Who Vindicated Abia Senators?

Posted by African Examiner Articles/Opinion, Latest Headlines, News Saturday, December 13th, 2014

By Madubuko Hart – Victory comes with it envy from enemies of the conqueror. Some persons and groups have towed this inglorious line since the polite Dr. Okezie Ikpeazu (PhD) was triumphantly elected the 2015 governorship flagbearer of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in Abia State.

Governor Theodore Orji of Abia State

While the governor of the state, Chief T.A.Orji has remained firm in making the state a peaceful and yielding place, the haters of anything good have been drumming their war drums of how to cause disaffection and disservice in the state for the reason that their preferred candidates were not elected the party’s candidate during the party’s primaries of Monday 8 December 2014 which took place at the Township Stadium, Umuahia.

They forgot that in a contest, one person must win. And here is Ikpeazu who was widely accepted by the PDP’s delegates during the time of the primaries in the state. No person or group would say that Governor Orji has not been performing creditably well. Anything short of this is mere propaganda as is today wont in many quarters just for the simple reason that the masses in Abia are drumming for tremendous support for Ikpeazu in the 2015 general elections.

Being transparent, Governor Orji who hates bad governance, impunity and corruption made sure that his government and him stayed aloof for the PDP’s delegates to choose who they wanted to be their candidate, hence anybody or group calling on the National Working Committee of the PDP, the National Executive Committee and most importantly, Mr. President, Goodluck Ebele Jonathan to ensure that Abia State is plunged into anarchy, is being Shylockic.

It baffles any sense with sound reason to believe the crassness from some quarters saying that the Abia State Government has not been erecting edifice and paying workers their salaries. The detractors in their figment of imagination have also taken Mr. Chinedu Orji to libelous height. When, who and where did they see the young man got hold of over 45 billion naira? The young Orji never boasted to any groups or associates that he was going to install Ikpeazu as the next governor of Abia State.

Previously, one Ebere Wabara published an article in The Sun edition of December 11 2014, titled, “Abia Senators vindicated”. After going through the inane essay what came to mind was who vindicated the Abia senators. It is observable that Wabara went to the market with his essay to draw people’s sympathy, but it is flagrant that by now he would be feeling disappointed, because the people know better and no longer take him and his insults against the government of Chief T.A. Orji, seriously.

In his maligned thinking, Wabara indicted the government of Governor T.A. Orji without any trial at a competent court of jurisdiction. Then, you wonder how democratic such a man that indirectly was writing that he was an advocate of justice is. What he failed to tell Nigerians is that the three senators he mentioned in his treatise in the persons of Senators Enyinnaya Abaribe (Abia South), Uche Chukwumerije (Abia North) and Nkechi Nwaogu (Abia Central), started their campaign of calumny against Governor Orji on October 28, 2014, after the governor had made it known that he was standing on equity and justice.

Hence, they started to shout that the governor was manipulating both the National Assembly and governorship congresses and primaries for who knows whatever Wabara was writing about. Did it occur to Wabara that before the emergence of Dr. Okezie Ikpeazu as the PDP’s governorship flagbearer in the state on December 8 2014, neither the governor nor his government said that they had an anointed candidate? They allowed the people to make their choice, and here is Dr. Ikpeazu.

So, where did the governor ‘manipulate’? Was it that Wabara was manipulating the truth for unpardonable falsehood he has been mounding and hyping around and against Chief T.A. Orji and his government? The election which the likes of Wabara have said was flawed was the best that even the officials who were at the election ground commended as the best they have ever seen in the history of the country.

Does Wabara want to say that the Returning Officer and Chairman of the electoral panel, Dr. (Mrs.) Angela Mba, who announced Ikpeazu winner with 487 votes to his credit, and said the exercise was the most diplomatic she had ever seen in recent times, did not know what she was doing? Let Wabara understand that this is not the way to draw attention!

Governor Orji has exalted the state from rubbles to the credible state it has become today. Dr. Okezie Ikpeazu is never the governor’s stooge as the governor did not anoint him nor did his government. The governor is a law abiding citizen and has never been selfish with power. Those who are doing everything to cause disaffection between President Goodluck Jonathan and him will not succeed. They should desist. Mr. President knows better that the governor is one hundred in support of his second term ambition. Nothing more.

Hart writes from Lagos