I am sorry to report that during the Obi administration, markets, the most important internal source of revenue for the government and people of Anambra State, were toyed with, to put it euphemistically. Peter Obi handed over the markets to his uncle to superintend. The result was that under Governor Obi’s leadership for a whole eight years, the state could not declare more than N400 million as IGR for even a month at a time of economic boom.



It was not just all the markets in Anambra State that Peter Obi handed over to his uncle to superintend. He also handed over to him all the motor parks in the state. As you must have known, NdiAnambra excel in motor transport business. It has been so right from the time of Sir Phillip Odumegwu-Ojukwu, the father of Chukwuemeka Odumegwu-Ojukwu, General of the People’s Army and Patron Saint of the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA). Proprietors of Ekene Dili Chukwu, Chisco Motors, The Young Shall Grow Motors, GUO Transport, Eddyson Motors, Izuchukwu Motors, Eekeson Motors, etc, are all from Anambra State. And they all have big parks in the state. There are other numerous parks by those who run smaller transport businesses. Was Peter Obi naïve to make his uncle the person to collect IGR from all markets but also all the motor parks in the state?


Let us cite another example. Ex-governor Obi made a show of how he developed an integrated development scheme called ANIDS, for short. One of the ANIDS success symbols is the Anambra State Transport Company (TRACAS), whose numerous commercial buses and minivans traverse the country daily. The government invested N300 million in TRACAS. But as Obi was leaving office three and a half years ago, TRACAS was declared a private venture and handed over to a private company! ANIDS did not pay even one kobo to the state government for the eight years Obi was our governor! Does anybody still wonder why Anambra’s IGR was never above a mere N400 million during Obi’s leadership?

We have carefully avoided mentioning how the police in Lagos under Marvel Akpoyibo arrested on Sunday, June 1, 2009, an Anambra State Government vehicle with N250 million raw cash at 7 Aerodrome Street in Apapa, the corporate headquarters of Obi’s companies. We have also carefully overlooked the demand for a refund of N7 billion as expenses purportedly incurred on Anambra’s governorship election four years ago, which is the genesis of the current fight between godfather and godson. Godson wonders if there will still be money for workers’ salaries and for building infrastructure, etc, if one person alone receives N7 billion. We have also carefully avoided talking about Obi’s claim last May at a public lecture in Lagos of wearing only one watch for 13 years, only for the media to publish photographs of him wearing several watches in just one year.



It is befuddling how our former governor Obi insists, without any sense of embarrassment, that he is the only living saint in Nigeria and needs only formal canonization in his lifetime. NdiAnambra are no longer amused by such theatricals. Jesus Christ used strong language to refer to the Pharisees because of their hypocrisy, calling them “you brood of vipers” (Matthew 12: 34). Saint Peter Gregory Obi is enjoined to meditate on this biblical line.

Okolie, a sociologist and indigene of Anambra State, is a businessman in Lagos.


Source: https://www.sunnewsonline.com/anambra-igr-between-obi-and-obiano/