By: Charles Okogene
The morning they say, especially in the Igbo land and parts of Delta State, shows what the day will bring .
That is the case of Abia State with Dr. Alex Otti in command ; the morning is positively showing what the day will be after his first four years in office. Abia, better known as God’s own state, the only state found in the holy book, has suffered 24 years of neglect in the hands of successive People’s Democratic (PDP) governors that had governed the state since Nigerians chased the military back to barracks. Umuahia, the capital of the state, apart from being a glorified local government headquarters, has become the headquarters of fifthy, Aba the commercial nerve centre of the state and by extension, that of the entire Nigeria, at best can be described as a refuse dump yard, no road and Ariaria International Market that came into being during the military era, are now in ruins, thus threatening the creative ingenuity of Aba artisans most especially, Aba tailors and shoe makers. This is the state of Abia when Dr. Alex Otti of the Labour Party was sworn-in on May 29 2023.
But all that is beginning to change; Abia is about to sing a new song. Umuahia, Aba and other towns in the state are beginning to wear a new look because a good man, in the person of Otti, is on the throne and Abians are rejoicing.
Otti whose journey to government house Umuahia was full of landmines placed on his way by members of the opposition is gradually and steadily renewing hope, dignity, cleanness, which they say is nearness to godliness, for God’s own state and it’s people.
From the day he was declared the winner of the March 14 2023 governorship election, Ottti, a seasoned banker, had declared that he has come to Umuahia to work, that he has come to bring back the lost glory of Aba by extension Abia State; that he has come to recover what the PDP has stolen from the people through its governors that governed the state from 1999 to May 2023. And true to his words, he is walking his talk.
And as such, the first thing he did was to clear Aba, the commercial nerve centre of the state, of the refuse the city had been turned into during the locust years of PDP. This he started when he personally mounted the earth moving tractors that where used to clear the mountains of refuse that littered the city.
That done, he focused his attention on internal roads like Ossah/Okpara SQ roads in the state capital Umuahia and other roads linking Aba with neighbouring states like Akwa Ibom and Rivers states; this his government is doing with not just ‘anyhow contractors’ but reputable ones like Julius Beger Nigeria Limited, CCECC, Ferotex Construction Company, and some other time tested local companies, perhaps, the first time in the annals of the state since 1999. Julius Berger is in charge of Port Harcourt Road, Old Court Road, Ndoki Road and Omuma Road while others are handling the numerous internal and intra state roads and this is in spite of regularity in payment of monthly salary to the state civil servants a feat the state chapter of Nigerian Labour Congress, NLC, attested to when they visited him recently .
Perhaps, the biggest achievement so far and which has got the entire nation talking good of him is the recent inauguration of the Geometrics Power Plant that it’s prime mover, Prof. Barth Nnaji, promised the day it was commissioned, that the project will give Aba and its environs 24/7 uninterrupted electricity supply and the promise has been kept and the residents of enyinmba city have been smiling and rejoicing about that.
Without saying it, Otti, has secured for himself a second term tenure, he has written his name in the letters of gold and in the hart of Abians.
The $800million plus project that is expected to deliver188MW when fully operational has light up Aba, the artisan city of Abia State and small and medium scale businesses that had long gone, will be back in full swing in no distance future and Aba will work again and contribute to the state’s GDP and IGR.
The good thing about this project according to Kazie Ukoh, the chief press secretary to Otti in a write up, is that Otti has been involved in it even when he was a banker both at First Bank and Diamond Bank. When he never thought that one day, he will occupy the governor’s office.
Hear Ukoh: ” The Geometric Power project is today easily the most celebrated infrastructure in Nigeria since the coming of the Global System of Mobile (GSM) telephony. It is the biggest and best news story coming out of Nigeria, currently saturated with stories of hunger, high cost of goods and services occasioned by very unfriendly and volatile exchange rate regime. Little wonder some are scrambling to associate themselves with the successful berthing of the power project, which by last account according to Professor Nnaji, had gulped a massive USD$800 million to complete. Unfortunately, these same people had opportunity spanning at least eight years to take all the glory, but they chose not to because it did not matter to them.
Posterity will be kind to Governor Otti for, as always, thinking outside the box. So, when fate brought him in contact with Professor Nnaji, while he was serving as an Executive Director at First Bank of Nigeria, he did not think twice launching into the deep with the renowned Professor of mechanical engineering. All he could see was opportunity to make a difference in the lives of a people and he threw his hat into the ring and gave hope to a dream that was fast fading.
As he recounted in his own words during the formal commissioning of the Geometric Power plant by the Vice President of Nigeria, Senator Kashim Shettima, on February 26, 2024, Governor Otti gave a verifiable account of his involvement with the power project. His testimony:
“Ladies and gentlemen, permit me to share my story with Geometric. In 2010, Prof. Barth Nnaji came to see me in First Bank, Lagos, where I served as an Executive Director. He needed the support of the bank to complete the project, the funding of which had been unfortunately stopped two years before, by the bank that originally started the project. This bank happened to be Diamond Bank. After securing approval for an $85m facility from First Bank of Nigeria, Geometric Power could not draw on the facility as it had become public knowledge that I was resuming as the Group Managing Director of Diamond Bank, shortly.
“As I resumed in Diamond on March 1, 2011, I put together a team that saw to the restructuring of the challenged facility and resumed funding of the project to completion. By the time I left Diamond towards the end of 2014, the three General Electric turbines and the 27km gas pipeline were in place. A combination of factors including ownership tussle over the Aba ring fence, sale of the oil block where the feed gas was going to come from to a new investor, and additional funding challenges conspired to delay project delivery for close to 10 years.
“On assumption of office May 29, 2023, my team and I quickly folded our sleeves and started working with Geometric to resolve the gas supply problem by directly interfacing with top management of NNPC and today we have gas flowing to the turbines.
“Just as recorded in Romans 8:28, “All things work together for good to them that love God”. I’m therefore pleased that 14 years down the line, God arranged everything such that the final resolution of all the issues and the firing of the turbines would happen when He had handed over the mantle of stewardship to me. May His name be glorified!”
Really when a good man is in power, the people rejoice, that indeed is the case of Abia and Abians.
Leave a Reply