The political trajectory of Anambra state from the inception of the present democratic dispensation is laden with historical impacts both negative and positive.
Growing up in that state in early 2000s, I saw it all. Notorious for being "Home for All" (thanks to Peter for changing it to Light of the nation) it was indeed home for many negativities.
How can I forget the horror of Bakasi boys. As young school children our sense of sacredness for life was scandalized when Bakasi gladiators chopped off heads and dismembered bodies with reckless abandon at almost every one-in-five junctions in major parts of the state. What they did to lives in the name of state security is so gruesome akin to what civilians accused of crime suffer today in Bokoharam controlled villages in the North.
Then came the one full year strike by teachers under Mbadinuju administration which caused thousands of students in secondary school those days to lose one calendar year of learning. The little effort by Mbadinuju to give the state a face lift was frustrated by the so called "godfather" and he was unceremoniously ousted as the governor.
The menace of Upper-Iweka by street urchins, marauders, extortionists albeit nuisance by criminals infested NURTW to mention just a few are no good memories to recall.
The historic 2003 election won by Mr. Peter Obi was criminally appropriated by then PDP and given to Dr. Chris Ngige who few weeks to the election made a U-Turn from senatorial race into governorship race.
Hardly had Ngige begun fixing things when he took government had the political vultures descended on his government to eat it to carcass as was their modus operandi.
Ngige put up a fight for the soul of his government but his ride to government house was punctuated by the flaw in Makievallian political dictum that "the end justifies the means". End doesn't justify means!.
After three years of legal struggle, the enemies of Ngige knew he had won the hearts of Anambrarians by his achievements especially in good roads so they fought him with the " both of us must go down" strategy. The appeal court in Enugu on March 16, 2006 nailed the coffin of Ngige's governorship having found convincing evidences that Peter won the election.
Peter came in and swung into simultaneous actions of; draining the swamp of rot in the state politics, rehabilitating the shattered political psyche of citizens through his didactic radio and town hall interactions with all. Those were the days of the interesting radio programme "The Peoples Governor Speaks" in Anambra Broadcasting Service (ABS). ABS has become today like North Korean state radio for political attacks. Peter embarked also on massive infrastructure development through his enviable blueprint "Anambra Integrated Development Strategy (ANIDS)".
But he had the political vultures to contend with. This time, given that the next general election was around the corner, there were nocturnal meetings of the political owls and vultures of the sate against him.
Then President Olusegun Obasanjo came on a state visit (state visit ke) in late October 2006 and left on a weekend (perhaps having emboldened Peter's adversaries who hated him for tightening loop holes through which they milked the state to carcass, in a close door meeting with PDP dominated State House of Assembly) by Monday Peter's impeachment motion was moved and in what best symbolized political rascality Peter was impeached in few days as early as 5am without press and without an opportunity to defend himself before a panel.
Peter was impeached. He fought his illegal impeachment up to Supreme court and won few days to end of window opened by INEC for parties that wish to substitute names for the general election in 2007.
Since Dem Virgy Etiaba the former deputy to Peter and later the Governor following Peter's impeachment was already campaigning under APGA as no one knew the fate of the lingering impeachment legal tussle.
Efforts to substitute Peter's name as flag bearer upon his return to power was thwarted by the political vultures who knew that with Grandma Virgy Etiaba as APGA candidate it was easy for them to outsmart her at the polls.
So it happened and Andy Uba was declared winner in an election where number of votes cast had no correlation with valid number of registered voters. No thanks to Prof. Maurice Iwu and Baba Iyabo.
Before then Peter returned to Court to seek for tenure completion since he was sworn in on March 16, 2006 his tenure ought to end in 2010. Once again Peter beat the vultures but this time around after clipping their feathers so they cannot fly around to convoke anymore. By that victory, Peter changed the political timetable of Nigeria and charted a path that Ondo, Ekiti, Edo and other states will follow in true spirit of democracy.
These and many political sacrileges marred the politics of that beautiful state whom God blessed with persons of enviable credentials.
The nexus of my concern in this piece is that Peter refined the politics of Anambra state and gave it class all roundedly; financially, educationally, institutionally, politically, culturally, infrastructurally.
When I say class, I mean Class!
Political rascals were rehabilitated and many of them understood how noble it is to be decent in politics. Those who refused to be rehabilitated could not find murky water to operate and they went underground.
Unfortunately, the present government in Anambra state with due respect to some achievements it has recorded thanks to the planning put in place by Peter seem to have in the name of desperation for second tenure which naturally will come if a governor has done well to the admiration of the people has stooped low in political culture to assemble the likes of political Lilliputs that defined the Pre-Obi Anambra political landscape.
If a stop is not put to this very archaic political behavior, it will be "A Walk Back to Political darkness in Anambra State".
Celestine Chidozie
Writes from Lagos.
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