Emeka Ihedioha and the Renewed Expectation of Imo People

Gov-Emeka-Ihedioha

Now Imo people know they have a dependable reformer, a right peg in the right whole and exactly that kind of leader needed to put Imo on the path of total transformation and economic recovery.

For many who have been following Imo state politics closely, it will be very easy to presume that the jubilation that greeted the announcement of the defeat of the trio Hon Uche Nwosu the son In-law to Governor Okorocha, the candidate of Action Alliance (AA), Senator Hope Uzodinma the candidate of All Progressive Congress (APC) and Senator Araraume the candidate of All Grand People’s Alliance (APGA) by Governor Emeka Ihedioha, the Candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) at the Election Petition Tribunal in Abuja is an expression of the majority of Imo people. Even though it has further shown that democracy is in action and justice has prevailed. The governor’s victory at the Tribunal is too clear as it conforms to an Igbo adage that says “rat cannot eat the fish of one who is not sleeping”. The pronouncements of the tribunal judge have further laid to rest all the political insinuation, assumption that our Judiciary is biased and working for the ruling party APC. With the latest removal of AA party by the Supreme Court at the tribunal recently, it is obvious that Uche Nwosu’s camp will be in disarray and cannot survive or make headway in the case again no matter how they try.

Hon Uche Nwosu and cohorts lost in the tribunal for multiple reasons and largely for playing politics with the people’s welfare and for brazen insensitivity and cruelty before the election. After several years of heightened expectations, Imo people from all indication can now sigh of relief and look up to the better things that is about to take place in the state soon in the area of infrastructural development. Governor Okorocha, and his son-inlaw Uche Nwosu by now would have discovered that it is much easier to assume winning elections in the state than to govern well in practical terms. This is despite the fact that their administration was heavily subsumed by policy anomalies and criticized for running short of ideas in formulation and implementations of good policies. Many thinks and attribute this as part of the reason why the government was rated poorly and taken as a huge failures in administering good governance and providing dividend of democracy to the people after a wasteful eight years reign.

Now Imo people know they have a dependable reformer, a right peg in the right whole and exactly that kind of leader needed to put Imo on the path of total transformation and economic recovery. He is one leader I know that is not afraid to challenge the status quo and has no regrets for his actions. The future of the state indeed belong to those few leaders like him who can identify the ills of the past administration and go all out to redress them without counting on the cost or be distracted by cheap propaganda. Governor Ihedioha has surprised many of us by his foresightedness, comportment, humility, consistency and good articulation with maturity, unfolding his mission agenda painstakingly as a real rescuer of the people, thereby sending big signals that Imo state is in good hands and may not be business as usual to Imo tormentors again. He had exhibited a high level of ruggedness and doggedness, by continuously working against all the oppressive tendencies of the past government talking the case of the Pensioners and workers passionately by paying them 100 percent as promised. He has challenged the voiceless and poor Imo people to rise up against bad governance, undemocratic practices, impunity, and financial recklessness of the highest order perpetuated by the past government and brace up the new challenges of hope for the better.

Today, Imo PDP can be said to have finally recovered from manageable internal crises which was created to bring them down as a family and ridicule them before the opposition the All Progressive Congress. Development after the judgment has turn thing to the better and has given them some impetus, as it has made many to swallow their words and shift ground by joining them or be left behind in the scheme of things. AA, APC has probably been frightened like never since that PDP got it acts together. One thing is certain here, everyone knows the PDP is a party to beat come 2023, and this is the funeral of APC in Imo as a whole. Many in Imo APC are no more at ease or happy that PDP has bounced back again in Imo. Many in APC are just suffering and smiling and afraid of leaving the party to face ridicules for joining a wrong party. Even the least person in Imo knows APC has expired with Okorocha’s exit as governor. AA and APC will not make it again, no matter who they present in the future. This fact is glaring and the bitter truth that must be told to the opposition. There is uneasy calm in Imo AA and APC now and I can tell you authoritatively that they will not be able to resolve their crises with what is happening within their fold.

That Imo Pensioners and workers have had a very rough time with the past government is not an overstatement. It is equally a fact that so many pensioners have never been paid anything reasonable commensurate to their entitlements since most of them retired. It is also on record that Imo pensioners were arm-twisted to sign and forfeit 60% of theirs entitlements to the government; a situation which was enforced despite a court judgement against such obnoxious policy. It is also a fact that the federal government in its magnanimity to help pensioners and workers nationwide released the first and second trenches of the bailout fund from the Paris Club Refund to all the state and Imo state received amount of N29 Billion and yet nothing was been done for Imo pensioners. It is equally true that Imo pensioners have been made to undergo rigorous and strenuous processes, with endless verification, re-verification and physical identification exercise in futility and afterwards they are abandoned to their fate and the suffering continued.

In most cases dud cheques are issued to them that never got cleared in the banks. Omission of names of Imo Pensioners has become a common feature now and it appears such has become the stock of trade of the handlers of Pension payment in Okorocha’s regime. From all indication it appears Okorocha’s method was another calculated way of sending the remaining pensioners to early grave in other to embezzle their remaining money then. The miseries and agonies of Imo pensioners without exaggeration did become unbearable and pathetic to a point that Governor Emeka Ihedioha, a man with conscience on assumption of power, decided to address and tackle the inadequacies headlong. With his firm action in the thoroughly reorganization of the Pension Scheme and its policy structure, has permanently addressed the various needs of our today’s pensioners, ranging from prompt payment as at when due, harmonization of e-data to e-pay, to checking ghost pensioners and fully recognize and back pension autonomy-law capable of blocking every loopholes upon which Imo pensioners could be punished and exploited by future lawless governments. This he has done without delay. Today Imo pensioners are happy and worker now receive 100% of their salaries as at when due.

I am particularly happy that, those who malign and projected dangerous propaganda to discredit Governor Ihedioha then and hoodwinked the masses for their selfish interests are the ones continuously fighting themselves in Imo APC, where the center cannot hold. We are beginning to witness the failures of those evil perpetrators that worked against an innocent man, as God has started opening the eyes of Ndi-Imo to the hidden secrets about those that mortgaged the people for money and left the state in misery and bad condition. The expectations of those who have continuously played one role or the other to deny Imo people the opportunity of getting a good, honest and credible governor that can salvage Imo state lost their heritage is now cut short. God has remembered Imo and already by disgracing the wicked and evil government under the hands of self imposed demigods masking then as Rescue Mission. Light has finally come and darkness has disappeared. Praise God!

About Cyril ARIRIGUZO 30 Articles
Cyril ARIRIGUZO

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