IGBEAKU ORJI writes on the multi-faceted approach of Governor Alex Otti to redirect governance in Abia State since he assumed office on May 29, 2023
May 29 marks one year of Abia administration with Governor Alex Otti on the saddle. From a new and healthy environment to bureaucratic reforms, from infrastructure transformation to economic revival, Otti has not only shown commitment to good governance but a significant departure from the retrogression and reprehensible conduct of government business that had been Abia’s singular misfortune.
Today, even the unsparing opposition admits that Aba and Umuahia have become cleaner and healthier. There is no gainsaying the fact that Otti rode to power on the overwhelming support of the people who had perceived the ruling PDP as the number one public enemy.
Thus, among the other parties that contested the 2023 election there was an unwritten unanimity to fight and get rid of the common enemy. At the time of the election the Labour Party, under which platform, Otti won the governorship election, like other small parties, had little membership in Abia State.
It was therefore a combination of providential and societal factors that thrust the leadership of Abia State to Otti at this time, having made his long tortuous sojourn from PDP, to APGA and APC, coming so close to clinching the office in 2015. In one year, Otti has touched what one would consider the most sensitive areas that had made Abia pitiable among the comity of progressive states.
For instance, before now, the civil service was unconscionably dichotomized to ‘core and none core in the payment of salaries. Pensioners were out rightly neglected and abandoned. It must be put on record that Otti met Abia in decay. Decrepit infrastructure, dysfunctional amenities and ill motivated workforce to mention a few, were the familiar features of the immediate past administration.
But Otti came, driven by the sorry state of affairs sought to tackle the multi-dimensional rot in one fell swoop. Little wonder in such a short time the impact was felt convincingly in the health sector, tertiary education, civil service and road infrastructure. The last 16 years were the worst in Abia State governance history.
Referred generally as the years of the locust and devastation, Abia would have been plunged deeper and longer in the cesspool of malfeasance if Labour Party did not win. Indeed, a new Abia has been born. The Port Harcourt road in Aba, one of the first major road reconstructions embarked on by Governor Alex Otti had been abandoned and made impassable by the previous administration after demolishing adjoining property under the pretext of reconstruction.
This singular action and the demolition of shops in Ariaria international market Aba, close to December, a period of trade boom, commonly regarded as “season” for the traders, under the guise of remodeling, was to be the undoing of the government of Okezie Ikpeazu. The people demonstrated their disapproval of his actions with their ballot.
He not only lost his senatorial bid, his party also lost the state. And the rest, as they say, is history. Meanwhile, Otti had brought the construction giant, Julius Berger, which was thought impossible in Abia given the refrain of paucity of funds. Now the six lane Port Harcourt road is undergoing the hitherto undreamt of attention befitting of the commercial hub that Aba is.
By the end of the year, one side of the 6km road would be ready for use. Aside the administration of Dr. Orji Uzor Kalu, who in addition to internal roads in the state capital, constructed the Leru-Lomara-Nneato road in Umunneochi Local Government Area and the Isi Court Ururuka road, traversing five local government areas, no other administration has had the courage to embark on such ambitious road infrastructure.
For 16 years, rehabilitation of a section of the Aba road in Umuahia was the major road infrastructure in the state capital. Now the Ossah-Abia Tower is being expanded to six lanes to give the state capital
a befitting status. All the previous administrations abandoned the 37km Arochukwu-Ndi OkerekeOzu Abam road at a point. The immediate past administration ended with construction of the Okobo bridge, but abandoned the road leading to it. Also, the 67km Umuahia-UzuakoliAkara-Abriba-Ohafia road was the dread of past administrations.
The Otti administration has in addition, awarded the 11.5km Nunya-Eluama-Isuikwuato road. A total of 79 roads have either been rehabilitated or at various stages of completion. Many have lost count of roads reconstructed in Aba alone. Also, most refreshing is the sanitizing and unifying the revenue task forces, an action that has promptly ended the harassment of citizens with multiple taxation and inhuman traffic control by rampaging touts. Governor Alex Otti has vowed to not yield any inch of the state to non-state actors.
He has consequently decisively gone ahead to fence the cattle market at Lokpanta in Umunneochi Local Government Area to function as a daily market and not residential, where criminals were hitherto harboured. Now, the Abia end of the Enugu – Port Harcourt expressway, which had become a nightmare to travellers has recorded relative peace.
Also, the ambitious Abia Industrial Innovative Park, AIIP, has the capacity to transform the bleak economic fortunes of the state with the potential of generating thousands of employment. The facility is designed to host a modular refinery and numerous other manufacturing investment concerns.
The hospitals were in deplorable condition before the advent of Otti. He invested resources to retrofit them giving the people hope of affordable and accessible medicare. The result is that the abandoned Abia Specialist and Diagnostic Hospital, Aba road, Umuahia, and Amachara have bounced back to life and efficient service delivery.
Also, other general hospitals and the Abia State University Teaching Hospital, which had lost accreditation with the medical students stranded, now have Otti’s imprimatur. The civil service heaved a huge sigh of relief. The service had become a community of indolent corrupt officials. Appointments to juicy positions were based on political affiliation and patronage. Prebendalism became the norm rather than the exception as cronyism replaced merit and professionalism.
Otti enforced the subsisting civil service rule on directors. Directors who have served for eight years and above were relieved, making way for fresh hands and new blood. An interesting aspect of the new Abia is the drastic cut in the cost of governance. Besides easing out most of the old permanent secretaries, the new ones were strictly recruited according to the number of ministries, now reduced and merged into manageable size of 19 from the bogus 29.
Now the era of salary dichotomy is over. All civil servants and pensioners are paid on the 28th of every month without being categorized as core or noncore, ministry or agency. Otti’s role in the realization of the Geometric Power plant in Aba is highly commendable. Today, Aba is a model in independent, reliable and stable electricity supply.
However, it must be mentioned that government needs to take critical look at the condition of service of primary school teachers. Not much has been done in the area of primary school education. Unlike the tertiary level, where new rectors and provosts were appointed for Abia Poly, Aba ASCETA and College of Health Science Technology, some of the primary school teachers in Umuahia South, Umunneochi and Ugwunagbo are going through excruciating experience.
They are not remunerated according to their grade levels in spite of the verification exercises. One wonders how such teachers would man the schools the State government has planned to upgrade in the local government areas. True, the situation the teachers have found themselves was part of the legacies of the immediate past administration.
But after the present administration inherited it as part of assets and liabilities, it is only fair to review it and do the needful. A situation where a teacher on salary grade level 10, for instance, is paid a Level 7 salary or even less, is unacceptable and out of sync with the new Abia mantra. Any government that is serious with education cannot toy with the welfare of teachers.
In some schools the teachers have no table and chair to sit on. Regrettably, Government no longer provides chalk, register and diary for the pupils. In a recent media chat, Governor Alex Otti said the situation has not been brought to his knowledge and promised to review it.
Also, in spite of the verification exercise, pensioners of the Broadcasting Corporation of Abia State, BCA and the Abia State University Teaching Hospital, ABSUTH are yet to be paid. It is reported that the BCA pensioners have not been verified. Government should hasten up its policies in line with the new Abia mantra.
It is reassuring that government has began the process of recovering the farm settlements and estates, bequeathed by the defunct Eastern Region government, which were concessioned to cronies of the previous administrations. In a short time the people would begin to feel the impact of these revenue spinners and employment generation, otherwise not much has been seen in the sector.