The Managing Director/CEO of the South East Development Commission (SEDC), Mr. Mark Okoye, has insisted that the Southeast region is in dire need of investments, and not appeasement.
Okoye believes President Bola Tinubu does not owe the South East symbolic appeasement.
According to him, the President owes the Southeast, just as he owes every region, the commitments articulated in the Renewed Hope Agenda, including agricultural modernization, infrastructure expansion, job creation, industrialization, improved security, and strengthened regional collaboration.
Okoye gave his view in a reaction to the heightened media noise around the travails of the leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra, Mazi Nnamdi Kanu, and the attachment of the fate of the region to Kanu.
He believes that if the region seeks a future different from its recent past, its political conversation must evolve, from grievance to growth, from sentiment to strategy, from emotional theatre to measurable progress.
“The South East today enjoys relative peace, and our Governors, together with the Federal security agencies have continued to work to safeguard the stability we are regaining. But peace alone is not the destination. It is only the foundation. The real task before us is to translate this stability into accelerated development.
“We must be courageous enough to say clearly that what the South East needs is not appeasement. What the South East needs is investment.
“This, in my view, is the type of politics the South East deserves and will endure. This is the realism the moment demands. This is the leadership ethos our people are increasingly embracing,” he said.
Regretting that some political actors and influencers from the Southeast have rushed forward with calls for political solutions and unconditional release of Kanu, as the only pathway to peace and progress, Okoye maintained that the crisis that shook the South East did not begin in a courtroom, and will not end in a courtroom.
“I say this as someone who lived in the Southeast throughout its darkest years. I witnessed young men misled and radicalized; people being murdered and beheaded, families grieving; businesses shuttered; communities turned into ghost towns; kidnappings and extortion spiraling; and children forced out of school and economic activity crippled on sit-at-home days.
“I also saw an entire region, once known for its nightlife, weekend economy, celebration of culture and people, suffocated economically, socially, and psychologically
“The people who carried the greatest burden were not politicians or commentators speaking from afar. They were ordinary men and women: traders trying to make ends meet, transport workers going about their daily routine, farmers working to feed their families, diasporas returning home after years of being away, job-seeking youths who simply desired peace and economic opportunities, families trying to raise children in a safe and promising homeland,” he regretted.
The SEDC boss said the recent happenings in the region is the reason its people must be careful not to reduce a complex regional trauma to a single individual, or to assume that the release of one person, automatically guarantees safety, prosperity, or justice.
According to him, the South East’s real crisis is underdevelopment, and the South East’s real solution is development and economic growth underpinned by investment in hard and soft infrastructure, “not slogans, not emotional shortcuts, not political theatrics.”
“The region urgently needs modern industrial parks; rail and road connectivity; reliable power; agro-processing and storage infrastructure; youth skills and enterprise programmes; Diaspora-led investment vehicles; a regional economic and logistics corridor linking us to opportunities beyond our borders across other regions and potentially other African nations under AfCFTA; predictable governance and security; and coordinated state-federal development frameworks.
“This is what restores dignity. This is what creates opportunity. This is what ends insecurity and instability in a sustainable way.
“Those insisting that Mr. President must release Kanu to win the South East votes in 2027, risk trivializing the deeper work required. Peace and prosperity are not built on shortcuts. They are built through investment, stability, and a clear pathway to growth.
“We all remember how sit-at-home crippled livelihoods. We all remember how fear became a daily companion. We all remember parents praying for their children’s safety on the simplest errands.
“Our people deserve better. Our people deserve peace, dignity, and opportunity, not endless fear and forced shutdowns,” Okoye said.
