RE: Lessons PDP Must Learn in Abia

Prince Ifeanyi Onyeije responds with more details to an earlier article on zoning of the governorship by the Peoples Democratic Party in Abia State

The piece authored by one Ugo Aliogo at Page 19 of THISDAY of Tuesday, April 27, 2021 made an interesting read. The author tried to X-ray the last House of Representatives bye election for the Aba North/Aba South Federal Constituency won by the PDP candidate, Chimaobi Ebisike.

However, a closer look at the piece and its real intent reveals a well oiled political plot aimed at strengthening the argument for power shift fo Abia North in general, and to the Isuikwuato area in particular, in 2023.

This objective made the writer to swerve from an objective standpoint and ended up obfuscating and needlessly politicizing what would have been a great write up.

The writer attributed the victory of the PDP in the Aba House of Representatives election to the sole reason of successfully managing the complexities of power shift in the state. In the words of the writer, “PDP’s mantra of justice and popular participation strongly appeals to the Republican minded Igbo who flourishes under an atmosphere that promotes equity. PDP’s strenght in the State is rooted in the Abia Charter of Equity. The Charter rotates the governorship position and other elective and appointive positions among the major political blocs that make up the State.”

The real intent of the writer became very clear after doing what amounts to a jaundiced analysis of the true meaning and application of the Abia Charter of Equity, he then stated thus, “The matter would have been settled, from the point of equity, had the Isuikwuato Division insisted on producing the next Governor after Orji Kalu in 2007. Instead, they reasoned that such a move would mean having one senatorial district producing the Governor for 16 years, and denying other zones the opportunity. THE ONLY COURSE OF JUSTICE AND EQUITY IS TO RETURN THE GOVERNORSHIP TO ISUIKWUATO”. (Emphasis mine).

The piece is riddled with several factual inaccuracies. First, the reasons for the victory of the PDP in the last House of Representatives elections in Aba were two fold, namely, performance of the Ikpeazu administration in Aba, and equity/justice.

That election was a clear referendum on the performance of the Ikpeazu administration in Aba. It was an opportunity for the people of Aba to pass judgement on what Ikpeazu’s administration has done in Aba. It is an open secret today that under the watch of Governor Okezie Ikpeazu, Aba has become a massive construction site with several hitherto impassable roads turning into beautiful and well paved roads. Major roads that define the landscape of the Enyimba City that had long been forgotten have come back to life under Ikpeazu with several others in the pipeline. The people see these projects with their two eyes. They see the workers, they follow the construction process. They see it completed and commissioned and they also begin to use these roads.

The resultant effect is that the people of Aba are happy with Governor Okezie Ikpeazu and were prepared to work with his party in that election.

They see real economic growth and development. They feel it. They see Aba coming back to life and bouncing back to reckoning. They see new businesses springing up with prospects for job creation. They see major markets being accessible. Indeed, all the major markets in Aba are opening up because all the major roads that lead to these markets are receiving heavy attention from the government. Indeed, it got to a point where the former Governor Orji Kalu, whose younger brother was the candidate of the APC in the elections, openly claimed road projects done by Ikpeazu in Aba as Federal Government projects. That claim spoke to the quality of the projects.

In addition to the renewed efforts at rebuilding infrastructure in Aba, the PDP played another masterstroke by fielding an indigene of Aba as their candidate, thereby reversing a trend that had been in place since 1999 that no aborigine of Aba had ever been elected to the Green Chambers to speak for their own people. That argument was unassailable. It was unquestionable. Our people have a deep sense of justice.

The writer was correct when he stated that one of the reasons for the failure of the APC in that election was because they allowed former Governor Orji Kalu to foist his biological youngest brother on the party as their candidate after another of his younger brothers had spent eight unproductive years at the House of Representatives for the same people of Aba. The people of Aba had become fed up of family oligarchies in our politics.

Equity means giving equal opportunity to everyone.

On the vexed issue of where the next governorship candidate of the PDP will come from, the writer was very passionate about his choice of Isuikwuato. He was so passionate that he forgot that Governor Okezie Ikpeazu and the Senate Minority Leader, Enyinnaya Abaribe are from Obingwa LGA in Abia South Senatorial District and not from Osisioma Ngwa LGA as he erroneously posited in his write up.

The true and most objective approach to the issue is to clearly understand that the main thrust of the Charter of Equity is to ensure that no Zone holds power consecutively to the exclusion of others.

Abia as presently constituted has three clear Senatorial Zones and it is these three Zones that have formed the platform for the smooth implementation of the Charter of Equity, under which the Governorship position has moved from Abia North to Abia Central and now to the South.

In other words, each of the Zones has had a shot at the office of Governor, meaning that the Charter of Equity has completed its first full rotation. Another rotation will commence by 2023.

By 2023, the PDP is expected to stick to the Abia Charter of Equity. This it will do by ensuring that the seat must move from Abia South where it is domiciled presently. Now the question is where it should go to.

The answer is very simple. The Abia North and Abia Central Zones will have equal rights to vie for the position. These two zones had produced governors before and it will now be a question of ensuring that the prerequisites of micro zoning will be put in place. Put differently, the micro zones that had produced the governor previously won’t be allowed to produce the governor by 2023.