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OPINION: Between Soludo’s electoral mandate and the mandate to clear Okpoko

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As the countdown to the March 6, 2022 swearing ceremony of the Anambra State governor-elect Prof. Chukwuma Soludo has begun, it is pertinent to discuss an issue that is of interest to me and many others, coming from the mouth of the incoming governor himself. I am one of the many admirers of the erstwhile CBN governor and I must confess that I am one of the very many people who prayed for his electoral victory and the euphoria that greeted his election indicates clearly that he is the right choice. Thus, there are high expectations from him by all and sundry given his pedigree, personal attributes, track records of performance, experience, professional and international affiliations and reputation. Anambra people expect a new dawn; everybody expects him to surpass the performances of Dr. Peter Obi who had taken governance to heights hitherto unknown in the annals of this country—in prudent resource management, accountability, infrastructural development, stakeholders’ engagement, selfless altruistic services among others.

I must also admit that I am elated by the steps he had taken so far since his election last November signaling his preparedness to work for his people. In particular, I am intrigued by his patriotic élan, his desire to bring Anambra technocrats into his cabinet, his decision to run an efficient lean government, his passion to patronize our local made products and avoid ostentations associated civil governance in Nigerian and his eagerness to work for his people and the obsession to turn Anambra into a strong economic hub.

In the light of this, every right thinking Igbo man should expect Soludo to succeed. Anambra is undoubtedly the epicenter of Igbo land. The success of Anambra has a trickle-down effect on the rest of Igbo land. In the current democratic dispensation, Ngige laid a firm foundation for development in Anambra and Obi took it a notch further and in the process establishing himself as the best governor ever in the history of this country. The State is peculiar in many respects. It has the highest number of billionaires in Africa and has the highest wealth per capita and the highest concentration of urban environment in the land. It is expected that the incoming governor will leverage on these.

However, the main issue that actually piqued my interest is Soludo’s oft-repeated desire to clear Okpoko. Indeed, he said that would be his first official assignment upon swearing in. The expression “clear Okpoko” connotes forceful ejection and that to me is disagreeable. However, if it implies preplanning, reconstruction and rehabilitation of the inhabitants of Okpoko to bring it to the status required of urban environment, then it is a welcome development. But if it is about bulldozing and forcible displacement of the residents of Okpoko as is characteristic of Nigerian governments in the name of environmental beautification or urban renewal, then it is unfortunate.

When Governor Raji Fashola committed the blunder of forcefully ejecting the many individuals that eke out their living at Oshodi without compensation and rehabilitation plans, there was an attempt to turn otherwise what was an error into achievement through propaganda. Media hirelings went abroad with it and soon after, the spin-doctors and hear-say analyst replicated the canard of super performance as everybody was made to believe but today Nigerians know better. What was an executive misdemeanor was hailed as achievement and buoyed by that he went ahead to also demolish Makoko, another sprawling Lagos settlement. Today, Fashola’s woeful performance as a minister has clearly shown that his fabled achievement in Lagos was mere media fireworks.

 

READ ALSO: Oby Ezekwesili to head Soludo’s transition team

It is only in this part of the world that people are forcibly displaced from their legitimate place of abode without compensation or resettlement. I have a friend who used to live in Heygate Estate in Southwalk London. Before the estate was demolished, the residents were not just given enough time to relocate but options to choose the part of London they would want to reside. But in Nigeria, the reverse is the case. The government would demolish your ancestral property by force without compensation and reassign it to whomever it wished with impunity and nothing would happen. It is insensitivity, irresponsibility and lack of respect and consideration for the citizenry.

Since 1984 during Buhari’s first misadventure into civil governance when he first introduced what was termed, “demolition of illegal structures”, this ugly phenomenon has continued till this day. We could remember Raji Rasaki’s demolition of Maroko and the attendant grief and misery it brought in its wake. Fashola’s demolition of Oshodi and Makoko is still very fresh on the minds of concerned Nigerians.

In Nigeria, a governor will wake up any time he likes and pronounce ban on okada or keke without qualms and his propagandists would hail him as an action governor. Taking drastic decisions such as that without proper intelligence and rehabilitation plan is not just irresponsible; it is preposterous, reckless and uncharitable. It is careless to take decisions without recourse to its concomitant effects. It is futile to attack effect rather the cause of the problem. One of the reasons usually adduced for banning keke is that armed thieves usually use them to operate. And I ask can we also ban the use of car because people use cars to rob? Can we stop swimming because people drown in the water? One expects a responsible government before taking action as drastic as banning keke rickshaw to take statistics of those involved, cost-benefit analysis of the ban, the unemployment effect, the dependency burden and then provide alternative employment for those that would be displaced and put plans in process to ease logistics problems that would arise from the ban. An attempt to dislodge the use of okada or keke because some use them to rob would create unemployment that would worsen the crime situation. It is always the case that when you attempt to attack the effects of a problem rather than the cause, the problem would resurface in another dreadful dimension.

It is against this background that I want to appeal to the in-coming governor of Anambra State Prof. Soludo to critically appraise his decision to clear Okpoko. The critical questions should be what intelligence does he have about Okpoko? And why is Okpoko slum clearance a priority project? Yes, when Soludo declared that his first assignment is to clear Okpoko, I wondered what information he had about Okpoko. I also wondered the scope of work he needed to do there. And I asked what rehabilitation plans he has about the lawful residents of Okpoko. I believe that he still needs serious consultations and effective stakeholders’ engagement before embarking on that project. Soludo should not play to the gallery. Soludo should avoid those swashbuckling populist programmes and concentrate on genuine governance.

Without doubt, governance is about fulfilling shared goals and expectations. And this means that political leaders should understand the problems/challenges as well as the potentials and the aspirations of the people, engage the people actively, design goals, and develop programs and strategies to meet these goals. It is not about showmanship. It is taking action that is legally acceptable and ethically desirable. It is not about exercising authority. The focus of governance and leadership is the people. It is about interest aggregation and goal congruence. When leaders realize this, they will not take actions that will estrange those they are duty bound to protect.

One of the greatest problems of the Igbo man is that of his apparent ubiquity occasioned by land hunger, cultural orientation and near-absence of infrastructural facilities and federal presence in Igbo land; which makes him vulnerable and susceptible to attack. Another is his hard work and success that easily attract envy everywhere he goes or domiciled. If Soludo in concert with other South East leaders can build a solid economic and industrial hub in Igbo land that will make the Igbo man bring his investment nearer home then 50% of the Igbo man’s problem in Nigeria would have been resolved.

In the colonial era, our leaders took into cognizance our cultural orientation and planned our economy to suit us. And so it was that the Igbo man dominated economic activities and produced the pioneers in nearly every field of human endeavors in post-colonial Nigeria. Today, we talk about the free trade zone and the success of Dubai. This was the model Zik envisaged when he built the Otu Onitsha Main market that attracted shoppers from across Africa. It is on record that the South East economy in pre-independent Nigeria was the most planned and fasted growing in the world between the period of 1956 and 1966. And even without the much-touted free education program, the South East has more school enrolment than those with free education because the Igbo man does not live on freebies.

AUTHOR: Gozie Irogboli…


Articles published in our Graffiti section are strictly the opinion of the writers and do not represent the views of Ripples Nigeria or its editorial stand.

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