₦airaland Forum

Abia police begin beatification of premises

The police authorities in Aba, the commercial hub of Abia State, have commenced the beautification of its premises geared towards providing a healthy environment for its personnel and residents alike.

The command is also constructing a car park for visitors as well as two churches—one for the Catholic faithfuls and the other for non-Catholics and a mosque for Muslims.

Rabiu Dayi, the Aba area commander of the Nigerian Police, in an interview with journalists stated that the ongoing projects, sponsored by the public, government and the office of the Inspector General of Police, were in line with the transformation agenda of the Federal Government.

He explained that the command has removed all abandoned vehicles within its vicinity and carted away a refuse heap, which they explained has been deposited in front of its premises for about 50 years.

According to Dayi, “A clean environment is a healthy environment and if we do not keep our environment clean, we will not also be clean inside and that is why shabbily dressed police personnel behave in a nasty manner. When you see well dressed police personnel, I bet you, you must get positive service from him/her.

He appealed to the public to emulate the command by keeping their environments clean, stressing that they should not wait for government to do everything for them.

“I expect residents of this city to also clean up their environments to help government achieve a clean and healthy environment devoid of diseases. They should not leave it in the hands of government alone, just as security is for all and not just for the police and government alone.

“Before I came in here, our surroundings served as toilet to the police and residents. They also used part of our frontage as a dumpsite. So, since this command was established, residents were disposing off their refuse there. So for many years the refuse was not removed until now. However, I have taken time to remove the refuse, planted trees and grasses as well as erected some artworks in front of our gate to beautify the place,” he said. source :http://www.businessdayonline.com/NG/index.php/city-file/city-file/53052-abia-police-begin-beatification-of-premises

ABIA GANG RAPE INCIDENT: WHY ABIKE DABIRI SHOULD APOLOGISE TO ABIANS
Abike Dabiri before membership of the National Assembly had risen to fame first as Presenter of NTA Network Programme NEWSLINE. She is therefore by every stroke of the imagination, a professional Journalist who is schooled in the rudiments of verifying facts before they are reported. This is because, news is not an event but an accurate and unbiased account of an event.

Abike refused to apply this common principle of journalism when she took the floor of the National Assembly in September 2011 to condemn Abia State Government for breeding Gang of Rapists at the Abia State University. Abike cajoled, insulted and made mockery of Abia State Government and indeed Abians. She based her condemnation on a video that was making the rounds showing a hardly clear image of about five boys raping an unidentified female student.

Only recently, the Nigeria Police through their official organ The Dawn March 11 – 24 edition revealed that they have arrested the gang believed to have perpetrated that dastardly act. They were arrested in Obite Town in Eche Local Government Area Rivers State same place investigations revealed the crime was committed. Interestingly too, the students are not Abia State University Students and the rape victim was a known family friend whose family were in land feud with the boys who masterminded the rape. So, Abia State University and indeed Abians is nowhere in the picture. By implication, Abians did not deserve being taken to the cleaners over unconfirmed reports.

The question is: Who sold the dummy that Abia State University and Abia State Government had a take in the incident? Who told SUN NEWSPAPERS that the rapists were from Abia State University because when you see that video over and over again, no mention was made of Abia State University? Why would anybody refer to that malicious statement and still make comments on them?

What Abike did tantamounts to malicious libel. She needs to apologise to Abians for ridiculing them before right thinking members of the public.

By the way Abike quoted SUN NEWSPAPER (aka rumor
newspaper) profusely.There are also too many Abikes out
there who swoop on every incident to cast aspersions on Abia Government and Abians. They are the enemies of progress, those who see no good, hear no good and talk no good. Resist the temptation of being an Abike Dabiri. Always cross check your facts before you rely on them for further comments.

A lot has been said about Aba, the commercial destination of Nigeria. I am not about to join issues with all the various positions that may have been advocated, whether for or against. But I will reiterate our avowal as publicly pledged, during the inauguration of our mandate, to the effect that we will faithfully live up to the aspiration of our people. Aba is not an exception to that pledge and this has been variously demonstrated by a glaring sincerity of purpose in addressing major challenges in Aba.

For a retrospective brief, it is a common knowledge that the gateway status of Aba is a follow up to the business adventures of our Igbo brothers. The city accommodated their strategic business interest in terms of proximity to railway and seaport through nearby Port Harcourt and accessibility to other states. Aba did well as a market town ably administered by retinue of Igbo merchants who ventured into various trades and vocations.

With the passage of time, these Igbo produce merchants flourished in their trade and consequently the British Colonial masters were attracted to designate Aba as one of their administrative enclaves.

Before the exit of the British Colonial Masters, Aba had become a household name in Nigeria and subsequently, made it to the African map as a commercial hub of note. Naturally, the status of the city compelled her to grapple with the influx of human beings who as it where came in droves. The consequence is that indecency and flagrant disregard for environmental friendliness has become a way of life in Aba.source: www.abiastate.gov.ng

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“PDP states in the South-east namely Abia, Ebonyi and Enugu-are witnessing rapid infrastructural development by their chief executives who talk less and do more for their people." - Col. Austin Akobundu, National Vice Chairman, South East zone (PDP)

this is a good idea...we all are in support of the same motion.....OUK is a mess

Now, what of Kalu’s WASC result?

The news that the Abia State University, ABSU withdrew the university degree awarded the immediate past governor of the state, Chief Orji Uzor Kalu was not surprising to many.

For some folks, it was a logical step in the continuing mutual war of attrition between the incumbent governor, Chief Theodore Orji and Kalu.

But how the “intellectual assets” of Dr. Kalu became an issue in the acrimonious war between the governor and his predecessor is something that is bound to worry many otherwise academically inclined Nigerians. It would be especially so, if the underlining reason for the withdrawal of Kalu’s degree was based on political consideration. The effect would be that academic credentials of oppositionists in the land would be open to political permutations.
Orji Kalu

Orji Kalu

As governor of Abia State, Kalu had caused a spectacle when he enrolled in the university raising moral questions as to how a visitor could at the same time be a student in the same university. It all passed away as the many intrigues and wonders of the Kalu years in Abia. That was until last week’s revelation of the revocation of the degree and the political reverberations that came with it.

