Udi People Cry Out Against Marginalization

Despite the fact that Governor Sullivan Chime is one of their own, the people of Udi in Enugu State still claim that they are marginalized in the scheme of things in the state.

Last Christmas festivities, the kinsmen of Governor Sullivan Chime of Enugu State treated him to a banquet. (Pix left is Governor Chime; Right up, OAU Onyema; Right down, Ike Ekweremadu, Deputy Senate President; Down down left respectively is Ossy Rockefeller Ogboso and incumbent Ozomgbachi)

Chime did partake in the jollification (eating and drinking of Udi palm-wine, a.k.a ‘Aneke-Achime) that usually characterizes such get together. Thereafter, Chime’s kinsmen gave him his own share of the slaughtered ram, and then proceeded to counsel him as regards his plum position as governor of Enugu State, and how the Udi man is marginalized under his administration.

Noted for his curt responses to issues of that nature, Governor Chime told his kinsmen that he is Governor of Enugu State, not that of Udi people alone. Thanking them for the feast, he told his bemused kinsmen that he was going back to the seat of government in Enugu to do the work for which they, alongside other communities of the state, elected him. Governor Chime, subsequently, cruised back to his office in his usually modest convoy.

Although Governor Chime seemed to have handled the situation with the ‘wisdom of Solomon’, the cry of marginalization of the Udis in the present political dispensation, especially, in top elective political positions is a song being sung by almost every Udi man. This alleged marginalization is hurting even against the background of their son being the Governor of the state.

Part of the complaint is that the Udis have, for the past 30 years, not produced a Senator from their Enugu West Senatorial District, even when their contemporary council areas have produced senators for two or three times.

Enugu West Senatorial District is made up of Aninri, Oji River, Awgu, Ezeagu and Udi Local Government Areas. It is germane to reason that except Udi and Awgu, the three other council areas of Aninri, Ezeagu and Oji River have produced senators from the District. Such senators include Ben Collins Ndu (Ezeagu); Hyde Onuaguluchi (Oji River) and the incumbent second term serving Deputy Senate President, Ike Ekweremadu (Aninri).

It is, therefore, on the basis of this that Udi people, advocating equity and fair-play, have called on the other council areas to allow them to produce the Senator representing Enugu West District this time around.

For sure, the Udi people are not kidding over this pursuit, as they have already asked one of their own, Ogochukwu Agapitus Umunnakwe (OAU) Onyema to throw his hat into the ring for the senate job in the forthcoming elections.

Understandably, the feeling of not a few is that Ike Ekweremadu, having traversed the length and breadth of the office of Senator for two terms of eight years, should willingly step aside for a candidate from another local government that is yet to occupy that position.

Granted that Ekweremadu has the constitutional right to take a third shot at the senate seat, his chances of emergence in the current situation, appear bleak and, perhaps, hopeless going by his profile of perceived non-performance in Enugu West Senatorial District.

OAU Onyema (Akpaagu Ikenga), Chairman of Ohanaeze Ndigbo (Enugu Chapter) and a tested politician, has been under intense lobby by a group which called itself ‘Friends of Sir OAU Onyema’ to run for the senatorial job.

For now, there is nothing to suggest that Ekweremadu is going back to the senate. The position Ekweremadu had, before now, angled for was that of the Governor of the state, but he and his campaign hirelings got overwhelmed by the popularity of Governor Chime whom Enugu state people have given his good governance and unparalleled hard work a pass mark.

Apart from Chime’s historic urban renewal project which has seen the hitherto pot-hole ridden roads in Enugu metropolis undergo complete renovation and, at times, reconstruction, Chime’s caterpillars of development still trudge on inside the hundreds of rural areas in the state.

This is in addition to Chime’s feats in other areas of development such as provision of pipe-borne water, housing and electricity across the state.

In the opinion of many, Ekweremadu, largely perceived as a ‘lack-lustre’ politician, cannot match these feats, hence he, swiftly, dropped his governorship quest to beseech Governor Chime to allow him to return to the senate for the third term.
But Chime is said to have bluntly snubbed this request, ostensibly, following superior logic that another council area which has not produced a senator before should be given a chance.

Although a few supporters of Ekweremadu had argued that it would be incongruous for Udi Local Government Area to produce Senator for Enugu West District when the Governor (Chime) comes from the council. But this logic, many say, does not hold any water because the two positions have two different conditions for their attainment.
Chime, it is argued, emerged from a state-wide elective process, which made him governor of the whole Enugu State. In the case of a Senator, he (the Senator) emerges from the Senatorial zone, and each local government is expected to produce a senator over time to represent the District.

Perhaps, as a balance of the argument, supporters of ‘Udi for Senate’, quickly, cite the present situation where Ike Ekweremadu is the Senator representing Enugu West, and his blood brother, Bernard Ekweremadu, hitherto a northern based businessman, is the second term serving Chairman of their Aninri Local Government Area. What this specifically means is that while Ekweremadu superintends over the affairs of the people of Enugu West Senatorial District at the national assembly, his brother, from the same mother, takes charge at the council level. Many have, indeed, queried: ‘Is this not inordinate ambition?’

