GOVERNOR SOLUDO'S INAUGURAL SPEECH: MATTERS ARISING

[okenw...@yahoo.com]

“We will conduct local government elections. No doubt, the uniform local government system as the third federating unit is one of the contested features of our federalism. But we must make the best of a bad system, by unleashing the potential of governance at the lower levels. Over the next two years, we shall review/amend the relevant legislations, reform and strengthen the system for efficiency, restructure/strengthen the Anambra’s Independent Electoral Commission, and conduct local government elections. We will collaborate and coordinate actively with LGAs to ensure synergy and complementarities. Let the revolution get to the grassroots.” – Governor C. C. Soludo’s Inaugural Speech, March 17, 2023.

 

Governor Charles Soludo of Anambra state has come into office approximately one year before the INEC-scheduled 2023 general elections. The new governor assumes office at the highest insecurity level that Nigeria has ever witnessed. Amid rising inflation, hunger has returned to torment the vulnerable segment of society at the bottom tier. There is widespread despair in the populace regarding the will and capacity of the government of Unitary Nigeria to handle the affairs of all stakeholders indefinitely through guile and forcible imposition, as has been the case in recent times.

 

There is an ongoing hot disputation over the imposed fraudulent 1999 Constitution and solemn resolutions have since been made by constituent stakeholders of the South and Middle Belt to repudiate and reject the subsisting constitution as the basis for building any future for a Nigerian nation that was founded on regional federalism at Independence of 1960. The Nigerian Indigenous Nationalities Alliance for Self-determination (NINAS), the arrowhead platform for self-determination groups in the South and Middle Belt, declared a Constitutional Force Majeure (CFM) and on December 16, 2020, commenced a 5-step orderly process for taking the Nigerian stakeholders to a political transition without disrupting routine governance and social peace. Two crucial steps required to herald the conclusion of the CFM are the stoppage of the stampeded to the INEC-scheduled 2023 general elections and the setting aside of the failed 1999 Constitution as the basis for renegotiating the future. The preceding are the political factors in play as Prof. C. C. Soludo becomes the new Anambra state governor.

 

HOW REALISTIC ARE GOVERNOR SOLUDO’S POLITICAL PROJECTIONS?

 

One consistently clear aspect of Governor Soludo’s message is that his administration shall be grassroots-oriented, starting by getting the Anambra State Independent Electoral Commission (ANSIEC) to conduct local government elections in the next two years. Within the same timeframe, the new administration also promises to “review/amend the relevant legislations, reform and strengthen the system for efficiency, restructure/strengthen the Anambra Independent Electoral Commission”.

 

Whenever one puts the terms “amend”, “legislations” and “restructure” together in one short sentence, the alarm bells ought to go off to alert the somnolent in our midst to open their eyes wide. The governor is not specific regarding what legislations should be amended and what sort of governance restructuring is being contemplated. One can say that the governor has direct control over the goings-on at the State Assembly and can also influence the proceedings at the National Assembly, Abuja, through the state representatives in both Houses. Governor Soludo has not clarified whether he intends to press his reform agenda exclusively in Anambra or Abuja or both. Whichever option he chooses, there is one major impediment. Depending on what happens to the INEC-scheduled 2023 general elections, the Soludo administration may not have two years, as projected in the inaugural speech, for implementing its key deliverables. Time is the scarcest commodity for the new Anambra government under Soludo as the driver.

 

Governor Soludo had, on more than one occasion in his speech, alluded to the peculiar obstacles to national development inherent in the strange constitutional democracy practiced in Nigeria where the term “federal” is, in reality, a brazen centralized Unitary governance mantra. He repeatedly vowed that “we must make the best of a bad system, by unleashing the potential of governance at the lower levels”. The preceding shows that the new Anambra governor is keenly aware of the fraud in the system that is responsible for all the woes of today’s Unitary Nigeria. But he promises that, under his leadership, Anambra state cannot only overcome, but also shall prevail over all the odds. Said differently, he promises a magical performance in the next two years despite his disclaimer not to be a miracle worker, for obvious reasons.

 

This is the evident contradiction facing the young Soludo administration of Anambra state.

 

Okenwa (Ezeudemba)