I saved Imo people from political bondage – Uzodimma 

From George Onyejiuwa, Owerri

He said that even  grand design to scuttle his ambition failed ,because his aspiration was divinely inspired, and that he had started afresh as governor as  there was no hand over note to him whatsoever.

Governor Uzodimma also disclosed that those who have vowed that he will never govern  the state had instigated the wanton killings  that had rocked the state shortly after he was sworn in as the governor of the state on January 15,2022 as they bent on making the state governable. But that they also failed .

The Governor who stated this on Friday at the Executive Session of the on going 18th All Nigeria Editors Conference, in Owerri, the Imo state capital ,  titled : “THE STORY OF MY SACRED CALL TO DUTY: CHALLENGES AND TRIUMPHS” said that the state in 2018 was gripped by palpable despondency not only as a result of the abysmal performance of the government but political the configuration that could sentence generations unborn to political servitude.

According to him, ” It was against this background that a group of Elders from Owerri and Okigwe zones led a delegation to me to come and salvage the situation knowing my political pedigree. Many of those who led that delegation are alive and some of them are present at this occasion. Their confidence that I could stop the political drift emboldened me. So, driven largely by patriotism and, feeling somewhat like the biblical Moses, I rose to the challenge to set Imo free from a looming political servitude. To the glory of God, I emerged victorious at the APC governorship primaries of 2018, and consequently became the APC flag bearer for the 2019 governorship elections. Wrestling the ticket from the grip of an anointed candidate was a significant victory of its own.

In the light of these, even before the first ballot was cast in the governorship election of 2019, it was obvious to even a political neophyte and naysayers that Hope Uzodimma, the APC candidate, was the man to beat in that election.”

However, Governor Uzodimma said that the first major challenge was the fierce propaganda that he had lost the election as part of the grand design by the incumbent governor who had vowed that he will never govern the state.

“The first major challenge I faced was the spirited effort and propaganda to give the impression that I lost an election which was always mine to win. This was partly because the then incumbent Governor vowed openly that I would never be the governor of Imo State. He followed this up with action as he went ahead to field his son-in-law to contest the governorship election as the candidate of another party, the Action Alliance (AA). He deployed all the instruments at his disposal as the serving Governor of Imo State to make sure he succeeded in truncating my gubernatorial ambition and to get his son-in-law elected.”

It was not surprising that there was a high-level conspiracy to stop me from emerging the winner of the election and this led to the well-orchestrated but ill-fated plot to place me in the 4th position in the governorship election results declared by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) in 2019. The grand design was to discourage me from going to court to seek redress. “

Continuing he said ,”This high-level conspiracy also led to the greatest violation of our constitution as a candidate who clearly did not meet the constitutional requirements for winning a governorship election in the country was declared the outright winner of the election.

However, as perplexing and as challenging as the situation was, rather than being daunted, I was encouraged to fight to recover a mandate I was convinced I got from Imo people which I had to get through the Apex Court after the lower courts didn’t do justice to my case especially with the exclusion of the 388 Polling booths where I had won majority of the votes “.

“The first challenge I faced after taking the oath of office was that there was nobody to take over from. There was no handover note, either. So, I had to start off like a man groping in the dark, without a compass. There was not even a nominal roll of the state’s workforce. To make matters worse, the state was in a state of rancid decay. There was hardly any motorable road in the state. Worse of all, the Civil Service was in complete disarray, following many years of neglect. The task ahead of me was by no means an easy one.

At the same time, the PDP, obviously unwilling to accept defeat, even when their candidate never legally won the elections in the first place, openly vowed to make the state ungovernable for me. They followed the threat by inciting a section of the public to mount pockets of protests and riots. They also tried to incite workers and pensioners against my nascent administration. As a result of all these, the first three months of my tenure were marked by incessant unrests in the capital city of the state.”

Governor Uzodimma  said that having made his personal  covenant with God after recovering his mandate that he will serve his faithfully ,that has committed himself to serving the people of the state with all his abilities.

” That was why in my inaugural address, I pledged to surrender myself to the will of the people at all times and to work honestly and tirelessly for the good of the citizenry. As Editors you can go on a tour of the state to see things for yourselves as peace and security has returned to the state with the prompt intervention of President Buhari and security agencies who have battled the unknown gunmen and chased out of the state. As a result Imo has being restored back as the hospitality destination east of the Niger “.