Okorocha should probe Louis Obodo now

Dr. Louis Obodo

By COLLINS Ughalaa
Governor Rochas Okorocha should do something very serious as far as Agwa electricity project is concerned, and he should do it now. He should not waste a minute; that is if he wants to get any votes from that area in 2015, either for his not-sure presidential ambition or most assured second term in Imo State, either way, we have our date with the Governor, and depending on what he does now and how he does it, that date might be a dooms day. What the Governor should do now is to uncover why the project was not completed despite the money that was released for the project. Agwa people need to know, and we cannot wait. He should probe the tenure of Dr Louis Obodo, the immediate past Chairman of Oguta Local Government Area on what he did with the Agwa electricity project. We want to know. We demand to know why we don’t have electricity and why we still lay in darkness after the state government was said to have released about N35m for the project. What happened to the money? Did it develop wings and flew away?

To ask for a probe is to ask for probity. It is to ask for accountability. It is to ask for inclusiveness. It is to ask for honesty in the management of our common resources, what belongs to all us. This game has been on for a long time, and we are increasingly becoming impatient with what seems to be a system of deceit and fraud; we are increasingly becoming impatient with our brothers who cannot do what they tell us, I mean those who refer to themselves as our leaders. I am more impatient at what I see: an ugly scenario where everybody who has got some money would think that because he has some money that many of us don’t have he becomes our leader. I am particularly upset with this, even if no other person is. When did we degenerate to the level where money or acquisition of wealth becomes the deciding factor for us? When did wealth acquisition become the criterion for leadership? Who made it so? I need the answers.

We cannot continue to pretend as if nothing has happened or nothing is happening, and we must begin to ask questions and hold our leaders accountable. That is the only way we can grow as a people. If we have leaders who are bigger than the rest of us, who cannot be asked questions, who cannot be held accountable, then we are gone and forgotten, forgotten like a plate of rice when eaten. Agwa as a people is not in short supply of the timber and caliber. We have them in their numbers, but what we don’t have is the person that would ask the questions; what we don’t have is the person that will lead. In a clime where leadership exists we should have been in the know of what happened to the electricity project, a project on which we were told lies from the high office of the Chairman of the Council, that Agwa now has electricity and that all should connect to the lines, when the TC Chairman, Dr Louis Obodo, to whom the lie was credited, had not connected to the lines, and as you read this piece it is his power generating set that powers his house. Whoever told the lies, whoever sold the lies that the electricity project in Agwa had been completed must come from the pit of hell and is anti Agwa and does not deserve to lead us, no matter the size of his pocket or the length and height of his connections and contacts. Such a person should first of all learn the essence of life and that honesty is required in every sphere of our existence on earth, and that moreover, dishonest people make bad leaders and leave the society worse than they met it.

It is a trite biblical saying that he who is faithful in small things will also be faithful in bigger things. And drawing from this biblical ageless saying, if a son-of –the soil is unfaithful with small things, can he get something bigger form the same people? I don’t know what you think or what your answer is, but I think that if the question were put to Jesus when he uttered that evergreen saying he would answered in the negative, that such a man would get nothing at all from his people. Jesus would have dropped the bombshell: that such a fellow had failed and that he should first of all be penitent and seek the face of God and the society for remedial acts of forgiveness. And if the person showed no such disposition as to penitence, he would have pronounced him doomed, just like he did the Pharisees of his time. But in our clime those who curry favours with the mighty or the fat pocket would never admit their masters could do some wrong. They tend to think their masters have some kind of immunity against wrong wrongdoing, and imitating Cypril Ekwensi in his Passport of Malam Ilia, they believe their leaders have swallowed medicine against wrong doing and probity; but they goof.

