Elochukwu Okeke
Within six months of Emeka Ihedioha assuming the office of the Governor of Imo State, the diaspora desk and Ease of Doing Business desk were set up. An unprecedented number of bills were signed into law.
The state’s sports festival was brought back to life. Ahiajoku Lecture Series, which is a signpost of the cultural heritage of Igboland, was restored. The commitment, energy and drive of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and Ihedioha’s administration shored up investors’ and donor agencies’ confidence in the state. African Export-Import Bank, Shell Petroleum Development Company, Waltersmith Petroman Oil, NEWMAP, World Bank, Seplat Petroleum, NDDC, etc, all commenced partnership with the state.
Within six months, Imo State won many awards, including but not limited to the following awards:
• Least Corrupt State in Nigeria (National Bureau of Statistics)
• Fastest Growing Economy in Nigeria (Businessday)
• Best State in ICT Development (National Council on Communication and Digital Economy), and
• Third Best State in E-government Implementation
The question on the lips of not a few is: How did Ihedioha perform this magic? The answer is simple but not easy: masterful execution of the strategy of balancing of policies, processes, politics and people.
By intricately navigating governance with a mix of seasoned, passionate, committed technocrats, and professionals, PDP and Ihedioha laid the foundation for the advancement of Imo State.
That was the state of PDP and Ihedioha’s Imo State before January 14, 2020, when that infamous judgement of the Supreme Court removed the people’s Governor and ushered in the All Progressives Congress (APC) that came fourth in the March 2019 election, truncating the giant developmental strides achieved and dashing the expectations of Imolites.
The judgement brought fresh memories of APC in the minds of Imolites. Imolites remembered five years earlier, in 2015, when leveraging on Nigerians’ disappointment, rightly or wrongly, of the PDP government in 2015, APC lured Nigerians into voting their party to power with irresistible promises, which turned out to be false and deceitful.
The recent COVID-19 pandemic has explicitly manifested the banality of the following promises made by APC in 2015:
• Ban on government officials from going abroad for medical treatment
• Upgrading all Federal Government-owned hospitals to world-class facilities within five years
Today, no government official had gone abroad for medical treatments more than the head of APC government.
It is exactly five years since APC lied their party to Aso Rock. The question remains: Where are the world-class facilities in Federal Government-owned hospitals?
Like the proverbial bride who had experienced marriage with two spouses, Nigeria as a bride has experienced two spouses, she can now attest to who among the two spouses is the better husband. Nigerians and Imolites have married Genuineness and they have also married Propaganda. They know the difference.
In Chemistry, Le Châtelier’s principle states that, if a dynamic equilibrium is disturbed by changing the conditions, the position of equilibrium shifts (either to the left or to the right) to annul the effect of that change to re-establish an equilibrium.
The emergence of APC government in Imo State has disturbed the development equilibrium in the state. Consistent with Le Chatelier’s principle, PDP in Imo State has shifted the position of equilibrium of the resources (including human resources) at the LGA, state, zonal and national levels to reflect the high level of loyalty, commitment, passion, intellect, resourcefulness, and commitment required to ‘Make Nigeria Work Again’ and also genuinely rescue Imo State by sustaining the execution of the strategy of balancing policies, processes, politics and people within the party.
Unfortunately, like the collateral damage in a war or the egg that must be broken to make an omelet, the balance of resources in a political setup impacts mostly career politicians whose dynamic equilibrium has been disturbed. This is what is happening in Imo State today.
So, it is understandable when the affected career politicians, in line with Le Chatelier’s principle, shift to the left or to the right in a bid to restore their political equilibrium. No one truly bears them any grudges.
It is also understandable why APC in Imo State (a party synonymous with propaganda and lies) will attempt to make a mountain out of a molehill by inundating the media space with the left and right shifting of positions of those whose political equilibrium has been disturbed.
It is understandable. Afterall ‘Okuko hapu kwum kwum, o ga eji gini zuo umu ya?’ (If the mother hen stops making the kwum kwum sound, how will it feed her chicks?)