Anambra, The Lumming Failure

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Peter Obi
Peter Obi

When few weeks to his handover of power to another administration, former governor of Anambra State Mr. Peter Obi announced his twilight intention to conduct local government elections in the State, the people were elated with the hope that this will help them reap the full benefits of local council administration that has eluded them due to governor Obi?s failure to conduct council elections throughout the eight years he ruled the state.
wpid-former-Governor-of-Anambra-State-Peter-Obi.jpgThis new hope was of course based on the desire that this fresh exercise might help them avert one of the major problems of local government system in Nigeria and Anambra State in particular, hinged on political control the governors have on the local government chairmen and which translates to eclipse of autonomous financial power of the local governments.
As everyone will recall, this cloudy state of affairs has robbed the local government system her major characteristics, central to its creation, mainly driving development to the grassroots while facilitating an avenue through which government and the people intermix, relate and more quickly than any other means resolve or dissolve issues that may have heated the system.
Today, nearly one year after, the toil of Anambra people to elect executive chairmen to pilot the affairs of their local councils have been dashed, turning the people?s hope into cloudy winter, as the election has been a mere colouration, a new name in the old garb. It is a continuation of the obnoxious transition local council chairmen in another form. As selected local council chairmen these leaders are firmly under the political control of the governor who handpicked them. A clear case of who pays the piper dictates the tune, re-igniting problems of diversion of local government funds for personal use of the governor which crippled development of the state under former governor Peter Obi who embezzled over Two Hundred and Seventy Billion Naira that accrued to Anambra State local governments from the federal allocation in the eight years he [Obi] ruled the state.
Since this unholy alliance, between state governments and local government councils gives the governor leeway to constitute Joint Action Committee (JAC), where federal allocations to the local governments are first deposited into a particular ad-hoc account before calling for the committee meeting. This, rail road a way for the state government, to plan for the local government councils, and release the money in installments.
The overriding force behind this is to divert the money to something else entirely, which does not have impact on the lives of the rural dwellers but that will be beneficial to the state governor. The overall negative impact of this on the people at the grassroots being their getting more and more far from developments even as the local council itself end up in financial crisis and are unable to tackle the challenges of service delivery and mobilization of both human and material resources required for the functioning and meaningful development of the local government areas.
Mr. Peter Obi who during the eight years he ruled the state had never hidden his distaste for the running of a properly elected local government system, cunningly hulled his twilight local government poll at the feet of the people of Anambra State as a gauge of battle. For after witnessing the peoples overwhelming and whole hearted reception of local government election promises made to them by a better candidate in the 2014 governorship campaign in the State, Obi decided to use the local government poll as one of his major tools to maybe appease the people for stealing their mandate and force down their throat his anointed candidate, Chief Willie Obiano the court named winner of the Anambra State 2014 governorship poll, he (Obi) with the help of INEC election rigging cabal marred with such massive voter irregularity and rigging never witnessed in the annals of Anambra State political history.
Today nearly a year after, Obiano who never had any election manifesto during that governorship campaign but only said he will continue from where Obi stopped, readily started where Obi stopped in coveting local government funds for personal use. The local council poll Obi conducted had become a mare tool to steal the people blind.
It has been a continuation of the evil transition council chairmen in another name and which has effectively incapacitated the state?s local governments from functioning effectively, throwing the local councils into financial crisis. Meeting her financial obligations has become a pipe dream to the councils, monthly salaries are paid at the end of the following month, for instance during the 2014 Christmas celebration local government workers went home empty handed as their salaries were only paid on the last week of January 2015.
