Eze Chimkanayo is a former Commissioner for Information in Abia State. In this interview, he speaks on Governor Alex Otti’s administration in the state and why he thinks that the governor may not be re-elected, JOHNCHUKS ONUANYIM reports

Is your association, Abia Best Interest Association (ABIA), a registered organisation?

The Abia Best Interest Association (ABIA), which fortunately shares the same acronym with the word Abia is a child of necessity, born out of the desire of ordinary Abians like myself to entrench a new era of transparency and accountability in the body polity of the state.

You know that I was among those that left Abia to come to Ladikwali Hall, Sheraton Hotel (now Continental Hotel) under the auspices of New Era Alliance, to join other bodies to form what we then called G34, which later metamorphosed to the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).

After that effort and PDP won at the national and state levels, I was privileged to serve as commissioner in Abia State. I was also blessed by God and given the rare privilege and grace to serve three governors back-to-back. I was commissioner under Governors Orji Uzor Kalu, Theodore Orji, and Okezie Ikpeazu.

I’m not just a foundation member of the PDP but I served in all the PDP governments in the last almost three decades. So, I felt it’s time to give back to my state by drawing from my experience with these three governors, drawing from my institutional memory to say these are the things that made us succeed and these are the things that made us fail in some areas because Abia could have been better if things were done excellently well.

But being that this is a human experiment and there is always room for improvement, I felt that having served in the ruling party for almost three decades and now in opposition, we should be able to leverage our experience and advise the current government, act as a watchdog and ensure that the best interest of Abia people is protected. That is the vision behind this organisation which I happen to convene.

In other words, if PDP was still in power and you were in government, there wouldn’t have been any need for Abia Best Interest Association?

No, it predates the current administration. It’s a non-governmental organisation. The Abia Best Interest Association has worked, only that when we were with the government, our advice and intervention were from within. But then we played an even more serious role then because we were opposed to certain policies of the PDP government at the time.

But because we were all PDP members and we had unimpeded access to the powers that be, maybe, our intervention was not giving us as much publicity as it is getting now. But then, I remember we opposed very many policies of the then PDP government because Abia Best Interest Association is not a political association. We have members of all political parties in our organisation.

It looks like, and from what we hear, you were expecting to be appointed into your usual portfolio by the Otti administration and because he did not look your way, you have chosen to oppose him…

With every sense of responsibility, I want to say that is a false notion. Number one, I could not have served in the Labour Party government. I am a believer in natural justice.

Abians will not re-elect a governor who has micromanaged the state into his private property. Abians will also not re-elect somebody who is an emperor, somebody who runs a one-man show

If I had served in the PDP government, it was because I was part of the emergence of those governments, and as it is customary, when you play a part in the emergence of a government, it looks inward to see the best hands in various sectors and engage them. But you know, our party did not win the 2023 election, and immediately after that, I left Abia State and went back to my legal practice and journalism.

I did not see myself anywhere around the Labour Party government, so it is preposterous to say it was because l was not engaged. Number two is that when the governor tried to deliberately distract the people from the message by attacking the messengers, I came out and threw a challenge to him, which he is yet to take up.

I challenged him to show any evidence of any phone call or any text message or any form of interaction between me and him in the last seven years because I know that the last time I had any interaction with him was in 2017, when I lost my mother and he was in attendance at the burial. After Governor Otti attended my mother’s burial, by 2019, he was in APC and I was in PDP and we had no political contact. And by 2023, I was in the forefront of those who were opposing his emergence as governor.

So, Governor Otti was being deliberately dishonest because he wanted to distract people from the issues that we were raising and then make it look like just labelled the messengers so that the message would be subdued. But we have gone beyond that. Over time, like you have noticed, we have continued to ask those questions and others have taken notice to the glory of God.

There is need for everybody to understand what has happened. We are not accusing Governor Otti; we are rather urging him to do the needful, which is being transparent, being accountable to other people. Our challenge is that Otti has refused to be accountable as a governor. What is public cannot be made private. IPR is a public concern.

It is known as IPSA. This portal is in the Federal Ministry of Finance. It is a transparency and accountability portal. Every governor is duty bound to upload what they have done at the end of every year; state financial accountability transparency programme.

For any state in Nigeria to qualify to receive grants from World Bank, for you to qualify to be guaranteed by the Federal Ministry of Finance for certain things that states look for in terms of financial relationships, you must upload every quarter what you have done with budget money already received.

