The culprits were as legion as the complicity was lethal, but by the end of the election of November 11, 2023, Ndi Imo were left wielding the short end of the stick and sore.
Ahead of the elections, the incumbent Hope Uzodinma had let loose some outrageous promises to a wounded state, none more outrageous than the ‘four thousand jobs in Europe by December’ delusion.
While Uzodinma who became governor only by dint of a last-ditch legal maneuver at the Supreme Court in 2019 also promised to continue with his projects, many wondered if those projects only existed in the phantom precincts of Orlu where he hails from.
But even Orlu, as Okigwe, had long been turned upside down by the state’s particularly virulent brand of insecurity, which it has unfortunately continued to export to other parts of the Southeast.
If the day of reckoning was near for Uzodinma whose mix of distant governance and ruthless impunity turned Imo into a sad place, he did not sense it. Nor did the Independent National Electoral Commission.
While the PDP so forcefully and farcically shunted out from the seat in 2019, fielded a weakened candidate in Samuel Anyanwu, the Labour Party went for the formidable force of Nneji Achonu.
Because it has long been beyond doubt that the Labour Party has now replaced the People’s Democratic Party as the country’s main opposition party, Uzodinma clearly knew where the danger lay.
The force with whichh he went after the Labour Party candidate and also the NLC national Chairman in the state said at much.
The election came and was quite dramatic, with some of the state’s most respected figures caught on video snatching ballot boxes. Yet, when INEC contrived to spell out the results, the APC won by a landslide, recording staggering victories in parts of the state where Chidinma had hatched generational enemies.
The question Is if the citizens of Imo, a strong and proud people, can survive the torment of another four years under a government that has proved itself ridiculously rudderless and ruthless. It is an important question.
The first requirement for any viable development is insecurity. This critical component of any progressive society has been sorely lacking in Imo State in the last four years thanks to the activities of the IPOB and the contributions of Ebubeagu and other security outfits sponsored by the state government.
That insecurity is used to play politics in Nigeria is now beyond doubt.
The greatest tragedy of modern-day Nigeria is many of those who now call the shots in public office in Nigeria should not be anywhere near the seat of power were elections free and fair in the country. Incredibly however, they are the ones conducting the operation of power.
Nigerians have seen more than enough in since 2015 when they sold an alligator to buy a crocodile by ditching the PDP for the APC. The APC has symbolized everything that has gone wrong in Nigeria in the past eight years-bad governance, corruption, insecurity, electoral malpractices to just absolutely shocking impunity.
The transition from Buhari to Tinubu may have been smooth, but a very valid question is: What is smooth in the circumstances? To put it simply, it has been an absolute shock for Nigerians.
But what makes matters considerably worse is that the signs are indeed ominous. If the farce in Kogi and Imo are harbingers of what is to come, then the country is in for more jolts.
Because it is what it is and what it is that in connivance with INEC, the APC is refining the art of rigging elections in Nigeria. With a complicit judiciary which is as reactionary as they come, Nigerians have been left at the mercy of those who would sell the country for nothing.
They are everywhere, and they are ready to do anything to reach their nefarious ends. These people have no place in any society that aspires to some level of sanity and dignity.
However, in Nigeria they remain in charge, their larger than life dispositions dispensing prominence to them at every turn.
Elections like the farce in Imo help them to get to power and stay in power. For as long as this remains the case, Nigeria will retreat deeper into the woods.
Ike Willie-Nwobu,
Ikewilly9@gmail.com
