Today, the 19th day of July,
2017, the man regarded as one of the best in governance, at any
tier, in the annals of our country turns 56. As usual, drums would be
rolled out by some of his admirers who believe excellence
ought to be celebrated. They contend that if for
nothing else, it is
a means of promoting merit as role models in name and
indeed. In a country where even imbeciles garbed in purple fall over
one another seeking attention, it is about time the society set up a clear
template for granting honour to whom it is due.
In another vein, beyond
panegyrics by his enthusiasts, most people will just wish
him a perfunctory ‘Happy Birthday’.
In this piece, I set out
to re-examine, through the memories of his tenure, what good
governance is all about and to encourage Nigerians to look up to him
as the man who came into governance through entirely different route,
with an entirely different mentality and left it as nobody has done
in the history of governance in Nigeria. For me, this is
decent birthday present that would also instruct those in
governance on the right way to go.
Born on July
19, 1961, Peter Gregory Obi started his life in the rustic city
of Onitsha, and obtained his initial formal education in Onitsha and
Nsukka. He has since attended some of the best tertiary
institutions in the world in his thirst for intellectual
insemination to boost his competences.
How shall we rank him? Which of us
possesses so varied the Knowledge
to understand him adequately? As
an experiment in perspective, let us see him through his dramatic entrance into
government and what he did while there as distinct from business as usual.
Before him, news emanating from
the State was not palatable at all. It was
always stories of intrigues, squander mania, rape and rapine.
Visions and memories of the State tormented all persons of
goodwill; an involuntary gloom penetrated our souls,
chilling their imaginations.
The Bakassi group and their
co-predators worsened the situation as they turned our dear State
into a vast Golgotha of carnage, an arena for horror, where her children
tore and destroyed one another with the clear conscience of nature. Concerned
like other decent people, Peter Obi developed an urge to turn these
barbarisms into civilisation and this was what compelled him to seek
election into public office.
He campaigned vigorously and
was seen as the best candidate for the job. In many respects he was different: He
was softened to tolerance by education and experiences as a top board-room
man. He relied on persuasion and effective marketing of his
programme of action to garner support and votes. Alas, his
opponents, hardened by the streets and subterfuge, stole his mandate.
Evidently, Almighty God always
has special interest in Peter Obi’s affairs;
and for every indignity he suffered, he came out stronger and as
a reference point for the country and Nigeria-watchers. By regaining
his stolen mandate through the courts, he became a locus calssicus in
that regard, not just from the point of law, but from establishing a
commendable precedent as the first Nigerian to have done so. A study of the
circumstances that led to that feat will easily show that it was due
largely to the grace of God and his perseverance and ability to
remain focused.
A few months into his tenure,
some renegades in the State House of Assembly led by Hon. Mike
Belonwu contrived his impeachment. It was not hidden that the
impeachment process that came to its peak on the visit of the then
President Olusegun Obasanjo, had some of its roots in the swelling
resentment against his parsimony; how, rather than business as usual, he
was using the resources of the State to work for the State and
her people. Consider one of the reasons why he was impeached: the
House used to “add and share”; accusing him of re-building the burnt
Government House with less than 50% of the actual money budgeted for that
purpose. This may sound incredible, but it is true.
It was the mark of the rascality of
the time that the house ended up impeaching him. Convinced of
the rightness of his conduct in office, Peter
Obi challenged the action of the House of Assembly in court;
and set another record as the first State Governor to come
back into office from impeachment.
As the Governor, he had many
challenges, but as customary with him, his usually calm and thoughtful
temperament often saved him
from unsavoury situations. Despite his convictions that the
condition of Anambra required early decisions and quick implementation of
policies, Obi, in the freshman year of his government, submitted himself to
robust debate over the State’s many problems. He started
with a profound bow to planning by establishing the Ministry of
Planning.
He did not have to rush
into new projects - mostly unplanned – when there were many projects
started by his predecessor which needed to be completed.
As a board-room guru, he subjected
his decisions to the Executive Council [EXCO] for proper debate and
consideration. He did this because he was the captain of the ship and was
in control. Till this day, his erstwhile Commissioners
recall their exhilarating times with him. One of them is the
highly-respected Dr. Patrick Obi who revealed that the then
Governor was often “Prolonging Council meetings, always returning to
the question – Is this just? Is that useful? He subjected each
question to exact and elaborate analysis.”
On Peter Obi’s capacity for
work, the cerebral & forthright Professor Chinyere
Okunna says: “I have never seen him tired, I never found his mind
lacking in inspiration, even when weary in body. Never did a man more wholly
devote himself to the work in hand, nor better devote his time to what he
had to do”.