When in 2007 Kalu handed over the instruments of office to Orji, few expected the kind of bickering between the two men as we are now seeing.

Kalu had against all odds defied the then authorities by presenting Orji, his chief of staff for eight years, as the gubernatorial candidate of the Peoples Progressive Alliance, PPA, the party he nurtured after he lost out in the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP.

Governor Orji’s transition from custody to the council chambers of the Abia State government in May 2007 was a remarkable act of political ingenuity crafted by the brawny and brainy Kalu that not many university degree holders could have pulled through.

Following the transfer of power, Kalu’s junior brother, Mascot Uzor Kalu emerged as the new chief of staff in the Theodore Orji administration that was, however, largely alleged to be programmed by the former governor and his mother.

The mutual tolerance of the old and the new continued until the emergence of the Goodluck Jonathan administration in 2010 when enemies of Kalu went through the first lady, Patience Jonathan who is partly from the state, to help Orji out of Kalu’s grip. Before then, there were suggestions that Kalu was about using the two governors in his PPA, – Ikedi Ohakim in Imo State and Orji- as bargaining chips in his own bid to return to mainstream party politics in the PDP. But Ohakim, reportedly a street wise man like Kalu, pulled a fast one on Kalu, and returned to the PDP ahead of Kalu.

Orji, who was the only remaining governor in Kalu’s PPA when Jonathan emerged, inevitably grabbed the opportunity when the PDP Abia caucus, led by the Minister of Labour and Productivity, Chief Emeka Wogu, went on a carefully crafted mission in 2010 to “woo” Orji to the PDP.

Chief Orji’s condition for accepting the offer, it seemed, was that the door being opened to him must surely be locked against Kalu.

Since that separation which has largely been celebrated as the liberation of the state, and Governor Orji hailed as the champion of the liberation, the politics of the state has inevitably put both men at odds. Remarkably, most of those who dined and wined with Kalu and used his political machine to achieve one political seat or the other in 2007 moved along with Orji to the PDP.

Since his famed liberation in 2010, Chief Orji according to some who have visited the state, has progressed in the delivery of democracy dividends to the electorate. Visitors to the state claim a spurt in infrastructure development with new constructions here and there.

One notable political development is the emergence of a new set of political lords. Where mother and son reigned in the past, a new set of power wheelers has emerged.

The new power peddlers may have checked Kalu, albeit for now. Given the controversies that trailed Kalu’s admission into ABSU, it is not unlikely that those that did this to him could go further to probe the circumstances under which Kalu obtained his secondary school certificate! But Kalu it is said has long reaches that make the present developments just a stop gap in the running feud between the two men.source : http://www.vanguardngr.com/2013/03/now-what-of-kalus-wasc-result/?fb_comment_id=fbc_132793596898860_122200_132969273547959#f2d21726a4853be

Count Us Out Of Orji Kalu’s Degree Travails – Abia Govt

Posted by: Our Reporter on March 5, 2013 in News Leave a comment

Abia state government says it has no hand in the withdrawal of the degree result and certificate of the former governor of Abia state, Uzor Kalu, saying that it is entirely an academic exercise carried out by the school.

The commissioner for Information and strategy, Dr. Eze Chikamnayo who stated this while briefing the press in Umuahia said the Abia state university enjoys some level of independence, while the day to day management of the institution is detached from the state government.

According to him, the state government does not interfere in the affairs of the university which has a well constituted senate, adding that it is preposterous and grossly misleading for anybody to ascribe the decision of withdrawing the former governor’s certificate to the chief TA Orji-led government.

He stated that the university withdrew the certificate on the basis of its merit as the former governor did not meet the requirements for the award of the certificate and cautioned that no person or group should politicize that academic exercise or draw the Abia state government into the fray.

The information commissioner also debunked the claim by the former governor of a shootout at the gate of his residence and stated that there was no such incident at all.

He revealed that there have been plans by Uzor Kalu to recruit youths to cause mayhem in the state and warned that the state government will not sit by and allow anyone alter the peace in the state.

Also speaking, the chief press secretary to the governor, Ugochukwu Emezue said it was not true that soldiers and the police brutalized students of Abia state university who were protesting the withdrawal of the former Abia state governor’s degree certificate.

Abia PDP protests Kalu’s return

The members of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in Abia State have protested the return of the former governor, Chief Orji Kalu, to the party.

The protesters, who came from the 17 local governments, demonstrated at the Government House, Umuahia, urging Governor Theodore Orji to convey their feelings to the national leadership of the party.

The spokesman for the protesters, Mr. Emma Ukwu, said Kalu’s return would spell doom for the party in the state.

Ukwu said Governor Orji had liberated the state from a particular family that had held the state to ransom, adding that,if Kalu is allowed to return, he would bring confusion to the chapter.

He said that, since Governor Orji assumed the reins, “the relationship with the federal government had produced good results and dividends of democracy for the state unlike before”.

Ukwu said: “Orji Kalu is a man who was defeated during the last general election when he vied for the senate in the Abia North and he was roundly defeated. Now, he wants to lead Ndigbo through his Njiko Igbo. A man who cannot get a senate seat wants to lead Igbo people”.

Ukwu urged the governor to inform the PDP national leadership about the protest “so that they will know that it is not a Bendel affair, but that the entire Abia PDP are against Kalu’s return”.

He added: “With the peace that exists in the party now, which the governor had brought to the party, we do not want confusion again as doing that will take us back to the dark days of the state, which we do not want to go back to”.

Responding on the governor’s behalf, the Chief of Staff, Cosmos Ndukwe, assured that their message would be delivered to Governor Orji. He charged them to maintain peace

He said: “The crowd that came has shown that the party members know what they want. Your actions and protests will be forwarded to the party office in Abuja for proper action. Popularity in politics is tested on the election day. This man was defeated during the last election. So, he has no political relevance again .source : http://thenationonlineng.net/new/politics/abia-pdp-protests-kalus-return-2/#comment-268629

Orji Kalu’s party, PPA, thanks Abia varsity for stripping former governor of degree
PPA chairman said Mr. Kalu thought of schooling as trading in spare parts
Former Abia state governor, Orji Uzor Kalu’s degree from the Abia State University was a “moral burden” Mr. Kalu’s own party, the Progressive People’s Alliance, PPA, said Sunday, justifying the school’s decision to withdraw the award.
The state university announced the withdrawal on Saturday saying it found out Mr. Kalu’s admission was flawed.

