From Juliana Taiwo-Obalonye, Abuja

Imo State Governor, Hope Uzodimma, Tuesday declared that the ruling All Progressive Congress (APC), will win the 2023 elections because, it has perfected credibility well, despite deliberate attempts by some group of people to pull the current administration down. 

This is even as he has thrown his weight behind federal government’s tagging arsonists in the South East burning INEC offices, politicians and other government institutions as terrorists, noting that all is not well hence every measure must be taken to return the country to normalcy.

Speaking to State House Correspondents after a meeting with President Muhammadu Buhari at the presidential villa, Abuja, was responding to a question on whether he was confident that more governors will defect to APC from the south East.

Uzodimma said: “Not just from the south East, many governors in Nigeria will join the APC, because it is not only the ruling party, and I have seen in good conscience speaking honestly, part of the problem of this government is the deliberate attempt by some group of people to pull it down. Because nobody is telling me that this government is not performing,  that salaries are not being paid or that the roads are not being constructed or the railway is not going on or the various  intervention funds  to empower our youths are not being given out.  Nobody has come in concrete terms to accuse this government of one failure or the other.

“All we hear is that herdsmen and farmers are fighting and for that reason 200 people are kidnapped. People are shot down here, people are killed there. What do you want government to do? We must be realistic. I believe in pragmatism. I believe in doing things right.

“Can anybody come and tell me one, two, three, four  reasons why this APC should not win in the next election? Nobody has said that, I’ve not read either in any newspaper. All I hear is that because of insecurity this, insecurity that but you send people out in the night to go and cause trouble and use it in day to blame government.”

The Governor appealed to stakeholders in the state including traditional rulers, religious leaders, politicians, must engage more with the people to restore peace in the state as he alone cannot do that.

According to him, former political office holders who fail to speak out against the activities of trouble makers have questions to answer.

He noted that if they had been speaking out in condemnation of the unwholesome activities of those destabilizing the country, things would have been different.

He was responding to a question why he was finding Ut difficult to mention names of politicians he alleged to be behind the state of insecurity in Imo and get them arrested.

Uzodimma: “It is not only in Imo State, I didn’t limit it to Imo State. I am saying and I want to say it again, that cases of insecurity here and there in the country, has not been helped by the posture of opposition party and some aggrieved politicians. Reason being that at a time like this in Nigeria, anybody worth his onions as a leader should be able to speak out. How many of them are speaking out? How many of them are condemning what is going on? Rather what you see are leaders fanning the embers of insecurity, blaming  only government. We must be tired of this blame thing by now and then contribute our own quota towards ensuring that national security is not further threatened in the country.

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“So it is not something for politics. It’s something that if you are a former senate president, and you are a former speaker, or a former deputy senate president, or a former deputy speaker, and things like this are happening in the country, and you are not able to speak out, and we’re not seeing you where you are engaging in addressing the young men and women in your  area on the need for United Nigeria. And this is a country that have given you opportunity to serve on that level one time or the other, then it is either overtly or covertly, you have a question to answer.”

On how he freaks about FG’s pronouncement tagging  arsonists  attacking government institutions as terrorists, the Governor said: “At this point, we’re not dealing with only feelings  alone, we must tie feelings  to national interests, is not about sentimental feelings, it is about knowing that this is a federal government asset. And you woke up willingly and deliberately go there to destroy,  what we are trying to destroy is the sovereignty of the country. And we shouldn’t take encourage.

“Whatever government has taken as a position, I think there are two things. Either you respect government and not destroy government assets, or you destroy government assets and face  the consequences. Those are the two things. So let us not pretend, as if all is well, all is not well, leaders must rise to ensure that they work hand in hand with government to ensure their security in the country.

“Have you seen a situation where people will wake up  and take buses to school and then load 200 students, you can imagine how many buses that will take 200 students and drive them away to somewhere.  And they will be asking for ransom, what type of society is that? This is not the society we used to know about our country.  We should all be worried and not only be worried, or to sit down and begin to blame government or blame, Mr. President, we should all get involved.

“In Imo state as I speak to you only me cannot restore security. Only me cannot guarantee security. I have to work with traditional rulers have to work with opinion leaders, I have to work with the youth leaders to be able to deploy community kind of security programme, to be able to resist what is going on today. But you have heard how people will come from outside the state in the name of unknown gun men. I don’t know when we will begin to know this people and they will commit atrocities, and they will now flee.

“So these are the things. I want to use this opportunity to invite all leaders, religious leaders, political leaders, community leaders, traditionally institution to join hands, because the only country we have is this Nigeria, we don’t have another country. And if we’re not united we will achieve nothing. We must contribute our quota, however it is to ensure that Nigeria remains a strong, united a place that we will go about our businesses, equity and justice is guaranteed. And then we have a country.”

Uzodimma, who said he was in the presidential villa to brief the president on the situation in the state, said he was satisfied with the response he got.

He also said that thing have returned to normal in the state as regards security breach.

According to him, “Of course, not just in my state, everywhere in Nigeria there are security breach here and there of course Imo is not left out. We are doing our best. So far, the situation is relatively okay in Imo State than it was. Imo is okay now, people can come around and do their businesses. The normal live and activities have resumed in Imo State, security agencies are on top of their situation.”

On allegations that his utterances were not helping the situation in the state and if he has foreclosed dialogue, he said: “Well, you say many people are thinking, that is their thinking. And I don’t know the kind of utterances that I have made that suggest to the position that I closed door… I did not closed no door. If you have  monitored what is going on in Imo state of late, you would have seen me receiving leadership by leadership according to local government, trying to find out the common way of resolving these security challenges we have had in the state.

It is not only in Imo State that we have had the challenges of insecurity, there are insecurity in other states. In fact, I can even tell you that Imo case  is better apart from  one or two cases that involved very important personality. There has never been  a time that 20 persons  died at a time, or  school children were kidnapped, and all that. We have  been doing our best to see that cases of security breaches are reduced to the barest minimum if not eliminated.”