By Temisan Otumara
LAGOS JANUARY 22ND (URHOBOTODAY)-Nigeria is at this point, by all indications, a nation at a crossroads. There is high anxiety, uncertainty and tension regarding what will be the fate of the beleaguered country after the 2015 general elections which are just a few weeks away. The fear and anxiety in the air are palpable and this is understandably so. Since 1999 when the nation returned to civilian rule the people have had to experience a raw deal from politicians who have ridden roughshod over them for sixteen unbroken years.
The ruling party at the centre which is the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) which also controls majority of the states has brought Nigeria to her knees and degraded the populace. Hopelessness continues to haunt the land as corruption and impunity eat deeper and deeper into the nation’s development fabric. Insecurity, political indirection, economic wreck, unemployment, poverty, broken down infrastructure and pervasive degeneration have become the order of the day. Yet, a keen observer of the Nigerian political landscape cannot help but notice that there is a hint of hope hanging in the air. This hope which started getting impetus about a year ago is daily being amplified as a result of the promise of change which the main opposition political party the All Progressives Party (APC) is offering. The air of uncertainty which the present order holds is countered by the great expectations inspired by the APC. There is something close to pan-Nigerian consensus that the APC should mount the saddle of leadership and stir the ship of state aright. After all, the PDP has brought nothing but pain and misery to Nigeria and Nigerians. The populace seem to have thus resolved ‘’let us then try an alternative which is what the APC represents’’.
The foregoing depicts a pan-Nigerian mood which is also the stark reality of the scenario in Delta State, a state of more than many wasted opportunities. For sixteen years, a vicious political cabal has held down the hapless people of Delta State and subjected them to exploitation and degradation. The state is one of the richest in Nigeria, yet it has no visible development landmark for the trillions of oil nourished budgets put together since 1999. Insecurity, unemployment and poverty index are provocatively high in the same way schools and health institutions have packed up. The insignificant numbers that are in government employment often have problems getting paid the inconsequential monthly emoluments especially at the local government levels and primary school teachers. Rural degradation, urban decay are at their frustrating peak. Waste management is at absolute nil, infrastructure like roads and housing are not part of the government’s priority if it ever had any. Yet, corruption ranks very high. It is for this reason that the budget for Government House Asaba alone was more than what was allocated to five ministries put together as revealed in an independent study carried out three years ago. It is corruption that has also crippled the Independent Power Project at Oghara, the Ughelli-Asaba road and the perpetual non-completion of the Asaba airport! This is the same reason why the two flyovers in Asaba and Effurun remain irritating reminders of a government walking on feet of clay.
When Olorogun O’tega Emerhor announced his intention to stand election for the office of the governor of Delta State many Deltans and indeed Nigerians who knew his track record of performance were elated at the great prospect of change his genius will bring to the traumatized state whose creation in 1991 elicited great expectations. O’tega Emerhor is best known as a business angel with the turn-around wand who has been instrumental to breathing life and vigour into failed businesses. Delta State has failed and it is only apt that Emerhor should mount the saddle and breathe life into the state. What elated the people the more was the APC platform which Emerhor mounted as a viable medium of wresting power from the entrenched PDP cabal. Once Emerhor took on the gauntlet he took his message of change round the state crisscrossing local governments, towns, villages and hamlets with the broom symbol of sweeping away the current sordid experience.
Emerhor’s change prospect is not hinged on mere words, but on a well articulated pan-Delta regenerative agenda aimed at transforming the state in less than three years! And with Emerhor’s antecedents, Deltans know that such regeneration is possible and they are only waiting for election day to cast their ballot for Emerhor and for change. A quick evaluation of Emerhor’s regenerative agenda code-named Ten Cardinal Points comprise youth and women empowerment through SME, social security for the old, turning the local government into the focus of development, pursuit of peace and security, employment generation, infrastructure, industrialization, back to land agro-policy, focus on education, health, housing, transportation and environment and finally collaboration with international institutions of economic development. The agenda put together by Emerhor is people centered and this has been the practice in all the APC controlled states in Nigeria. Let Delta State join the APC train. It is here.
Emerhor is set to inspire and liberate majority of Deltans who have been held down in despondency. This is the message of change and hope which the APC in tandem with the loud yearnings of Nigerians for an alternative socio-political praxis is anchoring. In Delta State Emerhor is the flag bearer the change agent in chief. The people are waiting and they are doing so with great expectations.
Otumara writes from Asaba, the Delta State capital.