The National chairman of the PPA, Ken Gbalikuma, commended the school for stripping the former governor of the award, saying the decision was “proper” although it came late.
“The award of the certificate to the former governor, who was the incumbent visitor of the university, was patently a clear indication that his admission and graduation violated the institution’s extant rules and regulations,” Mr. Gbalikuma said.
Mr. Kalu has blamed the incumbent governor of Abia state, Theodore Orji, for the withdrawal, threatening to respond “appropriately”.

Mr. Kalu’s recent dispute with Mr. Orji, his former trusted aide, and the irony of his post-office experience, have surprised many.
As former governor, Mr. Kalu founded the PPA, and deployed state and party machinery to install Mr. Orji, then his chief of staff, as his successor.
Both men have since fallen apart, with Mr. Kalu abandoning the party, and seeking to return to his former People’s Democratic Party, PDP.

The withdrawal of the school degree is seen as yet, the highlight of that conflict.
The National Chairman of PPA, Mr. Gbalikuma said that based on the strength of the findings and recommendations of an ABSU’s investigative panel, the decision of the school was in order.
He dismissed allegations that the school’s action was politically motivated; but attacked Mr. Kalu as a politically unstable person.

He said the former governor spent only two semesters in the school, “thinking that the university was a political spare parts shop where any dealer in government can ply the trade by using political power to aggrandize his bloated ego.”

“All political groups in the country to be wary of associating with Kalu as he portends evil in all his undertakings, and would readily tarnish the image of any sane entity,” Mr. Gbalikuma said. source : http://naijanewsreelity..com/2013/03/orji-kalus-party-ppa-thanks-abia.html?spref=fb

are we still dwelling on OUk's issue,let this not bother us,OUK is just a wimp,he has got nothing,just that he was opportune to meet run-away success,apart from that he is never a material able to impart positively in the life of citizenry....

OUK jaga jaga ,everything scatter scatter ,poor man dey suffer ,suffer ,gun shot in everywhere

how are we sure he has primary education,he is a tout ,don't u see how he speaks ,he is always counting his wordens,always finding it difficult to speak simple English...sorry OUK

That man was Orji Uzo Kalu who would later become a governor in God's own State. It may not be out of place to recollect here that Orji Uzor Kalu was the same man whom the Vice-Chancellor of University of Maiduguri; Prof Jubril
Aminu, had no option other than to expel from the University just to save
The corporate image of the University. Ironically and derisively, Orji Uzor
Kalu, after many years of rustication and intellectual disconnect,
Bamboozled himself, of course as the Executive Governor of Abia State,
into Abia State University and today he brandishes a degree certificate, a
certificate everybody knows he cannot defend.
Since Abia State government and her people were doggedly liberated from the excruciating and inhumanly exploitative grip of Orji Uzor Kalu his mother and siblings by Governor T.A. Orji in 2010, there has been no manner of irresponsibility, desperation and psychological dilapidation that Orji Uzor Kalu has not displayed.
His target of attack has been one person; Governor T.A. Orji, Ochendo. He has devoted his paper; The Sun as his platform for attack against the people's Governor. Yet he pretends to have forgotten that the people of Abia State know that the source of the establishment of the sun newspaper was entirely theirs.
In his determination to fight the Governor; a fight that is laced with crudeness and lack of intelligence Kalu ends up attacking highly placed Nigerian leaders. Take for instance; on page 7 of The Sun of January 21, 2013 . He unguardedly said he had to return to People's Democratic Party because the leadership of the party is currently in the hands of animals'.
What a very raw style of insulting President Goodluck Jonathan. By saying that the leadership of our great Party is in the hands of 'animals, Kalu only exhibited his hatred and disrespect for the President and P.D.P Governors.
On pages 56/ 57 and 58 of Sunday Guardian of January 3/2013/ Kalu, who called on President Jonathan to send the State Security Service after corrupt Governors, was just in his usual world of ignorance and inconsistence. Orji Kalu the pathological liar gave two different accounts of how he first met Governor T.A. Orji. Just within a range of seventy-four words, Kalu had given two contradictory versions of his first contact with the Governor; (1) 'There is a man called Mba Abali, from Ohafia; he was the one who introduced him to me", (2) I met this man (Orji) in former Abia Head of Service, Mark Agu Ogo's house…. This narrative is a characteristic feature of Orji Kalu. He will tell you everything but the truth. One can see the absence of reasonableness in Kalu's claim that the first day he met Governor T.A. Orji was the same day he promised he would appoint him his Chief of Staff and that after that first encounter he never saw him again until after the Governorship election of 1998. In as much as Kalu has refused to grow in terms of intelligence, it is an unacceptable insult to the Nigeria intelligentsia to want them to believe that someone he met only once before his election and the man did not, in any way/ contribute to the success of his election was the man he ended up having as his Chief of Staff. Since Kalu has not grown uptill now, no miracle would make him grow again.

