The security and welfare of the people shall be the primary purpose
Of government………..”
1999 CONSTITUTION OF THE FED. REPUBLIC OF NIGERIA (SECTION 14)
“With malice toward none, with charity for all; with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in”
Abraham Lincoln- 1809-1865) Second Inaugural Address.
By Jeffersonian, Aristotelian, Benthamist Principles and normative standards, “The pursuit of the greatest good for the largest number remains the cardinal plinth and matrix upon which visionary leadership, good governments and altruistic governance fulcrumises”. This is glaringly corroborated and explicitly articulated in the Book of Books ‘THE HOLY BIBLE’ that, “When a great and righteous King rules the people jubilate”. Are Deltans jubilating?
How has it been with Deltans ever since his Excellency, the Executive Governor of Delta State, Dr Emmanuel Ewetan Uduaghan came on board in 2007 vis – a- vis his three – point agenda and palpably tangible strides. Has the lot of Delta State and Deltans improved on the educational, economic, socio-political front. Do we have pragmatic structural evidences on ground to realistically, not hypocritical propandistic hype show that Governor Uduaghan is now walking the talk?
There are and will always be multidimensionality of opinions on these issues. But it must be laid bare from the beginning that Uduaghan’s electoral victory over Chief Great Ogboru was a pyrrhic victory, some say fraudulent and others called it a stolen mandate. He was not therefore given a place to stand, “damihi locus standi etare et mowebo”(give me a place to stand and I will move the world – Archimedes).
Uduaghan’s electoral victory made him an infrangible legalis homo and a litigant. This scenario affected his settling down to the rudiments of governance. Delta State gravitated and cascaded down the slop and labyrinth of dilapidated roads, hospitals without drugs, rickety school buildings, teachers without salaries as and when due, no light, no water, no good roads, kidnappings, sea piracy, armed robbery, ethnic schisms, extra judicial killings and assassinations, etc. Indeed, there was total structural decay and lethal insecurity.
Delta State became cocooned in the toga of momentum without movement. INDEED, A FAILED STATE. A failed state according to ‘The Crisis States Research Centre of the United States’ is “a state that can no longer perform its basic security and developmental functions and has no effective control over its territory and borders.” Delta State became the quintessential epitomisation of a failed state, broken promise, fraudulent agenda and dashed hopes.
Indeed, Uduaghan became enshrined in the throes of the Goliathic Complex and the Alice in wonder land syndrome. In visionary lapses and tantrums, he started organizing and sponsoring all sorts of conferences, talk shows, seminars, colloquiums, gala nights, award shows, carnivals and symposiums, etc, spending billions of tax payers money as if the use of money was going out of fashion. And like Emperor Nero who slept whilst Rome burnt, Uduaghan luxuriated in Barmecidal- Dish projects, whilst millions of Deltans suffered under the strangle hold and aspluxiating cliffhangers of scorching poverty, bad roads, massive unemployment, hunger, half-baked Micro- Credit schemes, instituting behemoth economic advisory team, kidnappings, assassinations and wanton payment of pension and gratuities to an ex-convict former governor who is in jail – Chief James Onanefe Ibori. What a socio-economic and financial rascality?
But, recently and like thunder out of celestial realm Uduaghan has started walking the talk of development. A drive through Warri, Sapele, Koko, Ugbuwangue, Orerokpe, Effurun, Eku, Abraka and some other towns in Delta State will reveal that Governor Uduagha has just woken up from a lethally deep somnambulistic slumber and has partially started walking the talk of his three- point agenda.
On the education front most Delta towns and cities are littered with Model school structures. WHAT A GREAT BEAUTY TO BEHOLD! He has started macadamising, patching, tarring, filling, constructing many roads including the Airport road round about, the Enerhen junction round about and the Delta Estate culverts and many others in Asaba and creating culverts in some towns and cities. There are think–tanks, syndicated institutions to drive the developmental agenda of Delta State to de-emphasize our over dependence on oil revenues through partnership with the private sector as well as to improve access to education, water, shelter and health as a conduit to dovetailing into the attainment of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGS).
The flagging –off the construction of the 12 kilometer road project that runs through Oginibo- Obi- Ayagha, Erhuwaren- Agbowhiame communities, in ughievwen kingdom, Ughelli south LG A, Delta State must be commended.
Delta State has budgeted N398.31 billion for the 2013 fiscal year with N145.94 or 36.64% for recurrent Expenditure and 252.3% billion or 63.36% capital Expenditure.
These achievements are indeed a minuscule microcosm in the macrocosm of real development, a tip of the iceberg and a molehill in a mountain. Deltans want to see all-embracing and palpably tangible development in the provision of real total free Medicare, free education at all levels, construction of 2,000 Blocks each of Low Cost Buildings in the 25 Local Government Areas of Delta State, building of hospital annexes in every 3 Miles Radius, massive construction and repairs of roads to 65% of villages and farm locations in Delta State.
