By Eugene Obaji
NTRO:
On Friday, 31st January, 2025, an online news publication, FAMOUS LINK, published what looked like an interview granted by the President of Ohanaeze Youth Council (OYC), Mr. Igboayaka O. Igboayaka, with the title: “2027: DRAG OF APC PARTY LEADERSHIP WITH UMAHI”. It was not like the conventional interview with questions and answers.
But from all indications, the publication was the product of political jobbery as Mr. Igboayaka laboured incoherently to make some strange postulations about the administration of Ebonyi State Governor, Rt. Hon. Francis Ogbonna Nwifuru in comparison with that of his predecessor, Engr. David Nweze Umahi.
The vituperations of Igboayaka were full of innuendos, falsehood and bias. His comments may be part of the background noises probably orchestrated by the creeping godfather and his fellow travellers to create confusion in the state so as to introduce and perpetuate their inordinate ambition in Ebonyi politics. But the idea of a godfather cannot survive in Ebonyi State because it is a cankerworm that destroys the polity. Ebonyi is too decent for such cancerous politics.
IGBOAYAKA’S THEORY OF POLITICAL PARTY CONTROL
Igboayaka’s theory of political control of the party runs contrary to the dominant situation in today’s Nigeria. Therefore it is a fallacy. The summary of his position is that the incumbent Governor of Ebonyi state, Rt. Hon. Nwifuru was prioritizing the APC leadership in the state instead of addressing security and development challenges in the state. He even went to the extent of warning the Governor to focus on delivering dividends of democracy to Ebonyians “instead of entangling himself in party leadership altercations with his predecessor,” (David Umahi).
Haba, what arrant nonsense is Igboayaka talking about? Is he saying that an incumbent Governor who is the leader of the party in the state should abandon his responsibility of exercising effective leadership over the party? For what reason must he not take full control of the party machinery? Perhaps, Igboayaka is a harbinger of godfather politics and would have favoured a situation where the former Governor was in control of the party in the state. This suggestion has exposed him as a political undertaker for tyrants and dictators who want to control everything in Ebonyi permanently and continuously even after they had their own turn in governance. Is Igboayaka saying that Gov. Nwifuru should be running to Umahi any time he wants to lead the party. Is Umahi politically indispensable or has he proven to be a genius in human management?
When Umahi was the Governor, whom did he share power with or whom was he reporting to? Is he in any way superior to Nwifuru or any other person who ruled the state before now? After all, Umahi is not the first former Governor to become a Minister. Dr. Sam Egwu who ruled the state from 1999 to 2007 was the Minister of Education from 2009-2011. He did not dictate to his successor, Chief Martin Elechi about party or any other matters. When did Umahi become so important that the incumbent leader should surrender his powers to him? Will Ebonyi people who gave their mandate to Nwifuru allow him to transfer the powers to the former Governor? Did Ebonyians vote for Umahi as Governor in 2023? Is he not a mere appointee( boy-boy) to President Bola Ahmed Tinubu? after abandoning his seat in the Senate? Is he holding any other elective position today?
FALSE INTERPRETATION AND WRONG JUDGEMENT
Igboayaka’s interrogation of the governance process in Ebonyi State under Nwifuru is very suspicious because he had taken sides with enemies of progress in the state. If it is true as he claims that he visited Abakaliki, Ebonyi State where he granted the so-called interview, then it is clear that he may have come on a special mission, bankrolled by his paymasters to denigrate Gov. Nwifuru through a mischievous campaign of calumny. If he meant well as an activist youth leader in the South East, why did he only talk with supporters of the former governor, Engr. David Umahi?
And where did he get that strange impression that the incumbent Governor was involved in a tussle over the control of the APC apparatus in the state? Who briefed him on the security situation in Ebonyi that made him make wrong conclusions about insecurity in the state? Did he speak with any government official to get the proper information about the way things stand in Ebonyi? If he had done his work as a neutral and unbiased observer, he would have found out that Ebonyi State is more secured under Gov. Nwifuru than it was under Umahi. Umahi’s government was the most chaotic and violent administration in the history of Ebonyi State. People were killed at will and most times under the instigation and supervision of killer squads, militia groups and special task forces, created and funded by Umahi’s government. Communities in the state were railroaded into anarchy and perennial disturbances. Life became brutish and short.