For the avoidance of doubt, let me remind the reading public that Governor T.A. Orji, as at 1996 when Kalu claimed he met him, was the Administrative Secretary of National Electoral Commission in charge of Abia State. The Mba Abali whom Ka1u simply described as coming from Ohafia and whom he rightly acknowledged as the bridge between Governor T.A. Orji and him, was an Electoral Officer in the Electoral Commission in Abia State and was, therefore a subordinate of Chief T.A. Orji. It is now left for Nigerians to know between Chief T.A. Orji who was very strategically positioned in National Electoral Commission and Kalu who was desperate to become a governor, with an avalanche of petitions against him, to make up their minds on who was actually in need of the other. Before I round off this paragraph, Kalu should tell the public whom his mother, Eunice, asked me to accompany her in January 1997 to meet in a small Quest House in Umuahia called Midland Hotel. As someone who was very deeply involved in Kalu's quest for governorship from 1996 to 1998 when the election took place, Kalu would be adding to his lies if he says that I do not know many of those that played very strategic roles for him to become a governor.
The porosity of Kalu was severally manifested in the Guardian interview. One is at pains to imagme the foolishness of Kalu who thought he had the audacity of telling a sitting Governor who had courteously come to visit him in Abuja that he should Took for somebody of his choice to replace him for the remaining term, was Kalu not arrogating of himself the constitutional function of the Abia electorate to determine who governs them? If Kalu had an intelligence quotient that was, even, up to twenty-five percent, he would have been ashamed to vomit this magnitude of stupidity before the public.
I worked closely with Orji Kalu and his mother; Eunice, in defunct United Nigeria Congress Party; U.N.C.P, Reality Organization, Still-born New Era, People's Democratic Party; P.D.P., as a Commissioner in Abia State Local Government Service Commission, and a two-time Special Adviser on Grass-roots' Mobilization. I know him as a man who is always economical with the truth. He may even claim not to know me before giving me appointments. After all, he has claimed that he only ran into Chief T.A. Orji. To prove my assertion that Kalu is an unrepentant liar, in the Guardian interview he said former President Olusegun Obasanjo called his mother to 'change his (Orji's governorship) candidacy to one of my brothers'. The question one may need to ask is; could Chief Obasanjo have called, Eunice to change the candidacy of Chief T.A Orji on the platform of People's Progressive Alliance when Baba was very busy with his P.D.P? Does Kalu want to accuse Baba of anti-Party activities or, as usual, he just wants to insult him?
Kalu claimed he is not corrupt and that he is known the world over. I am not an anti-graft agent so I will not say much on that except to remind him that he is currently being prosecuted on charges of corruption and since the matter is in the court of competent jurisdiction and, therefore, subjudice, he should be disciplined enough to allow the court run its course and, thereafter, Nigerians will know whether he is corrupt or otherwise. Declaring himself as not being corrupt before the court passes its verdict amounts, in my opinion as a lay man, to contempt of the judicial process.

SKELETON IN OUK's CLOSET
• Forged transcript
• Employed six different persons to enter for six exams for him
• Returned to ABSU, sixteen years after ‘leaving’ University of Maiduguri
Shame has a way of locating the man with impeachable integrity. There is usually a judgment day. Some times in life, we are poisoned by the instruments of our chalice. This is obviously the case of Orji Uzor Kalu (OUK), a lowly rated secondary school and University drop – out who traded his way to the enviable position of Governor of Abia State and for eight years, he carried on with the stamp of shame; afflicting the State with fraud, indecent malpractice and the shameless act of lying under oath.
The Senate of Abia State University insists that in the first place Orji Uzor was not qualified to be admitted as a student having exceeded the stipulated three years for which a student can transfer from a University (he was rusticated by University of Maiduguri in 1984 after trading in school for four years) while he managed to do two out of the mandatory six semesters. So, his stay in ABSU is declared ultra vires and of no effect. What a shame!
The Senate of Abia State University literarily went dead
when documents were presented to show that Orji Uzor Kalu based his admission on a Transcript from a “ghost University”. Here was a man who claimed to have attended University of Maiduguri between 1980 and 1984 but presented a Transcript purportedly issued by Abia State University. In his display of acute illiteracy, the courses listed in the transcript were non – existent and unfortunately inconsistent with his claim of a transfer.
At its 69th extra ordinary meeting of 1st March 2013, the Senate of Abia State University in a resounding vote of 88 against 3; basically acting on the prompting of an Investigative Panel that looked into the allegations of irregular admission and wrongful award of the University Degree to former Governor of the State, Orji Uzor Kalu; cancelled the degree awarded to Orji Uzor and declared ultra vires any claim whatsoever made by him in that regard. To that effect, Orji Uzor seizes from the 1st day of March, 2012 to be a holder of the University Degree and declared a criminal impersonator; should he continue to so describe himself.
The Senate while cancelling the degree, said among other things that: In accordance with Section 9 Sub section 5 of the Abia State University law 1995; subject to right of appeal to the Council for a decision of the Senate, the Senate may deprive any person of Degree awarded to him/her or cancel it if the Person is not qualified to be a student or found to be engaged in any misconduct or guilty of any exam misconduct. Based on that amongst others, Kalu Orji Uzor violated the academic regulations of Abia State University on admission by transfer which rendered the admission invalid.” The University maintains that the action aforesaid derives from its onerous statutory responsibility to guide and maintain at all times the academic reputation of the university and the credibility of the University Degrees so awarded”
The self – acclaimed “Master Strategist” failed to cover his tracks and in what could be described as the dumbest forgery in the history of mankind, committed unpardonable mistakes in his quest to acquire a University degree, which was denied him by University of Maiduguri in 1984.
It would be recalled that sometime in 2000, OUK made the news for his ingenuity in going back to school having been reportedly admitted into the Government & Public Administration of the same University he was a Visitor – Abia State University. Right thinking members of the public condemned the ignoble act and lampooned OUk for desecrating the Ivory Tower. Reuben Abati had in his column in December 2001 said among other things: “OUK’s admission into ABSU is depressingly annoying as it further reduces what is remaining of the integrity of the Nigerian Universities. His act will bring further disrepute to the Ivory Tower as in the first place he is not known to have a School Certificate”. Eleven years after, Abati is vindicated.
Interestingly, Prof. Ogwo; OUK's kinsman and the University Vice Chancellor at the time was one of the three dissenting voices while the Senate voted. Ogwo represents the college of shameless scholars whose character rating is despicable and nauseating. He ought to cover his face in shame after those startling revelations. He should tell us why of the six courses Orji Uzor managed to write its exams, why six different writings were identified in the scripts. He should tell us which Officer of the University certified OUK qualified for admission sixteen years after he claimed to have left the University of Maiduguri. The Chairman of ASUU, ABSU chapter Chimezie and his friend Prof Obeten Kalu failed to reason beyond ethnic sentiments while dissenting.
Prof Victor Nmaju summed the matter in this intelligent manner, “by this decision, the University has over turned an executive fiat that saw a Visitor intimidating his employees in the most bizarre manner. We have been able to subtly redeem the integrity of the University having erroneously awarded her Degree to a person who is neither worthy in learning or character”.
Very few persons know that Orji Uzor does not even have a School Certificate. That would be a story for another day. In the meantime, I encourage him to go back to primary five as he was last seen in the Primary four class

Are we still talking about OUK,his career is finished as far as Abia state politics is concerned......he is a failure

Meritocracy ought to be the norm in a democratic setting, but instead of meritocracy, we have mamacracy whereby the former governor of Abia State, Chief Orji Uzor Kalu, who had a very chequered and beleaguered childhood allowed his inability to grow up to get into the state arena whereby he effectively handed over the management of the state to his mother. He referred personalities and statesmen to his mother, allowed his mother to take up a title that is both obnoxious and completely unknown which they called Mother Excellency. Took his wife away from the scene, at a point the wife was maliciously labeled a psychiatric case just to make sure that his mother extended her stranglehold of her immediate family into the state arena and that brought Abia down to the lowest ebb.