The way Dr Louis Obodo celebrated his appointment as the TC Chairman of Oguta Local Government Area on the busy social media platform, facebook, gave some people the impression that Agwa had got the man to fix things. But I did not buy that crap. To me, it was another political patronage to another Agwa man. To me, that could spell doom for the political career of the Chairman who had not occupied any public position, and until 2011 when he stormed politics like a thunderbolt, we never knew he was a politician. But such is human being and the human nature: they are entitled to pursue any course of their interest. What happened in his 2011 experiment is what happens in politics, and it has become part of our history. And now, as 2015 beckons, politicking has began in earnest and people are willing to go for offices that they crave most without having something to offer. So I hear that Dr Louis Obodo will be running for the Imo State House of Assembly (no longer the House of Reps, and I heard that the Governor asked him to look in the direction of the House and not Reps, that better things are in the House- but that is politics, because the Governor may have said that to some other people. So it is not guaranteed – after all despite the Governor’s backing, Ogbuagu Walter Uzonwanne is not in the House) to represent the people of Oguta State Constituency who have not had a representative in the House for over three years. The first in the history of our democracy.

But there is need to ask what Dr Obodo did at the Council. What did he achieve there, at least for the people of Agwa? Did he on the social front unite the leaders and the people? Did he as the Chief security officer of the council tackle the raging and smoldering insecurity and crisis that has engulfed Mgbala Agwa Autonomous Community, so much that our Eze now lives outside the community? Did he complete the general hospital in Agwa that was started by his predecessor, Engr Bernard Iroegbu? Did he initiate any project for Agwa people? Did he initiate any project for the whole of Oguta? Did he sink any borehole anywhere? Did he complete the nagging electricity problem in Agwa, even when that project has something to do with his name?

You know how information flies about politicians. And it was said that when the governor realized that electricity was a major problem to the people of Agwa he sought for somebody from Agwa who had a level of respect and credibility that the people could listen to and support him and vote for Ogbuagu Water Uzonwanne. That permutation worked, though some of us held the promise of electricity to Agwa just about two weeks to the election with the tip of the finger. And we were vindicated. The electricity project was a mirage. But the people, for the sake of the promise of electricity abandoned their favourite, Hon Eugene Dibiagwu, and voted for Walter, the governor’s anointed. But like his fate would dictate, he never got to the House. And when Dr Obodo was appointed the TC Chairman of Oguta Local Government Area, the joy of most people was that he would give us electricity. But some of us who had walked that road or who had seen others walk that road held our breath. We crossed out fingers, doing nothing, saying nothing; just watching. And at the end of the day we cannot be accused of distracting anybody from providing us the age long desired electricity for the people of Agwa.

And thank goodness, we never heard of sabotage or stealing of the cables or any such thing as reason for the non-actualization of that dream. What I heard so far about the botched but highly hyped electricity project makes me suspect fraud in the execution of that project. And that is why I want an inquiry into what really went wrong, or are we witnessing another $16b sunk into the power sector without a headway, without a lead as to how to get electricity in the country. This electricity project should not be something like that, it should be something different and realistic. Yes, what I have heard is that the state government gave the TC Chairman a whooping sum of N35m for the project. Dr Obodo has not said how much was released to him for the project, but those who told me said they are cocksure. I also heard that the project was botched because he spent only a paltry sum of N11m. There is a third twist to it: that Obodo shared the balance with a certain government officer. Is it the head of service or the chief of staff? We need to know. Or is it any other person, the SSG? We need to know. And of course, there is a fourth poser: that Dr Louis used his share of the money to acquire a property somewhere in Owerri or to complete his building. I have not seen the building but they have given me the address. For me, I am making no allegation; I was only making inquiry and asking for probe and probity; I was only told, and that is why I want Dr Obodo to tell his own side of the story. And you know the way some people talk: they will give you the impression that they are cocksure. Yes, they said they are cocksure, but that notwithstanding, we need to hear from Dr Obodo.  Did he get N35m from the government to do the electricity project? How much was spent? How much is remaining? What is the level of work done? Why was the project not completed? And of course, did he say the project had been completed and that the people should link up? If he did, why?

Don’t forget that Dr Obodo, despite what I have been told about the botched electricity project remains, under the law, innocent, until the court finds him guilty. But you know court process; it is not the same as the court of public opinion. That is the best where Dr Obodo will show his innocence. If he does not clear himself, if he does not tell his own side of the story we will be left to believe what we have been told. We will also remember what his uncle, Ferdinand Obodo, the first politician from the Obodos, did. A story is told in the ‘0s how he deprived Agwa a major road that would have crisscrossed Agwa to Egbema, just because that road was not planned to pass through his community, Obudi. He used his influence, and that project never saw the light of day. Till today, that project has not been realized. Let this one not be like that one.