He was yet to conclude his
first term when elections were conducted. As far as everybody was
concerned, that was his end. Dr. Andy Uba was already sworn in as the Governor
before Peter Obi’s erudite lawyer succeeded in his tenure
interpretation case. I recall that as soon as Dr. Onyechi Ikpeazu,
SAN mentioned that, Femi Falana, SAN picked up the gauntlet and turned the
matter into a forensic debate. Some intellectual charlatans
have recently tried to appropriate the copyrights, but we have
the records. The end of that saga was the successful interpretation
of the tenure matter, which induced
another significant political earthquake – the staggering
of elections in Nigeria. Peter Obi thus became
a key architect of the overhaul of the political landscape in
the country.
One of the major challenges of his
tenure was the issue of security. Though the entire South-East
was having security challenges at the time he assumed office, the
case of Anambra was horrendous as the State
had little relationship with legitimate security agencies. In the
first instance, he restored this strategic relationship with
those agencies; supporting them as no other Government in the
State has ever done, including donations of over 500 vehicles, among
which were Armoured Personnel Carriers and Armoured patrol
vehicles.
Reflecting on the far-reaching
measures he took on securing the State, one has to admire Peter
Obi’s ingenuity of compelling a society to improve its ways
of protecting itself from crime and criminality, including armed robbery,
kidnapping, and cultism. For instance, while the likes of Ofe
Awkwu, Ngwu Ekeluomu, Osisi ka Ngwu were literally
parading as unchecked despots of the underworld, he came up
with a legislation which enabled the destruction of
buildings used to keep kidnap victims. To further enhance security, his
administration provided at least one security patrol van to each
of the 177 communities in the State as well
as to various other organisations as markets and
Churches.
When one of the dare-devil kidnappers, Evans, was caught
recently, he confessed the truth that propaganda has held
hostage for long: that it was Peter Obi that made criminals to run out of
Anambra State because he made the place an operational hell for
them. At another event when Obi was asked about security in Anambra State
during his tenure, he replied rather cryptically in Igbo: “Woke nuchaa
ogu, nwanyi enweluakuko.” (“After a man fights the battle, the
woman takes on the story”).
With his overall
achievements, the state, which until his tenure was treated as a
pariah, was opened again to the world. It was at this time that
several Envoys of countries represented in Nigeria started to visit
the State for collaborative projects and programmes. These include: United
States, Britain, Russia, European Union, South Africa, Belgium, Israel, The
Netherlands and Canada. In the same vein, Development Partners such as UNDP,
UNICEF, The World Bank, DfID, and UNESCO began to take active interest in
the state. Indeed, hitherto, many of them had nothing to do with the state.
Under the Obi administration, Anambra State was consistently adjudged one
of the best states in development partnership and commitment to reforms
for good governance.
Before his tenure, the
manufacturing sector – not to be confused with commerce –
was comatose. The few operators that hung on groaned under the
debilitating effects of an uncongenial environment of bad roads, low
patronage, excessive (and mostly illegal) taxation, insecurity, no
government support, among others.
The Obi administration resuscitated this
critical sector not by the inundation of propaganda, but by practical
steps – including development of an Industrial Policy for the state,
consultations with operators and concrete enablement for them – which
yielded tremendous results and boosted the socio-economy of the State and
environs. Link roads, other relevant infrastructure and logistic
support were provided for such vibrant manufacturing
outfits as Innoson Vehicles, Chikason, Cutix Cable, Juhel
Pharmaceuticals, Krisoral, Orange Drugs, EkuloGroup, and many
others. The administration also attracted giant manufacturers like
Intafact, Innoson, Neimeth, and Distel.
Among others, Innoson Group has
continued to acknowledge that the patronage of
the Obi administration ensured the survival of its vehicle
manufacturing company – with the purchase of billions of Naira worth of
vehicles and personal introductions to The Presidency and other State
Governors.
Easily one of the unsurpassed
attainments of Peter Obi was in education. Here, he achieved another
first on January 1, 2009, with his return of schools to their
original owner-proprietors – Voluntary Agencies, including Churches – with
commendable results. While the management of the schools was transferred
to the agencies, the State Government retained the funding responsibilities,
including capital projects, staff salaries and emoluments, and other
recurrent expenditures. Such was the impact of this momentous decision that Obi
administration stabilised basic education in the State.