PDP not threatened by APC – Governor Orji

In his determination to remain in the People’s Democratic Party, PDP despite rumour of massive exodus of people from the ruling party, Abia State Governor, Theodore Orji has said that the ruling Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, was not in any way threatened by the emergence of the new mega party, All Progressives Congress, APC.

In a statement by his chief press secretary, Ugochukwu Emezue, Governor Orji hinted that the PDP remains the preferred party in Nigeria, as such, the opposition cannot diminish its influence, popularity, domination in the 2015 polls.

He appealed to Nigerians to be patient with President Goodluck Jonathan whom he said is working round the clock to transform Nigeria in all sectors of the economy, while at the same time enhancing the welfare of Nigerian women and youth.

The Governor added that Abia state will next month launch the third phase of its youth empowerment scheme in Umuahia, the state capital.

HE, Chief T.A. Orji speech at the 7th Joint World Bank/FGN FADAMA Project.
HE, Chief T.A. Orji speech at the 7th Joint World Bank/FGN FADAMA Project.



AN ADDRESS BY HIS EXCELLENCY, CHIEF T. A. ORJI (OCHENDO), EXECUTIVE GOVERNOR ABIA STATE, ON THE OCCASION OF A COURTESY CALL TO GOVERNMENT HOUSE, OF THE 7TH JOINT WORLD BANK/FGN SUPERVISION MISSION ON THIRD FADAMA DEVELOPMENT PROJECT, HOLDING AT THE EXCO CHAMBERS OF GOVERNMENT HOUSE, UMUAHIA, ON THE 18TH DAY OF FEBRUARY, 2013





PROTOCOLS





DISTINGUISHED LADIES AND GENTLEMEN!



It is indeed a great pleasure to welcome all of you to Abia State on this memorable occasion of the Seventh Joint World Bank/FGN Supervision Mission on Third National Fadama Development Project, covering the South-East Zone, and holding in our Abia State.

For us, this marks another milestone in the history of our several fruitful collaborations with the World Bank and the Federal Government of Nigeria, in our passion to quickly develop Abia State



I want to say a big welcome to the World Bank and the FGN Teams for the deep interest you continue to show in Abia, ‘God’s Own State’, especially for giving us this singular honor and privilege to host this august gathering. To the officials of our Sister States who are participating in this epoch-making event, I say ‘Nnoonu, Unu Abiala!’



You will recall that just a few weeks ago, our State played host to the Good Governance Team of the Federal Government, led by the Honorable Minister of Information, Mr Labaran Maku. It is instructive to note that our many legacy projects inspected by that team, truly attested to our Government’s sincere desire to transform our State and make a difference.



But I can clearly state here that some of these acclaimed legacy projects will not achieve their full effects, without a sustained healthy and well-fed citizenry, which the FADAMA Projects seek to emphasize.



Therefore, the agricultural sector and other goals of the FADAMA Projects will remain in the front burner of our march towards transforming Abia State.



I acknowledge the noble objectives of FADAMA, which is targeted at the rural poor. This is why our Government had taken the lead in quickly keying into the programme, when it was launched at the Federal level. We had immediately released N15 million Naira as our preparatory FADAMA Project-fund in 2009.



We will continue to honor our obligations in-spite of the paucity of funding, and I have directed the Accountant General of our State to make all outstanding remittances to Abia State FADAMA 111, without further delays, beginning from the end of February, 2013.



I have also been reliably informed of the high level of commitment of our Local Government Areas to ensure the success of the project in Abia State, and our Ministry of Local Government and Chieftaincy Affairs, has been accordingly instructed to ensure that all funds accruing to the FADAMA 111 project from the LGAs, be deducted at source, in order to ensure a steady cash-flow into the project.



It has been of immense joy to see the huge impact that Abia State FADAMA 111 is making in the lives of our people, especially through the sub-projects that are spread throughout the State. I therefore make bold to say that the Agricultural Revolution, which we have embarked in this State, has received a great push from FADAMA 111 projects, and will be absolutely incomplete without them.



Our Administration is committed to transforming the agricultural sector of our State and Nation’s economies, and in line with the visions of the Federal Government. This is why Abia State wasted no time in accessing and disbursing to genuine farmers, the N1 billion agric-loan backed up by the FGN/CBN efforts. We have equally continued to provide some improved cocoa seedlings, fertilizer and other required agro-inputs to our farmers to improve farm products.



Right now, we have commenced the establishment of our Liberation Farm Projects in our 17 Local Government Areas of the State. This is to revive interests of the youth in farming and create young agro-entrepreneurs. We have equally continued to make remarkable efforts in our rural infrastructure to help drive rural development, create wealth, and raise the level of food security in our State.



Finally, I wish to most sincerely, commend the World Bank/FGN Team for this initiative, and appeal to you to ensure the project is extended for its immense benefits to our citizens, and especially in sustaining the agricultural value chains we have commenced building for the sustainable development of our State.



On this note, I wish you a very fruitful deliberation in all your subsequent sessions while in the State. May God guide and protect you throughout your stay in Abia State.



Thank you and God bless Nigeria!

Orji Uzor Kalu rejected by APC
Former Abia Gov Uzor Kalu received what could be described as the shock of his life recently in Abuja as he was rejected by members of the APC , being promoted by Buhari and Tinubu. We learnt that Kalu who has been struggling to join the PDP recently without success, wants to join the new emerging party, but he is meeting a strong wall.

