Okorocha Presidential Ambition: Charity Begins At Home

by Maazi Obinna Akuwudike

I wasn’t one of those who fell for Okorocha’s promises and sweet talks in 2011.

In fact, the many promises he made, without giving a clear-cut roadmap for their implementation, was one of my biggest turn offs about him.

I’ve always associated people that make too many promises upfront to fraudsters, nde MMM, nde i’wete nke’a (your vote), i’rie nka, and as such I did not vote for Okorocha in 2011.

Having confirmed that I was right about him from 2011 to 2015, I yet again did not vote for him in 2015. In fact, with my lack of faith in the strong names presented that year, I decided to spend 2015 election day at home drinking beer.

Of what point was it coming to vote when I knew what to expect?

Yesterday, Rochas Okorocha jumped on a stage somewhere in Abuja, and yet again, started dazzling the lightheaded with his sweet words.

For Okorocha, words come cheap. Keeping those words is yet another matter.

I didn’t waste my time listening to whatever he was saying to those who bothered to listen yesterday. What was the point? For a man I’ve seen and heard speak several times in the past, I knew that everything that comes from him is likened to the promises from email fraudsters promising you billions in inheritance money just to get what they want from you.

In our case, our trust.

But an important question to ask, would have been how he managed the trust you gave him in 2011 and 2015, before we can sell him to Nigeria as a viable product?

I remember watching Okorocha on a TV programme, blatantly lying to the world, that he had built 27 world class hospitals in all the 27 Local Government Areas.

I’ve taken tours of every Local Government in the state, and I’m yet to locate these hospitals. If you have seen them, please kindly post pictures and locations of the entire 27.

Somebody posted that Okorocha yesterday claimed that he met Imo State as a village and turned it into a township.

Hilarious for those of us living in this same state he is telling the world about.

I wonder how Okorocha’s disruption of the pipe borne water he met in our so-called village, translated to turning Imo into a town; a town now threatened by futuristic ecological disasters because of the number of boreholes drilled across the state so that people can have water to drink, after Okorocha took away their water.

Once an award winning state in cleanliness, Okorocha earned Imo the record of being the only state to make national headlines, because of the mountains of refuse dumped indiscriminately across the state.

Ana amara mma na ulo ma puo ama. Are we going to be exporting to Nigeria, a man than will help Nigeria amongst other things, earn the award of the World’s dirtiest country?

I’m rather surprised that the opposition in the state are quiet over this. Probably because of the rumoured political marriages we’ve been reading and hearing about.

Suddenly the Facebook warriors of the opposition parties in the state, who before now, were quick to point out all the atrocities of Rochas Okorocha, have suddenly gone dumb.

For those of us who attacked Okorocha for the good of the people, it becomes clearer that other people had other intentions for attacking Okorocha back then.

It was under Okorocha that pensioners protested for days, fainting on the road, while begging him to pay them their entitlements, after giving the state 35 years of their lives.

Okorocha left office without paying them for over eight years. Many died.

It might sound strange to you because you don’t have a pensioner in your house. Just don’t pray such happens to you.

Is that the president we will be giving to Nigeria? Is that the champion of Ndi Igbo? A man who had no regard and respect for our aged parents, wishing untimely death upon them?

And the opposition is silent. Okorocha’s sins are now forgiven because the enemy of my enemy is my friend.

Haba!

Were the same roads Okorocha claimed was washed away by acid rains, the same roads he claimed he built solid in Imo State?

Even at Ogboko where Okorocha comes from, when I was there in his company around December of 2019, the road from his hotel to his country home, built by him, was already collapsing at one side. I don’t know if it has totally cut of completely by now.

He was telling one former governorship candidate I went with to his residence, while he drove him in an open-roof four wheeled mopid, and who he hoped would be the one to unseat Ihedioha at the Supreme Court, to ensure he fixes the roads in his village after the man is sworn in.

The man was never sworn in. In fact, his relationship with the man, is costing the man dearly both politically and financially.

For a man with a taste for substandard roads, taking over the construction of the second Niger bridge, if Buhari doesn’t finish it before he steps down, the death toll from its collapse would be astronomical.

God saved people from the collapse of some of his bridges in Imo State.

We talk about disregard of the judiciary. For a man who have never respected a court ruling as govenror, but today running to the same court for protection, I wonder the integrity of some judges who haven’t deemed it fitting to serve him in his own coin.

Don’t worry, if he becomes president, he will permanently retire the judiciary and that is a fact.

Am I surprised that the EFCC are bringing charges against him? I’m even disappointed in the anti graft agency, as they have yet failed to compel Okorocha to give Imo people closure on what happened to the bailout funds given for the payment of salaries and pensions amongst other things we’ve been reading from the probe reports.

Why were pensioners still not paid and today, we are paying for a grant we don’t even know what we used it for.

For those of you who don’t know, we’re going to pay back that bailout fund, so we need to know what happened to it.

In sins against the people, there were so much. Reports from the panel set up by Ihedioha and carried on by Uzodinma; panels we were told Okorocha begged to be scrapped, have revealed massive corruption perpetrated in Imo from 2011 to 2019.

From lands forcefully taken from the people, to financial crimes.

So I’m disappointed in the EFCC for being too political rather than objective in their approach.

Probably if Okorocha didn’t declare and decides to be a good boy, his sins would be swept under the rug, just as the Imo opposition who may soon be in bed with him, have so far done.

I urge Nigerians to visit Imo State and move around on your own. Okorocha as he claims he has more money than the state, can afford to stage manage some hungry people and televise them giving him praises. Stop people randomly and ask them what they think about the Okorocha presidency.

Their honest response would probably give you a clue of the man asking for your trust.