Among other outcomes,
Anambra State leaped from its usual 24th place of the 36
States in many external examinations to Number One in results of both the
National Examination Council (NECO) and West African Examination Council (WAEC)
examinations for three consecutive years. Indeed, this revolutionary
partnership and phenomenal achievement informed the World
Bank-commissioned study group led by the renowned Professor Paul
Collier of Oxford University.
Under the Obi tenure,
Anambra State was the first in the Federation to procure and
distribute over 30,000 computers to secondary schools. These
included 22,500 from HP, which the Managing Director HP (Africa
and Middle-East) described as their largest such procurement in
the Middle-East and Africa. In the same vein, Internet
access was provided to more than 500 secondary schools, which the CEO
of Galaxy Backbone then (Mr. Gerald Ilukwe) characterised as incomparable to
any other in the country.
Microsoft Academies were also
established in those secondary schools – a project the then Head
of Microsoft in Nigeria (Mr. Ken Span) described as the
biggest of such in Africa to date.
Similarly, secondary schools in the
state got over 700 buses, while boreholes were sunk and classroom blocks
constructed in several schools in the 177 communities of the state.
Having determined that the
partnership with the voluntary agencies/Churches was working, he steadily
extended the formula to other critical sectors. In the health
sector, for instance, the symbiotic relationship resulted in a tremendous
boost to health care delivery across the state with investments of grants,
structures and supplies to the tune of several billions of Naira. Among the
beneficiary-organisations – whose transformation made positive impacts on the
sector – are: Iyienu Hospital, Ogidi; Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital,
Ihiala; St. Charles Borromeo Hospital, Onitsha; Diocesan Hospital, Amichi;
Holy Rosary Hospital, Waterside, Onitsha; and St. Joseph Hospital,
Adazi-Nnukwu. The Obi administration also constructed the Joseph Nwilo
Heart Centre at St. Joseph’s Hospital, Adazi-Nnukwu, where heart
operations are now being performed satisfactorily.
The grooming of health-care
professionals similarly received serious attention. By the end
of Peter Obi’s tenure in 2014, over 12 health institutions,
including two hospitals, had secured accreditation for their courses and
programmes. Interestingly, prior to his assumption of office in 2006, no
health institution in Anambra State was duly accredited.
Predictably, the achievements of
Peter Obi as Governor elicited several authentic, verifiable commendations
and awards. Among others, he won the Bill & Melinda Gates
Foundation US$1 million prize for best-performing state in immunisation in
the South-East. With complementary funding from Government, he used the money
to construct 10 Maternal and Child Care Centres across the State,
particularly in rural communities, in partnership with the Churches.
One of the acts of Obi that nobody
would wish away is his ability, against the convention, to clear debts owed
pensioners running into over 37 billion Naira; his consistency in paying
workers’ salaries; and commitment to paying contractors on certificates
generated – and yet being able to leave in excess of N100 billion
(including set-aside funds) in the state treasury for his
successor. This is one of the features that define him
from others that seek the governance of the people. How he did it
will one day become a topical issue in this country. Another marvel
is that even with that huge savings, he still recorded more achievements than
most others that owed hundreds of billions.
Commenting on Peter Obi inclination
to hard-work, one of his Commissioners, Chief Joe
Martins Uzodike, noted that “Mr. Peter Obi wore himself
out as he did others; the engine was too strong for the body. He crowded
a life-time of events into twenty years because he compressed a week
into a day. He came to his desk about 7am. It is only those not in
Nigeria that would not appreciate what he did for Anambra State and how he
is sadly being repaid today. But like his other travails, he
takes them with equanimity.”
On her part, his wife, the oil
behind the strong engine, Mrs. Margaret Obi is perplexed that what he
suffered has not driven him to insanity. She asserted that her husband
remains the person he used to be: “He still eats well and sleeps like a
baby. He could go to sleep at will, at any hour and in any place wherever
he needs repose.”
The man himself revealed that he
keeps different affairs arranged in his head or memory as in a closet with
several drawers: “When I wish to turn from business, I close the drawer
that contains it, and open that which contains another. If I wish to
sleep, I shut up all the drawers and I am soon asleep”.
Rather than seek by what magic or
inspiration Obi achieved all this and get close to him to achieve a fraction of
his goodness by prestige imitation, they are busy running round
the lunatic asylum. When they discovered it would not lead them to
anywhere, they resorted to propaganda and elevated it to a State industry,
almost a monopoly.
As he turns 56 and is increasingly
relevant because he has something to offer, may we raise our glasses and cling
to his continued good health and pray to God to always lead him aright.
•Obienyem wrote in from Lagos.
Tags
Politics