This news online learnt that APC members see kalu as not only a political leper but a liability. According to one of the key players in APC who is a former head of state, any attempt to allow kalu in the party will be resistedstrongly. For him kalu has no political value. He directed kalu to remain In PPA.

He further described kalu as a loose cannon who may be a pain in their neck if allowed. Our crew gathered that kalu right now is confused as he is neither accepted by PDP or APC. He is considering staying back in PPA since he has been rejected by these parties. source :http://naijanewsreelity..com/2013/02/orji-uzor-kalu-rejected-by-apc.html?spref=fb

You Can’t Compare Kalu to Orji, Says Abia Commissioner
by:
Eze Chikamnayo


Abia State Commissioner for Information and Strategy, Mr. Eze Chikamnayo, spoke with Charles Ajunwa on the state of the state. Excerpts:

Recently, Governor Theodore Orji said Abia was in the process of rebuilding. How much of the process as he covered yet?
The truth is that His Excellency, Sir T.A. Orji, is the father and founder of new Abia State. He is now consolidating on the fresh foundations he started laying some two, three years ago. 2013 is our year of consolidation and the way to consolidate in most cases is to work more, to do more and to re-enforce achievements that have already been made. You consolidate when you do not rest in your oars, you consolidate when you try to open up new horizons, you consolidate when you surpass your own achievements and surpass the expectations of even your worst critics in terms of positive impacts in developments.

The truth and nothing but the truth is that the experience of Abia State between 1999 to 2007, and a little between 2007 and 2010 when the godfather still had his tentacles in the polity was worse than what Ugadans suffered under Idi Amin. It was a more insidious but very corrosive experience but for the super natural intervention of God, Abia State today would have been an effective monarchy masquerading as a democracy. In our lexicon here in Abia today, we now have a term that effectively substitutes meritocracy.

Meritocracy ought to be the norm in a democratic setting, but instead of meritocracy, we have mamacracy whereby the former governor of Abia State, Chief Orji Uzor Kalu, who had a very chequered and beleaguered childhood allowed his inability to grow up to get into the state arena whereby he effectively handed over the management of the state to his mother. He referred personalities and statesmen to his mother, allowed his mother to take up a title that is both obnoxious and completely unknown which they called Mother Excellency. Took his wife away from the scene, at a point the wife was maliciously labeled a psychiatric case just to make sure that his mother extended her stranglehold of her immediate family into the state arena and that brought Abia down to the lowest ebb.

As a member of that cabinet, you should not be proud to criticise else, what were people like you doing at that time?
Yes, it’s like when you get on an ABC Transport on your way back to Lagos and because you were passenger somewhere in the bus, somebody said why didn’t you grab the driver from behind to hit his head or why didn’t you collect the steering from him. That will obviously be a very erroneous assumption. Governance is something that when a leader takes the driver’s seat he is not expected to drive on the emotions of the passenger. A driver is expected to have an idea of the destination, he is supposed to have confidence in the craft of driving and he is supposed to be able to know the state of the vehicle viz a viz the journey at hand.

Rather, what you should do is to congratulate us for having the courage to at the time we saw that the driver was taking us in a contrary direction, for us to have had the courage to say ‘stop this vehicle we want to go down.

The fact that we saw that the young man became obsessed with power, became absolutely incapable of handling the instrument of power, abdicated the reins and instrument of power to his mother who was by the way an illiterate, incompetent trader who couldn’t handle a town union for her to have taken charge of the entire paraphernalia of office. Those of us that had conscience said ‘hey stop this vehicle and where he failed to stop, we found one way or the other to get ourselves out of the vehicle and then began to look for wedge to see whether we can stop the vehicle from crashing. You see, that is the angle you must look at it. We ought to be congratulated.

But why is difficult to allow a peaceful return of Kalu to Abia PDP in the interest of peace and reunion?
If it were to be former President Olusegun Obasanjo, he will say I dey laugh o. My reaction to Orji Kalu’s hallucination is, I dey laugh o. The man said he wants to gate-crash into an organisation, freedom of association doesn’t translate to gate-crashing. Much as an individual is free to join people’s club or to join Rotary or to join a church, every single church has its own rules and its own freedom to accept or reject an individual from joining. Much as you are free to walk up to a girl and propose marriage, the girl is also free to either accept your proposal or reject. To the extent that you have freedom to apply is the same extent to which the young lady has the freedom to either accept your advances or reject. So you cannot force yourself into an organization.

PDP is made of individuals, human beings and freedom of association means there is a sort of symbiotic relationship, a sort of concurrence of understanding and agreement.

He is talking about fear, fear of what? How can you be afraid of a man you has effectively put on the ground and saturated his throat with a lot of sand and mud so, he must be hallucinating. If he is talking of fear of being infected by his political virus, a virus that leads to backwardness, confusion, greed, avarice, disunity, yes! Certainly, every normal human being ought to be afraid of infection and as far as we are concerned today Orji Kalu is a very infectious political disease that ought to be absolutely phased out from anybody who has any desire to be politically healthy because his epoch marked the worst period in the history of Abia State and Abia politics and Abia development. So we are not afraid of Orji Uzor Kalu in terms of anything that he may want to claim politically but we are certainly weary of the political virus called Orji Uzor Kalu whom we do not want to infect our system because we don’t want this system to crash.

What if he is coming back to form an alliance with PDP in the light of the opposition merger in the country?
Is marriage by force? If you chased a woman too much, she will tell you: ‘is it by force?’ It takes two to tango even now that you see the opposition parties in Nigeria trying to come together to assume the name of a defunct analgesic that was used for headache in the 70s called APC; You know you need to have headache before you look for APC. The people who are looking for APC are those who have some form of political headache. No normal human being goes for such analgesic and by the way, an analgesic that is no longer in the counter. But suffice it to say that even in that contraception called coalition, you discovered that the individual parties agreed to come together and when APGA said we were not properly consulted that the top echelon of the party wasn’t properly consulted.

