Former governor of Abia State and Vice Chairman, Senate Committee on Agriculture, Senator Theodore Orji has explained that the Supreme Court judgement which affirmed governorship elections in Abia, Akwa Ibom and Rivers states calls for celebration and that it would have been an ugly incident and miscarriage of justice if it was the other way round.
In an interview with DAILY POST, the former governor was emphatic that Abia, his home state has a peculiar case where its Southern zone had been elusive of powers since the creation of the State, a situation that informed his commitment to power rotation that produced the incumbent governor, Okezie Ikpeazu so as to ensure justice and equity.
Excerpts:
How will you describe the Supreme Court judgement which upheld governorship elections in Abia, Akwa Ibom and Rivers States?
Court judgement as it affects Abia, Akwa Ibom and Rivers is that of excitement, fairness, equity and justice because Abia’s case is similar to that of Akwa Ibom, but let me talk about Abia State where I come from. At the party level, we took a decision that power should move South Senatorial zone because that is the zone that has never produced governor since the creation of the State either during the Military era or Civilian and the Peoples Democratic Party took note that they lack manpower and in taking that decision, the party also looked at what we call Abia Charter of Equity which was the concept of founding fathers of Abia State on how power should move from Abia North, Central and South not only in terms of governorship, but in political offices too.
When it comes to governorship, Abia North and Central has done and it naturally should be the turn of Abia South and Abia State is predominantly a Christian state which was taken into consideration too. God said, he is God of Justice, God of fairness and God of equity.
For the first time, we summoned the forum of Abia elders, we told them that and they agreed that power should move. You have to produce somebody through the party. It went and conducted primaries transparently that produced the incumbent governor as its candidate then. Of course, some people will not be happy and they went to Court to challenge the outcome.
The main challenger of the incumbent governor who is from Arochukwu Local Government in Abia North has turned around, claiming now that he is from Abia South and that is the foundation of his failure because he lied to God and to himself. This Supreme Court Judgement has shown clearly that when you are doing something, you must have a foundation which is what the Supreme Court stands for. They carried out checks on this and saw evidence in their law and pronounced the incumbent governor as the winner.
Summarily, we built our foundation on the tenets of the Bible, we built it on Abia Charter of equity and on what the people want, so those who came to oppose the incumbent governor have not seen this and that is why they failed. You cannot come and take what belongs to me. I will not be happy. These people have been agitating and this is the only opportunity they have, so the Supreme Court Judgement has helped situations as it were because if it had happened the other way round, I can’t imagine what would have been happening now. They would have been wanton destruction of lives and properties in Abia and for the Supreme Court Judgement, we have peace as equity, fairness and justice have been delivered to us.
There was a Court of Appeal judgement against the governorship elections in Abia and Akwa Ibom and PDP insinuated that there must have been government interference in judicial system, so how will you reconcile these conflicting judgements?
Well, the Supreme Court Judgement has shown that there was no government interference. I know that at the Supreme Court level, they will not allow interference from anywhere and even if there was at the lower courts, it would be blocked. I am saying very clearly that there was no government interference in the Judiciary. We are happy with the government and this is democracy in action. Separation of powers among the three arms of government is in action and the rule of law is prevailing. Once these principles are upheld, there is constant peace, but if there is infringement, there cannot be peace in the land.
As Vice Chairman of Senate Committee on Agriculture, what do you think informed the 2016 budgetary proposal to a whopping sum of over N907billion for agriculture alone?
There is a policy of government to diversify the economy away from oil and right now our hope on oil is the one built on sinking sand and in doing that, it is not only in Agriculture, but solid minerals, science and technology which would give our teeming population employment. If you go to villages, there are young people who are highly educated and uneducated, married without doing anything and if government cannot provide job opportunity, they will take to criminality, a kind of vengeance on the society where they carry out robbery operations and Kidnapping. Agriculture is a major sector that could employ lots of people and there is no amount of money voted for agriculture that is regrettable. Remember that agriculture has earned the nation enormous wealth before especially Cocoa, Palm Oil and groundnut Pyramid and the advent of oil has made us lazy.
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