Attack the menace of sea piracy, kidnapping and assassinations by the creation of Marine and Land Farm Locations to employee all jobless artisans, unemployed graduates and artisans, pay monthly stipends to the sick and senile old people above 70 years. Endeavour to create the tourism socio- economic, political template and environmentally conducive auibience to make Delta State the investor’s Mecca. Let us make use of the carbon black from the Warri Refinery as industry stimulants. The dead industries should be brought back to life. The Asaba Textile Mills, Ughelli Glass Factory, AT&P Sapele, Bendel Steel Structures etc.
The Laodicean attitudinal orientation of Deltans has been the major catalyst to our undevelopment in the past and present. Hence, Senator Williams E. Borah (1865 – 1940) observed that “the marvel of history is the patience with which men and women submit to the burdens unnecessarily laid upon them by their Governments”. Our suffering in Delta State did not start today, from Air Commodore Luke Ochulor – 1991- 1992, Olorugun Felix Ibru- 1992- 1993, Col. Bassey Asuquo- 1993- 1994, Col. Ibrahim Kefas- 1994-1996, Col. John Dungs – 1996- 1998, Navy Capt. Walter Feghabo- 1998- 1999, Chief James Onanefe Ibori 1999-2007 and now Dr Emmanuel Ewetan Uduaghan 2007-20… Our story and struggles continues to remain the same, reminiscent of the comrades of Ulysses who loved their servitude, brutish and slavish conditions.
Delta State receives over N400 Billion Federally Generated Revenues and over N50 Billion from Internally Generated Revenues every year, exclusive of the 13% derivation earnings. Yet we have little or nothing to show for it. It is against this scorched background that the respected Itsekiri woman, Chief Rita Lori, the Igba of Warri Kingdom, whilst rejecting Uduaghan’s Xmas gifts said “By now you already know my stands on the way you run the administration of Delta State. I feel unhappy and depressed to see the State, and Itsekiri land particularly declining from the time you have been in government. Severally, I have spoken to you as a brother and son, stressing that the Itsekiri Riverine Areas are declining educationally and economically. The way our land is today shows no planning or foresight. There is no creation of jobs, neither is there adequate security of lives and property. For many years, there has been fighting and bloodletting in Escravos. In fact, things have got worse since you became Governor. Yet, you have not used your position to bring peace to this very important Itsekiri town. Indeed, what we have are cases of Itsekiri sons killing one another.
Also, it is sad to know that when people are saying we have a Governor as a son a place like Ugborodo, which people know as the terminal for Nigerian oil, can boast of nothing but mud and water. There is no infrastructure, no houses, no roads, schools or hospitals…………..”
Chief Rita Lori has with laconic brevity spoken the minds of 90% of Deltans. She is a formidable Itsekiri opinion leader, highly venerated Itsekiri Nationalist and Mother – like person to Governor Uduaghan. If she could speak like this, notwithstanding the principles of familiar piety and ethnocentric sensibilities, what will other Deltans who truly really feel the lacerating and scorching hell of economic hades and social doldrums talk about. If wet leaves should burn, what will dry leaves do and if gold should rust what will iron do?
The time has come and it is now for Governor Uduaghan to consign propagandistic- skullduggery and Goebbelian narcissism to the incinerator and start charting the course of true palpable development for Deltans and Delta State. He must start by making his Assets public, because what we read about him and the EFCC is not palatable at all and he should treat sagaciously because of the “Ibori Saga.” He should reconstitute all Delta State Agencies across the gossamer of integrity trajectory, provide jobs, all–embracingly engage in massive construction of roads across the state, pay teachers 27 % minimum wages and stop clandestine and furtive subtraction from their salaries, declare true and pragmatic free education and free Medicare of all levels and let the Warri industrial park and the tourism projects etc work.
Finally, we passionately appeal to Governor Uduaghan to find work for idle hands and our cries about kidnappings, sea piracy assassinations, terrorism, armed robbery and thuggry will reduce to its barest minimums. The essayist Thomas Carlyle posited that “A man willing to work, and unable to find work, is perhaps the saddest sight that fortunes inequality exhibits under the sun, blessed is he who has found his work, let him ask no other blessedness” and that “work is the grand cure of all the maladies and miseries that ever beset mankind.”
This is substantiated by the great poet Voltaire, he sad “work keeps us from three evils. Boredom, vice and need” and Virgil said “labour omri vincit” (work conquers all). UDUAGHAN THINK!!!
Chief Bobson Gbinije
Mandate Against Poverty (MAP),
Warri.
08023250378.