You saw Alhaji Lai Mohammed come out to say ‘we wouldn’t even include their logo in the new emblem that will emerge because we don’t want them to sue us for putting their logo without their consent.’ If Lai Mohammed and his people realised the need that there should be some form of mutual understanding before any form of co-habitation could happen politically, what makes Orji Uzor Kalu think that he will gate-crash into PDP without any form of understanding with the people who are now holding the affairs of the state? So, it smacks of hallucination and ignorance. Honestly speaking, I can relate all these things back to Mama Excellency. Orji Uzor Kalu is a young man that has a beleaguered background.

Back to the incumbent, there are insinuations that most of the governor’s projects are concentrated in Umuahia?
No. I am not from Umuahia; I am from Isiochi in Umunneochi Local Government. In my local government today, we have several ongoing projects sponsored by the state government. Isikwuato is the next in Abia north and we have Nnoya Road that is going on. We have a road that is connecting Isikwuato to Afikpo that is going on. We have the helipad, we have the ecological projects, we have health centres, we have hospitals that are going on as I speak and are subject to verification by any well-meaning journalist. You move a bit from Isikuato to Ohafia Local Government, Arochukwu Local Government and Bende Local Government, you’ll see government projects scattered all over the place.

A few days ago, the biggest cassava processing plant coming to the South-east in collaboration between the State and Federal Government, was sited at Abriba in Ohafia Local Government. That is not Umuahia. If the governor was guilty as some individuals have alleged, may be that great investment will also find its way into Abia Central or Umuahia. As I talk to you now, the Abia State government has spent more money in Aba and environs than in Umuahia.

The Aba/Owerri Road though a federal road but because the Federal Government couldn’t come to intervene and the people that ply that road are our citizens, His Excellency put in over N2 billion to make that road motorable from Osisioma junction all the way to the park and stretching down. If you bring N2 billion into Umuahia for instance, that would build about five roads, because of the nature of Aba, the terrain and the soil type, it costs more money per kilometre to do a road in that environment than it costs in the hinterland, Umuahia and environs.

You see, Governor Orrji is to us what Nelson Mandela is to South Africans. After all, South Africans did not celebrate Mandela because he built roads and brought them a buoyant economy. Mandela was there just for four years but a single historic feat he achieved for South Africans was liberty and the fact that in Abia State with the all the very intractable structures of domination which Kalu had effectively put in place, but when God wanted to deliver the children of Israel he made sure that an Israelite called Moses was trained in Pharaoh’s court so that quietly without shedding blood, he could just bring out His people. Liberation can only happen in two ways: either inside out or outward in.

But because Abia is God’s own state, God on His own predestined Orji like Moses into the court of Kalu and kept him there for an appointed time so that Abia could be liberated without the shedding of blood. After liberating us from Orji Uzor Kalu and clutches of his mother, Governor T.A.Orji went ahead to liberate us from kidnappers and armed robbers. Today, Abia is the oasis of peace in the South-east. After doing that, he went ahead to lay the solid foundations for infrastructural for Abia’s socio-economic growth. That is why you are seeing projects dotting the state. There is no way you can compare the era of the locust under Kalu and this era of liberty and prosperity under Orji.

H.E, Chief T.A. Orji speech at the 1st Made -in -Abia Product Exhibition

A SPEECH PRESENTED BY HIS EXCELLENCY, CHIEF T. A. ORJI (OCHENDO), EXECUTIVE GOVERNOR ABIA STATE, ON THE OCCASION OF THE 1ST MADE-IN-ABIA PRODUCT EXHIBITION, HOLDING AT THE IBEKU HIGH SCHOOL, UMUAHIA, ON THE 19TH DAY OF FEBRUARY, 2013


PROTOCOLS


DISTINGUISHED LADIES AND GENTLEMEN!


I am very proud to be here today, to attend this opening ceremony of the 1St Made-in- Abia Product Exhibition, holding on this ground. I am proud, not just for the uniqueness which this great event bears as a bold attempt to promote our own goods made by Abia people, within Abia environment.


I am also proud for the reason that this unique initiative is coming from Her Excellency’s Office, my dear wife, who made all the necessary connections to bring together committed and interested people from the organized Private and Public sector, under a Public-Private Initiative (PPP), so that all of us will begin to holistically address the issue of the accelerated economic development of Abia State; which I am also proud ties into our Government’s legacy projects.

I therefore strongly commend this initiative from Her Excellency’s Office in its entirety. I also thank all those from the public and the private sectors of our society, who share this dream, and have come together to begin the process of taking Abia-made products to the next level and with renewed confidence.

I also find this exhibition very unique in another special way. It is a celebration of the famed ingenuity of our people, especially our local entrepreneurs, whose ‘can-do’ spirit and legendary quality goods were once celebrated and sold all over the world under false labels, even though they were indeed ABA-Made Goods.




Aba-made-products, are Abia-made products, and these are still sold through-out the countries of West Africa and the world under false labels. It is time for Abians to reclaim the pride of their franchise. It is my belief that today’s exhibition and the many goods showcased here, will provide an ample and timely opportunity for Abians to become proud again to market their products as Abia-made products and flaunt their ingenuity.

Through this medium, Abians will not only reclaim our rightful place as pioneers of the Nigerian and African economic revolutions, but will once more lay the solid foundation for the new and young industries that will spring up and grow in our Urban and Rural areas from accelerated demand and supply of Abia-made goods.


As part of our legacy projects, our Government has been building new markets and renovating or relocating old ones for better positioning and for aesthetic values. These new markets are meant to offer veritable grounds for continuous exhibition and massive exchange of goods and services that promote Abia-made-products, which fame will certainly soar after this exhibition, and new wealth created in our State.

I therefore take this opportunity to encourage all Abians to begin to employ their energies, their ingenuity and business-acumen for productive competition through creativity and not through dishonest or criminal activities. That way, we can all help in building a prosperous Abia of our dream.

I assure Abians, and especially our commercially-minded citizens that there is enough room for everyone to work hard in all sectors and with honesty, create the values that will make Abia products desirable and Abia State great.



Our Government will continue to ensure the maintenance of peace and security which we have now established in the State, so that the enabling environment for business, equitable politics and the good life which our people crave for and enjoy, will be firmly established in Abia State.