UMAHI WAS NOT A MODEL LEADER
When Chief Nnia Nwodo delivered the 83rd Birthday Anniversary Lecture of former governor of Ebonyi State, Chief Martin Elechi at the Ecumenical Centre, Abakaliki, on 2nd April, 2024, and the issue of Umahi’s zig-zag governance of the state cropped up, he(Umahi) became sobber, took the microphone and apologized to Ebonyians for his shortcomings and claimed that he fought many wars during his tenure. He said that he was like King David, who fought many wars but that his son, Nwifuru was like King Solomon. These were his words. But he did not tell us how the wars came about.
Umahi’s case was one of monumental incompetence and leadership backwardness. That was why he used force and intimidation in everything he did and saw government as nothing but the instrument of self enrichment. He was a sworn enemy of the people and had no iota of human conscience in him. Ebonyians have survived Umahi and are gradually recovering from his excesses. Let nobody come here to remind us of Umahi again.
GOV.NWIFURU AS PEOPLES LEADER
Igboayaka wrongly stated that “the administration of Gov. Nwifuru has witnessed a decline in the pace of infrastructural development” in the state. This is a fat lie as nothing can be further from the truth. Gov. Nwifuru is running a people-centred administration. He does not concentrate on one sector of development while the masses and retirees suffer and die in silence. He does not engage in white elephant projects like his predecessor.
Under Umahi, the white elephant projects were nothing but conduit pipes for siphoning public funds while education and health sectors were completely neglected. There was no pipe borne water in Ebonyi State under Umahi but Nwifuru has restored it. It was under Umahi that primary schools in Ebonyi State were likened to “poultry farms” in an award winning article published by the Daily Sun newspapers of 23rd November, 2023. But Nwifuru has reversed these ugly scenarios.
Umahi drastically reduced the subvention to Ebonyi State University while Nwifuru increased it to a very reasonable percentage. Governor Nwifuru has restored the scholarships which Umahi cancelled in 2015. Recently, 201 Ebonyi post-graduate students were airlifted from Ebonyi Airport to Lagos en- route the United Kingdom for Masters and Doctorate degree programmes in Europe. And more than 540 others are pursuing the same scholarship programmes in indigenous Nigerian universities. That is the policy of a leader who cares about the genuine development of the people and not a selfish rabble rouser bent on self aggrandizement.
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Under Umahi, school fees in Ebonyi State University were increased drastically but Nwifuru has reduced them by 10% while the salaries of Lecturers were recently increased by him. But Umahi reduced the salaries of Lecturers by 40% during his tenure.
Construction of roads are going in in all the communities while the government has been asphalting the concrete roads abandoned by Umahi. Much is going on in educational infrastructure. Smart schools are being constructed at the secondary level, where three schools were chosen in each LGA to construct the modern buildings with classrooms, laboratories and libraries and computers.
In the health sector, Umahi ran the 14 General Hospitals in the state aground with six medical doctors, two pharmacists and five laboratory scientists. Nwifuru came and employed three doctors, pharmacists, laboratory scientists and physiotherapists for each of the hospitals in the state. Official vehicles were given to each of the doctors to save lives in the rural communities but Umahi refused to employ a single staff in all sectors and Ebonyians were dying because of a non-functional secondary health care delivery system.
Nwifuru has employed over 1000 workers of all categories in Ebonyi State public service and efforts to employ new teachers have reached advanced stage but Umahi employed nobody in his 8- year tenure in all the sectors. He also refused to pay the gratuities and pensions of retired workers in the state for 8 years during his tenure which accumulated to a debt of more than #10 billion. Nwifuru came and cleared the debts by paying the retirees their legitimate entitlements.
UMAHI’S POLITICS OF SELF SERVICE
Umahi promoted a shameless culture of self enrichment to the detriment of Ebonyi masses. A typical example is the #360 billion which he allegedly looted to build his private 5- star and 300-bed Osborne hotel at Gen
Sanni Abacha Way in the GRA, Port-Harcourt, including his acquisition of more hotels and other properties in Abuja, Lagos and foreign countries. So, who is fooling who? And in April, 2024, the same man tried to deceive the whole world by sponsoring a publication in the Vanguard newspaper of 21st December, 2023, titled ” Billionaire real estate mirgul:Osborn Nweze Umahi launches Nigeria’s 5-star hotel”. In the said publication, his 24- year old son, Osborne was projected as “a serial investor, an emerging power house and businessman in Nigeria and Africa.
The young man had graduated from a University in the United Kingdom in 2021 and completed his Master’s degree in 2022 when he was 22 years of age”. They claimed that “Osborne Nweze has achieved the biggest milestone in his amazing storyline with the heralding of Osborne Nweze’s La Palm Royal Resort in Port -Harcourt. The 5- Star facility avails a window into the mindset of an intellect that he is”. These false praises were replicated in another news report in the Vanguard newspapers of July 22, 2024. In this second publication, it was claimed that Umahi’s son holds a net worth exceeding 200 Million Dollars. These are the lies promoted to invent the fake sources of Ebonyi looted billions. But the question is: “What was he doing and where had he worked at the age of 24 to amass such humongous wealth?