In the Biblical book of 2kings 5:20 ? 27 when Prophet Elisha miraculously cured Naaman, a Syrian general of his leprosy by asking him to dip himself seven times in the Jordan river but afterwards refused gifts of silver, gold and clothing that the Syrian general brought to him. However, his servant Gehazi followed after Naaman to receive from him those very items his Master Elisha had refused. Gehazi lied to Naaman that Elisha had sent him to receive those same items and Naaman was very glad to give him two talents of silver in two bags and two changes of raiment. And when Elisha asked him where he has gone, he (Gehazi) lied that he had gone nowhere not realizing that Elisha had seen his whole sordid deals in spirit.
And Elisha said unto him, ?went not mine heart with thee when the man turned again from his chariot to meet thee? Is it a time to receive money, and to receive garments, and Olive yards, and vineyards, and sheep, and oxen, and menservants, and maidservants?? Elisha then cursed Gehazi and his descendants with the leprosy of Naaman forever.
Gehazi represents our political leaders today, who embezzle public funds and divert funds meant for the upkeep of the people to personal use. They do not seem to understand that leadership is all about service to the people and addressing their welfare needs.
It is heart rending to note that Governor Obiano?s covetous streak is not confined to local government funds alone, for while the staff of Anambra State local councils went home last Christmas season without salary, though the allocations to the state?s local councils were fully paid by the Federal Government, Obiano took two billion naira from the state treasury for Christmas decorations in the state and went ahead to paint Awka and Onitsha roundabouts, connect electricity to the two roundabouts and that was the end of it and the state?s two billion naira.
He had tripled what his predecessor Mr Peter Obi paid out to political scavengers, hangers on and never do good politicians who crowd the corridors of power in search of ways and avenues to milk the state dry. Aware of the governor?s lifestyle, of evening relaxation with a little wine, these political jobbers, scavengers and 419 persons troop to the governor?s lodge from four o?clock in the evening armed with their fictitious contract bills and what have you, where then they easily arm twist the governor to sign away the state?s funds to them. They never carry these bills to the governor?s office during work hours where they may pass through the scrutiny of secretaries and assistants. And whether the people of Anambra State get anything from the person ruling them these people do not give a hoot, neither do the governor realize yet the havoc they are doing to his government.
?Lamentably, it is a historical fact that privileged groups seldom give up their privileges voluntarily. Individuals may see the moral lights and voluntarily give up their unjust posture, but as Reinhold Niebuhr has reminded us groups tend to be more immoral than individuals.?
One may wonder whether I ever see anything good in this governor; and having sifted through his achievements as written by other reporters in the past one year only came upon Obiano?s achievements on security and refuse disposal, and wondered loudly at the cost. For the governor, in the guise of fighting security has hyped up his security vote to high heavens. He is collecting three times what his predecessor or any other governor of the state has ever collected as security vote since the creation of the state and the rubber stamp state House of Assembly members apparently do not want to do anything about it to ensure his support in the coming general elections.
Though using the Nigerian Army operatives and federal government support to rout and burst the secret hideouts of hoodlums and kidnappers may of course have qualified the governor to rip off the state in such manner since that time.
It is unfortunate that Anambra people seldom look through the shoulders of their governors or other political leaders to see what they are doing and protest in cases of wrong doing, but rather we sing their glories to the heavens and help them become larger than the gods, which gives them room to do as they like. They push us to the wall, and we even ask the wall to open and hide us.
Like Martin Luther king Jr, ?we will have to repent in this generation not merely for the hateful words or actions of bad people, but for the appalling silence of the good people. Human progress never rolls in on wheels of inevitability; it comes through the tireless efforts of men willing to be co-workers with God and without any hard work, time itself becomes an ally of the forces of social stagnation. We must use time creatively, in the knowledge that the time is always right to do right.?
Now is the time to make real promise of democracy and transform our pending passiveness into burning ambers for nation building. Now is the time to lift the policy of our state from the quicksand of ineptitude, corruption and lumming failure, to the solid rock of progress, human dignity and real statehood. Governor Obiano can, like the biblical Daniel spurn the denties at the table of the king of corruption, and etch his name in gold in the minds of Anambra people by ensuring proper use of the funds of the state as well as proper functioning the state?s local government system.

Source: Clement Nworah.

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