By Emma Olewunne
Rochas Okorocha
Even with the 2019 general elections still six months away, activities and calculations by interest groups and individuals for various positions, are already taking shape.
Put in everyday Nigeria’s street lingo, the body languages of the politicians are giving indications on where they are headed for, at both the federal and state levels.
Imo State, is thus, not an exception. And this is not without reasons. In Imo, there has been this impression – and correctly – that the state has not been too lucky with its leadership choice.
Perhaps, no other time, had the situation been more painful as in the seven years of the Rochas Okorocha administration.
Since the inauguration of the administration in 2011, virtually all indices of measuring governance and performance, have been on almost below-the-average level.
With arrears of unpaid salaries and pensions, dilapidated infrastructure and culture of impunity running high in conduct of state activities, Imo has been in piteous state and mostly mentioned among its peers, in derision.
2019 therefore offers another opportunity for the traumatised electorate in Imo, to get it right and define the leadership that will explore the potentials of the state and transform it.
There is also the moral side of the choice, if the very beacon of the state, which was anchored on equity, is to be sustained.
This is perhaps, where the Imo voters and other stakeholders, should take more than a passing interest in the antics of Governor Okorocha, to have his Chief of Staff and Son-in-law, Uche Nwosu succeed him, next year.
While the kite on this gambit was initially flown by the governor dumping the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA), early in his inauguration and doing away with his first deputy – Jude Agbaso from Owerri zone, not many initially took him seriously.
The script began to take more concrete shape in his latest onslaught on his current deputy, Eze Madumere, also from Owerri geo-political zone, all in a bid to clear the way for his son-in-law, who hails from Orlu zone, with him.
Curiously, however, there has been the tendency of the people shrugging off the sordid scheme, with the mere expression of Okorocha’s party, the All Progressives Congress (APC), not being popular in the state. His bizarre style of governance, has also not helped matters.
In similar stead, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), in the state, has not demonstrated adequate cohesion among its fold to earn the trust of the people.
Consequently, there has been enormous gravitation of the people towards the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA). For one, that is the political party that has earned the sentiments of the people in the state and the entire South east, given its association with the late Igbo iconic leader, Dim Chukwuemeka Odumegwu-Ojukwu.
Besides, the performance profile of the governors elected on the platform of the party in neighbouring Anambra state, entices the Imo electorate to give the party another chance.
It is thus, hardly surprising that APGA presently commands presence of some first-rate politicians in Imo. These include management consultant and ex-banker, Okey Ezeh, transportation expert, Frank Nneji, former commissioner, Nick Oparandudu, and erstwhile governor, Ikedi Ohakim.
They are incidentally aspiring for the governorship ticket of the party. At the last count, the aspirants are about 32. At individual levels, they have all made marks in their various callings and look good for the office. And they have the goodwill, some say.
But governance is not an engagement that is actualised merely on account of goodwill. It involves strategic thinking and philosophical conviction, especially given the enormity of the task ahead.
Put in other words, governance, especially in a state like Imo that has been systematically run down by successive administrations after the glorious era of late Sam Onunaka Mbakwe, needs someone with the zeal and drive to turn around the tide of events.
It also requires a candidate that has the benefit of experience in human resource management, exposure to macro-economic and corporate management.
Such person must provide the stabilising force to the Imo charter of equity, which the 16 years of Achike Udenwa and Okorocha administrations in the state, have drastically altered.
The charter, which was endorsed by Imo Political Leaders on June 9, 1991, had made explicit provisions on succession to the office of governor in the state.
It had allotted Owerri zone the first slot, followed by Orlu Zone and lastly, Okigwe zone. Owerri took its turn with Evan Enwerem in the Ibrahim Babangida political transition programme.
With the onset of the current dispensation, the slot went to Orlu as represented by Udenwa. Udenwa was succeeded by Ohakim, for Okigwe zone.
Ohakim’s tenure was however truncated after the first term by the emergence of Okorocha. With the governor completing his two terms next year, Orlu zone would have enjoyed 16 years in the office.
Adding another possible eight years to Orlu if Okorocha succeeds in planting Nwosu, his son-in-law, would be an overkill, analysts argue.
That is the crux of the argument by observers and indigenes of Owerri and Okigwe zones. But how they go about it this time, will go a long way in restoring the principles of the charter of equity or distort it, further.
Not handling the situation carefully, would see both zones playing into the hands of Okorocha and his flawed politics. Orlu has 12 councils, Owerri 8, Okigwe 7.
Strategic considerations and reality, appear to weigh against Owerri. With more than 30 APGA aspirants from the zone, zeroing the ticket to a particular candidate may not be easy. Many even see the exercise a ready recipe for trouble in the party.
Besides, a candidate from the area, if successful at the election, may need to go for the conventional two terms, in the process, furthering the distortion of the charter.
This is where the odds favour Okigwe zone. Ohakim, incidentally, is the only APGA aspirant from Okigwe. This, analysts say, would confer on him an advantage of getting bloc votes from delegates from the area, at the primaries.
If he eventually wins at the election, he can only go for one term, having been in the office before. With the two-term constitutional restriction, he cannot aspire for another term.
The slot would, automatically go to Owerri, subsequently.
Ohakim has also had the required experience for the job. He, incidentally, made this declaration in a recent interview with a Lagos newspaper, Sunday Sun.
He said, “I believe that my experience as governor for four years, is what the state requires to return to sanity. The situation is that this is not the time to send an inexperienced fellow to that Government House. We will fail if we send an inexperienced fellow to take over from the current mess. I am the only former governor with experience that can still be elected into that office”. Even his harshest critics would concede to him, the argument of having the experience required for the office.
He has also remarked that his aspiration is to rescue Imo from its current drift. Taken from the pledge, Ohakim could be said to have hit the nail on the head.
What he and APGA as a political party, perhaps, need to do, is to fashion out a fool-proof understanding that will ensure a team with a fellow aspirant from Owerri that will understudy him and take over from him at the end of his tenure in 2023.
This is the only viable way to stop Okorocha and his son-in-law in 2019.
By that, also, the Imo charter of equity, would be back on stream.
Olewunne, a political commentator and Imo indigene, wrote from Abuja.