And the Winner is...

Oseloka Obaze and Tony Nwoye will lose this election. Take this to the bank!

Never in the history of Anambra State has any gubernatorial race produced three unequally matched candidates as this one. Barley two weeks to Election Day, it is hard to tell the difference between Oseloka Obaze and Tony Nwoye. Neither has risen above the echo to deliver either a memorable rhetoric or a dramatic rupture that could cause a scare in the camp of the ruling party. Neither has produced more than a few incoherent grunts. Neither has the charisma, the elan, the elegance of thought and language to sway fence-sitters to their side.

And sadly too, neither Nwoye nor Obaze has the oomph. Both are dour, colourless, befuddled and uninspiring. Obaze deserves more pity. He walks like a constipated man who has stayed too long in a toilet. And Nwoye is probably the ugliest man in Anambra State today; a strange mutant from Nsugbe, a land of beauty. A choice between the two is a choice between six and a half dozen. It leaves you with empty hands!

Outside of Governor Willie Obiano, the only sparkle in this race comes from Osita Chidoka. But he is in the wrong geopolitical zone and in the wrong party. Case closed! Even so, there is a growing feeling that Chidoka carries himself as one who is intensely aware of his good looks and overall effect on the women folk. So, his is a case of “over-do” or “notice-me.” What the Igbo call “onye nlecha.” Nlecha is seriousy frowned at in a man among the Igbo. There’s a silent understanding that political leadership requires more than good looks and cultivated manners. It calls for more grit than glamour. As the Igbo say, “mma nwoke nalu níyi mana mma nwanyi na ebutelu ya okwu.”

Chidoka’s excessive sense of self-worth is therefore out of place and out of time. Had Osita not taken himself too seriously, he would have realised that his candidature is rather absurd. Osita is from Anambra Central. The auguries favour only candidates from Anambra North at the moment. This is clearly understood. His resolve to forge ahead with a doomed ambition which everyone knows would crash, gives him away as a cheap attention seeker who is merely positioning for patronage.

In reality, of all the candidates lining out against Governor Willie Obiano, Oseloka Obaze cuts the most pathetic picture. After all the lavish praises heaped on him by his godfather’s two-for-a-kobo spinners, Obaze has become a captive of his own inordinate ambition; staying mute as a baby that is too scared of offending its angry mother. He is never heard at campaign rallies. It is not even certain that the rallies are his or a thinly disguised effort to shore up the flagging glory of his godfather. Obaze’s comments do not make the headlines. No quotable quote is credited to him. No sparkling slab of thought. He is not even allowed to fashion out his own economic blueprint. He was forced to accept his godfather’s primitive ANIDS as his panacea for the problems of the state. Obaze is everything that a gubernatorial candidate should never be. His godfather has totally eclipsed him. Sadly, two weeks to Election Day, Obaze has shown no signs of emerging from the thick shadow of Peter Obi. This has hardened the impression that he is a mere puppet on a string…Peter Obi’s 3rd Term shadow!

If Obaze is pathetic, Tony Nwoye is tragic. All the perfumes in Arabia cannot wash off the odium that clings to his name. That man is blamed for everything that is rotten and broken in Anambra State. His claims of innocence elicit only derisive laughter from people who know him closely. Nwoye’s profile reads like a long list of disaster. He wears this strange honour of being one of the few medical students who began the study of medicine in a prestigious school and then abruptly ended it in a backwater college. This leaves many gaps that only Nwoye can fill in. Again, while medical students are rarely involved in politics or activism due to the discipline in pursuing a medical degree, Nwoye was a stormy petrel in his college days with fingers in every pie. Worse still, he has no record of any serious medical practice after graduation. Rather, his name was whispered in circles where discussions centred on the shadowy arsonists who burned down public buildings and kidnapped a sitting governor some years ago.

And though Nwoye has made good and spruced himself up to become a federal lawmaker; he is reputed to be one of the mutest lawmakers in the lower legislative chamber; making little impression on any of his colleagues and appearing lost more than half of his entire time in the National Assembly. He is not known to have sponsored any important bills or raised his voice on burning issues concerning his constituency. Nwoye was content with making up the number.

It is therefore not surprising that Nwoye has had a most uneventful race to the Government House in Awka. As a candidate who fancies himself a representative of the youth, Nwoye has yet to articulate the dilemma of the Nigerian youth in a gerontocracy like Nigeria. Indeed, how can he? Nwoye is seriously handicapped. He is more brawn than brain. Nothing of weight has ever slipped through his mouth. When some less critical Nigerians were waiting to hear a new political language from a supposedly youthful candidate, Nwoye came out sounding like a fossilized dinosaur. He opened his campaign by calling governor Obiano a thief. If that is his strategy, it is bad one. Many people dismissed him with a wave of the hand after that goof. They concluded that he had nothing to offer.

Strangely, the final nail into Nwoye’s political coffin was hammered in by his godfather, Prince Engineer Arthur Eze. In one voluble moment, the multi-billionaire had described Nwoye as “a poor boy from a poor village” whom he wanted to make a governor. In one sentence, Prince Eze had practically destroyed whatever chances Nwoye had in the coming election. He did it by his boastful, brash and demeaning suggestion that he alone could plant Nwoye in the state house. In order words, he is the egocentric godfather who has no need for guile. In order words too, Ndi Anambra have no choice than to live with his cheeky imposition of this terribly flawed man as governor. Eze fancies himself the fairy godfather whose very words ought to be an enchantment to the ears of his hapless followers. It does not matter that his choice is widely seen as the very antithesis to everything that pulsates with life and colour. This godfather is bigger than the state. He is the chest-thumping political Alusi who must be obeyed.

What emerges from the above analysis is the imposing image of Governor Willie Obiano. It is crystal clear that Obiano’s immense personage looms over the Anambra horizon with the sound of victory echoing in the distance. What will not escape anyone who has followed Obiano’s first term in office is the fact that he started campaigning for his return early. In fact, much of the foundation for the success of Governor Obiano as we know it today was laid during his First 100 Days in Office. It is to his credit that none of the people challenging him has any clearly communicated Vision and Mission for Anambra State. Worse still, when people expected Oseloka Obaze to come up with a robust economic blueprint, he brandished Peter Obi’s discredited ANIDS as his magic wand for Anambra State. Similarly, Tony Nwoye has no economic plan whatsoever. The only thing Nwoye knows is that he wants power. As for what he would do with that power, the man has absolutely no clue.

From all indication, the next governor of Anambra State is already known to anyone with any ability to see. It is so clear that no one can miss it. And if we care to look in the mirror, we can see it. We can all see the Face of the Winner. We can all see Willie Maduaburochukwu Obiano!