In fact, it is so serious that the Federal Ministry of Finance in liaison with the World Bank gives prize money of $700 million in grant to states that have actually complied with that transparency requirement as an incentive in terms of transparency rating.

Many Abia indigenes are saying that Otti has done well for them; why are you insisting that under him Abia has not fared well?

One thing you must understand is that Abia State under Governor Otti has become the corruption capital of Nigeria. And, the intriguing thing about it, in answering your question, is that, Abia State has also, paradoxically, become the maker of bloggers and skit makers in Nigeria.

As we are talking, Otti is running fantastic in propaganda and very low on performance. I’ll give you an instance. When Mr. Dave Umahi went to Abia recently to commission projects, we asked him a simple question.

We said, you came to Abia to commission Port Harcourt Road, which is 6.5 kilometres, and three re-asphalted streets already existing in the city of Abia.

The roads that Dave Umahi went to Abia to do all that drama put together are not up to 20 kilometres within neighborhood. When the President went to Enugu to commission projects, you saw him commissioning projects in education, projects in health, the smart schools; projects in security, the centre where all information about movements, cameras and all of that.

We asked Umahi, how come you came to Abia to commission less than 20 kilometres of roads, and he couldn’t answer the question. Number two, we asked: Is it a crime for Otti to start his own legacy project? If you go to Abia today, you will see the three secretariats.

All of them were built in less than one term by Theodore Orji as governor. He also built the Jack Building. Each of those secretariats, by the way, is a fourstorey building, started and completed by Theodore Orji and they are known as his legacy projects. The International Conference Centre was also built by Theodore Orji. You can also relate to several other projects that different governors have done, which are credited to their era.

As we speak, I challenge anybody to show me one building started and completed by Otti in the last two years with over N1.4 trillion that has accrued to Abia State or show me one housing estate of whatever size, started and completed by the governor. Otti is now infamously known as a repainting and retrofitting governor of Abia State.

For instance, the secretariat that is being brandished was built by a military administrator and has been renovated by successive governors. Otti went and repainted it and refurnished some of the offices and then presented it as one of his projects. The Michael Okpara Auditorium was built by successive military administrations.

Otti went in there and took some plywood, did some panelling, then removed the rubber seats and put some tables that looked like a restaurant and called people to come and commission it. N22 billion was taken to retrofit and repaint existing primary health centres. In my village, it was even pathetic that the health centre that Abia State government is coming to repaint and retrofit is the one that the community contributed money to build.

All that we require from Otti is some level of transparency and accountability. Pictures don’t lie. Evidence is the end of argument. What we are saying is that in Abia State where a humongous sum of N54 billion has been withdrawn in the name of 51 public schools, smart schools, we want to see these schools.

Are you saying that come 2027, Otti will not be reelected?

Otti will not be reelected based on the fact that he is the only governor in Nigeria that is operating from his bedroom in his village. I just made an observation that even the President at the gathering of governors told him that it is an anomaly for a governor to operate outside the government house. When people are coming to pay official visit to Abia State and they move to Otti’s village, some kilometres away from the state capital to meet him in his private house. It is an anomaly and Abians will not re-elect a governor that takes their governance back to his bedroom and parlour.

Number two, Otti takes away over N2 billion every month in the name of servicing of government house. Where is the government house located, in his house? He is improving the buildings in his house. He is improving facilities in his house. When he finishes as governor, those things which he has done in his compound, how do we recover them?

If he is operating from government house, all those improvements in structures and facilities will be available for the use of Abians. So, Abians will not re-elect a governor who has micromanaged the state into his private property. Abians will also not re-elect somebody who is an emperor, somebody who runs a one-man show.

Some of the things you are saying are in tune with what the Deputy Speaker of the House of Representatives, Benjamin Kalu is saying. Are you working with him to ensure that Otti is not re-elected?

Every Abia that is honest, every Abia that is patriotic, regardless of party affiliation is in agreement that it is enough of this deception; enough of this smokescreen; enough of this the more you look, the less you see; enough of this autocracy and imperialism.

Abia state is not a private concern and cannot be run as a personal company of Alex Otti. So, this is not about the deputy speaker. Indeed, we had expected him to start saying what he is saying earlier than now. It is not only the deputy speaker who is saying that. Chikwe Udensi of All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA) had also gone ahead to make his own observations known.

Mr. Igara, the Labour Party chairman in Abia State that delivered Otti in 2023, has also issued a statement dissociating himself from Otti’s imperialism. And indeed, the National Chairman of Labour Party, Julius Abure, has disassociated himself from Otti because of what he has brought to the party that delivered him.