire!

A fabulous story claimed that the pro-Biafra agitators had burnt down the Onitsha Central Mosque. How come that, to this day, not a single photograph of the incinerated mosque is available for public viewing? Another fantastic story claimed that the dem­onstrators torched branded Dangote vehicles. Why, then, is it that not a single picture of a single one of the burnt vehi­cles is on exhibition anywhere in the world? On the night of the demonstrations, the Sabon Gari Market in Kano went up in flames. Pictures abound of the burnt market; films exist of the market burning. How come that, as concerns Onit­sha, there is no pictorial evi­dence of violent demonstra­tions, no pictorial evidence of the “burnt” mosque, and no pictures of the “torched” Dan­gote vehicles?