Imo state in the last decades has witnessed avoidable economic stagnation and retrogression occasioned partly by years of reckless military incursion in Nigeria politics. The successive civilian administrations that took over the reins of power when the country returned to democratic governance in 1999 has not helped matters as they continued to run the affairs, in military style. This is perhaps why many analyses have described Nigeria democracy as a pseudo military regime.
The result of this unabating leadership ineptitude in the state in particular, and Nigeria by extension is the drastic decline in the quality of life of the people. Need we repeat here that unemployment, hunger and starvation, squalor, high death rate and general economic hardship have become the life of the majority of Imolites. Consequently, many citizens of the state leave IMO daily, in search of survival in neighbouring states like Rivers, Abia, Lagos, Anambra, Delta, Enugu, Abuja even Ebonyi. Many of those who reside in Boko Haram infected areas of the north, have refused to return to Imo state for the simple reason that they would not be able to grapple with what they see as the high cost of living and near absence of job opportunities in Imo. Can any other assertion be more apt than this?
A concerned citizen recently raised a poser on the socio-economic quagmire which Imo State has found itself since the military truncated the administration of the legendary Sam Mbakwe, who was Imo state governor between 1979 and 1983. His question was why Imo has refused to industrialize, inspite of trillions of naira that has accrued to the state since 1999 under different democratically elected civilian governors.
While sister states like Anambra, Abia and the relatively young state of Ebonyi have taken off industrially, Imo still lags behind in terms of industrial presence. Most of the state-owned industries set up by the visionary Sam Mbakwe administration of old Imo State are either moribund or under-utilised, culminating in loss of job opportunities for the teeming unemployed youths of the state aside economic losses to the state.
To properly situate the poor socio-economic conditions of Imolites, experts and technocrats point at the poor-quality leadership that the state has had to grapple with since the turn of the 4th republic in 1999. A former Interior Minister and son of Imo state identified lack of capacity on the part of those who have been at the helm of affairs of the state. To the former minister, Imo state after Mbakwe has been ruled by emergency governors; people who were not prepared for governance given their obvious lack of vision or blue print to kick start the state's economy and improve on the quality of life of the masses of the state.
Today, there is a consensus on the part of leaders and followers in Imo vis-a-vis the imperative to reconfigure and inject New blood into the governance and leadership structure of the state. To achieve this, a new breed of well groomed, differently oriented leaders equipped with global competences necessary to rejig the obvious systemic failure responsible for ugly state of affairs in Imo must be allowed to take over in 2019. It is this connect that a London trained lawyer and technocrat, Barrister Aloysius Osuji has offered himself to lift Imo State out of her present socio-economic and leadership malaise. Barr. Aloysius is prepared to sacrifice his comfort zone as a successful legal practitioner based in the United Kingdom, in order to answer the clarion call come 2019 Imo governorship election. Agunecheibe, will bring to bear his vast experience garnered via years of working in some of the much needed contacts and connection to lure international investors to Imo state.
Barr. Aloysius clearly stands out from the lot. His United Kingdom training ensures Imo will have a governor with the discipline and vision to steer the ship of the state from the looming socio-economic golgotha occasioned by years of ruthless leadership. Imo needs critical infrastructures, as well as she needs industries desperately, agriculture need to be revamped to form the substructure of the state's economy, while education must be restructured to serve today's need of society. Judges 1 Vs 1-2.
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