The boy in question was only 15 years in 2015 when his father became governor. From all available records, the senior Umahi was not a successful businessman before he ventured into politics in 2007.
We can now see why he called himself a man of war. Umahi never subscribed to the concept of equity and justice( Egbe bere, Ugo bere, nke si ibe ya ebela, nku kwaa ya). Saint Augustine, in his book, The City of God, said that: “Without Justice, what else is the state but a great band of robbers. Any regime devoid of Justice is nothing but a gang of robbers”. According to him, “They were robbers because they established their nations by forced acquisition of what originally did not belong to them”. And that is why in Psalm 71:4, King David wrote: “Deliver us, our God from the hand of the wicked, from the grasp of those who are evil and cruel”. In every society, people should pray that political power does not fall into the hands of those who are extremely self-centered, greedy, arrogant and megalomaniac.
He became Governor in 2015 and served for 8 years. Simultaneously, his brother, Dr. Ogbonnaya Onu, from the same tiny community of Uburu served as Federal Minister for same 8 years. Now he is in office and wants to serve as Minister for four years. He may even seek reappointment as Minister in 2027 so that the Ministerial post would have been in his family for 16 years. Add that to his eight years as Governor and you will get 24 years from one family. But now he doesn’t want another person to serve as Governor for 8 years. Tufiakwa. So, where is the Justice? Where is the Equity? Ebonyi Founding Fathers must hear this.
ALLEGATION OF INSECURITY IN EBONYI STATE.
It is almost clear from the tone of Igboayaka’s rhetorics that there is a conspiracy to falsely frame Gov. Nwifuru as being incapable of governing Ebonyi State from the point of view of insecurity. So, if the godfather out of his own desperation decides to sponsor violence in a number of flash points in the state, then the same agents will rush to the presidency to report that Gov. Nwifuru cannot rule the state peacefully. Ebonyians know how the security situation worsened under Umahi as Governor of the state. With special reference to Effium which Igboayaka talked about, Gov. Nwifuru has done a lot to restore peace there. The Peace Committee headed by Chief Frank Ogbuewu has stipulated the way forward for lasting reconciliation in Effium. But Umahi was the one who created the conditions for the latest wave of the crises in Effium which started in January, 2021. He manipulated the situation with the use of the political leaders from the area who were very close to him. He had his eye on the huge limestone and uranium deposits there. In an attempt to develop the strategy for him to have access to the resources, the crises erupted and developed beyond his imagination.
He was fingered in the brutal killing of the five NELAN Engineers who were working on the Ring Road Project. Umahi wanted to dictate the disbursement of funds on the 150 Million Dollar road project but the Engineers refused and he had a shouting march with them. A few days later, they were declared missing, after being abducted on November 3, 2021. Later on, it was reported that they were beheaded and burnt like criminals, according to a report published in the Guardian newspapers of 2nd January, 2022.
The violent activities of Fulani Herdsmen in Ebonyi State also had its origins in Umahi’s selfish political maneuvers. He was a self-appointed agent of the Northern caliphate based on his sycophantic political behaviour as an Igbo renegade. As Chairman of the South East Governors Forum, he became unstable in the defence of the Igbo territories in order to gain mileage as a sellout to Igbo detractors.
Umahi gave out some settlements to the Fulani Cattle rearers and encouraged them to behave as they liked while officially supporting the use of some community lands for RUGA operations. Umahi must be compelled to renounce his treacherous ways if a solution to the problem if insecurity is to be found in the state.
CONCLUSION:
It is quite clear from the foregoing that Gov. Nwifuru is innocent of the malicious allegations levelled against him by Mr. Igboayaka. The Governor inherited a terrible baggage from his predecessor but he has managed the situation peacefully and quietly in order to save Ebonyi from the kind of ugly altercations playing out in Rivers state. Ebonyi cannot afford such political prebendalism. All the political actors should be advised to respect themselves and allow peace to reign in Ebonyi state.
Nwifuru will go for a second term in office, come 2027. He is a mass leader committed to the restoration of normalcy in the governance of our dear state. The youths of Ebonyi are behind him and are ready to defend this peoples government for the realization of the vision of the founding fathers. Intellectuals inspire revolutions and fanatics execute it. He who has ears, let him hear. Those who ignore the lessons of history will be ignored by history itself. So be it.
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