The Udi people are not only marginalized in senate representation. The marginalization is, also, felt in the people’s representation in the Udi/Ezeagu Federal House of Representatives.

At the moment, Chief Ogbuefi Ozomgbachi holds sway as the federal legislator on behalf of the two councils. Ozomgbachi, also, a second-term serving member of the House of Representatives, seems to be looking for a third term ticket, even when he could not give a credible account of his steward for the eight years he has ‘entertained’ himself in the House.

It is, therefore, not surprising that other candidates have emerged to give Ozomgbachi a run for his money in the forth-coming election into Udi/Ezeagu Federal House of Representatives seat in the state.

Just last weekend, Hon. Ozomgbachi, maybe, for the first time in his past eight years of representing the constituents of Udi/Ezeagu, distributed to them some items for their ‘empowerment’.

The items included 40 pieces of motorcycle; 120 pieces of Tiger Generator (popularly called ‘I Pass my Neighbor’); 120 pieces of clipper; 40 pieces of drier; 40 pieces of refrigerator; 40 pieces of video camera; 40 pieces of grinding machine and 40 pieces of complete public address system.

Others were N200,000.00 per ward (40) wards for identified indigent students; N20,000,00 per ward (40) wards for identified indigent widows, as well as 400 pieces of ‘agbada’ for women (to promote efficient processing of garri.

It is clear that, with this largesse, the honorable member (Ozomgbachi) is asking both his constituents and the PDP high command in Enugu State of a third term in the Federal House of Representatives. Both his utterances and body language indicate that, by this sudden generosity of his, he wants the masses of his constituency to return him to the Federal House of Representatives for another four whole years!

‘It’s all politically motivated. He wants to go to the House for the third time. But it won’t work. Another person should go and represent us at the House. It must not be Ozomgbachi always’, an agitated constituent told Insider Weekly.

Yet, the people of Udi Local Government Area insist that it is their own turn to produce member of the House of Representatives this time, Ozomgbachi, an Ezeagu man, having served two terms of nigh-inactivity in that office.

Hon. Garry Eneh, an Udi man, had served in that capacity before Ozomgbachi. The House of Representatives office having been rotatory between Udi and Ezeagu, the Udis maintain that Governor Chime, being their son or not, ought not to hinder them from running for the office in the coming poll.

With the kind of democracy prevalent in the PDP, many politicians who harbor the ambition to replace either Ekweremadu or Ozomgbachi are still reluctant and, maybe, afraid to do so simply because they are waiting on the Governor and the party to anoint them.

But a few personalities from Udi have been observed to have interest in the Udi/Ezeagu Federal House of Representatives seat. And one of such personalities who, if God permits, will be taking over from Ozomgbachi is Rockefeller Ossy Ogboso, an indigene of Umuabi in Udi Local Government Area.

Apart from being Chairman of Enugu State Council of Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ), Ogboso, a career journalist and second term serving Chairman of the union, has other antecedents to sustain him as a federal legislator representing Udi/Ezeagu. Ogboso was, in the late 1990s, Chairman of Enugu State Chapter of Sports Writers Association of Nigeria (SWAN). During the FIFA World Soccer Youth Championship in 1999, Ogboso, superlatively, served as Member, Publicity sub-committee in the Enugu Sub-seat. At the moment, apart from NUJ chairmanship, Ogboso is a Member, Board of Directors, Rangers International Football Club, Enugu.

There is no gain-saying the fact that Ogboso’s feats in the administration of No. 4 Rangers Avenue, Independence Layout, Enugu secretariat of NUJ, remain non-descript. Unlike in the past when the premises of the NUJ Press Centre used to be a play-ground for squirrels and lizards, as well as other animals, the Centre presently bubbles with life, with developmental projects dotting the entire landscape.

Apart from being a consummate grassroots mobilizer and dedicated and fearless leader of men and women, Ogboso’s diction, eloquence and perspicacity will serve as his armor in representing his Udi/Ezeagu brethren in the Federal House of Representatives. Let it not be forgotten that Ogboso, apart from being a card-carrying member of the PDP, is a good and obedient party man.

All in all, the people of Udi are worried over their alleged marginalization in the politics of Enugu state. Udi, they maintain, is the oldest Local Government Area among the four others that make up the senatorial district. Udi Division was so vast that all the local governments in the old East Central State used to be under Udi Division. Udi should, ideally, be the most civilized of all the councils east of the Niger, having produced eminent personalities in all spheres of life.

For instance, Dr. Ezievuo Onwu and Justice Daddy Onyeama (both from Udi) are readily cited as the first Igbo Doctor and the first African Justice at the International Court of Justice, Hague respectively. Still, at a time during the Iran/Iraq war, the United Nations (UN) appointed a 19-man weapon inspection team, who were mainly physicists, to carry out some studies on the weapons being deployed in the war by the two warring countries. It is a known fact that Professor Benson Agu, an indigene of Umuabi Udi, was one of the UN appointed Physicists. Other instances abound.

Will Daniel, then, come to judgment for Udi people?

Culled from: Insider Weekly Magazine, Issue of June 28, 2010