I thank everyone that has attended this event, and urge you to take home the core lessons of this 1st Abia-made Product Exhibition. It is a lesson in courage and resilience of one woman, and of several people that share the same dream, to promote the identity and good quality of a proud people and a proud State. It is a lesson in the belief that working together, ordinary people, the public and the private sector, can make Abia work again!

Thank you and God bless you.

THE ANTIC OF A MAN THAT IS SUNK; THE ORJI UZOR KALU EXAMPLE
As biologists would put it, there is no living thing that has no characteristic feature. This, therefore, implies that a well composed and stable character can always easily be known by his gait, composure, gesticulation, ideas and utterances. On the other hand, a man that is at war with himself and the society he finds himself in is easily identified by his instability of character, negativity in comprehension and other attitudinal tendencies that summarily portray him as a maniac-depressive.
One major havoc the Generals Babangida and Sani Abacha's military administrations' insincerity in their very tortuous, long and deceitful transition programmes that was unfortunately evident in the outcome of the 1999 general elections was the emergence of persons who, known by their antecedents, should have had no business directing the affairs of any given polity. Due to the loss of confidence in Babangida and Abacha's transition programmes, many responsible Nigerians were forced to detach themselves from their transition programmes as it had become obvious the two maximum rulers only wanted to succeed themselves. Hence their so called transition programme was rightly adjudged a hoax.
Abia State was not an exception. Hence the emergence of Orji Uzor Kaiu; a charlatan who had never been associated with anything positive in life, as governor in 1999. Nigerians may not have forgotten, in a jiffy, the young man who, in the late eighties, claimed to have donated one million naira to Borno State Education Endowment Fund, only for the authorities of the State to discover, to their utmost chagrin, that the carton containing his so-called one million naira merely contained pieces of paper. That man was Orji Uzo Kalu who would later become a governor in God's own State. It may not be out of place to recollect here that Orji Uzor Kalu was the same man whom the Vice-Chancellor of University of Maiduguri; Prof Jubril
Aminu, had no option other than to expel from the University just to save
The corporate image of the University. Ironically and derisively, Orji Uzor
Kalu, after many years of rustication and intellectual disconnect,
Bamboozled himself, of course as the Executive Governor of Abia State,
into Abia State University and today he brandishes a degree certificate, a
certificate everybody knows he cannot defend.
Since Abia State government and her people were doggedly liberated from the excruciating and inhumanly exploitative grip of Orji Uzor Kalu his mother and siblings by Governor T.A. Orji in 2010, there has been no manner of irresponsibility, desperation and psychological dilapidation that Orji Uzor Kalu has not displayed.
His target of attack has been one person; Governor T.A. Orji, Ochendo. He has devoted his paper; The Sun as his platform for attack against the people's Governor. Yet he pretends to have forgotten that the people of Abia State know that the source of the establishment of the sun newspaper was entirely theirs.
In his determination to fight the Governor; a fight that is laced with crudeness and lack of intelligence Kalu ends up attacking highly placed Nigerian leaders. Take for instance; on page 7 of The Sun of January 21, 2013 . He unguardedly said he had to return to People's Democratic Party because the leadership of the party is currently in the hands of animals'.
What a very raw style of insulting President Goodluck Jonathan. By saying that the leadership of our great Party is in the hands of 'animals, Kalu only exhibited his hatred and disrespect for the President and P.D.P Governors.
On pages 56/ 57 and 58 of Sunday Guardian of January 3/2013/ Kalu, who called on President Jonathan to send the State Security Service after corrupt Governors, was just in his usual world of ignorance and inconsistence. Orji Kalu the pathological liar gave two different accounts of how he first met Governor T.A. Orji. Just within a range of seventy-four words, Kalu had given two contradictory versions of his first contact with the Governor; (1) 'There is a man called Mba Abali, from Ohafia; he was the one who introduced him to me", (2) I met this man (Orji) in former Abia Head of Service, Mark Agu Ogo's house…. This narrative is a characteristic feature of Orji Kalu. He will tell you everything but the truth. One can see the absence of reasonableness in Kalu's claim that the first day he met Governor T.A. Orji was the same day he promised he would appoint him his Chief of Staff and that after that first encounter he never saw him again until after the Governorship election of 1998. In as much as Kalu has refused to grow in terms of intelligence, it is an unacceptable insult to the Nigeria intelligentsia to want them to believe that someone he met only once before his election and the man did not, in any way/ contribute to the success of his election was the man he ended up having as his Chief of Staff. Since Kalu has not grown uptill now, no miracle would make him grow again.

For the avoidance of doubt, let me remind the reading public that Governor T.A. Orji, as at 1996 when Kalu claimed he met him, was the Administrative Secretary of National Electoral Commission in charge of Abia State. The Mba Abali whom Ka1u simply described as coming from Ohafia and whom he rightly acknowledged as the bridge between Governor T.A. Orji and him, was an Electoral Officer in the Electoral Commission in Abia State and was, therefore a subordinate of Chief T.A. Orji. It is now left for Nigerians to know between Chief T.A. Orji who was very strategically positioned in National Electoral Commission and Kalu who was desperate to become a governor, with an avalanche of petitions against him, to make up their minds on who was actually in need of the other. Before I round off this paragraph, Kalu should tell the public whom his mother, Eunice, asked me to accompany her in January 1997 to meet in a small Quest House in Umuahia called Midland Hotel. As someone who was very deeply involved in Kalu's quest for governorship from 1996 to 1998 when the election took place, Kalu would be adding to his lies if he says that I do not know many of those that played very strategic roles for him to become a governor.
The porosity of Kalu was severally manifested in the Guardian interview. One is at pains to imagme the foolishness of Kalu who thought he had the audacity of telling a sitting Governor who had courteously come to visit him in Abuja that he should Took for somebody of his choice to replace him for the remaining term, was Kalu not arrogating of himself the constitutional function of the Abia electorate to determine who governs them? If Kalu had an intelligence quotient that was, even, up to twenty-five percent, he would have been ashamed to vomit this magnitude of stupidity before the public.

I may sympathize with Kalu who is, obviously, suffering from selective amnesia. He claimed that 'their problem is that if I go for a popularity contest with them, I'll dwarf them because I am with the people'. Kalu's grouse, which is a result of inferiority complex, is with Governor T.A. Orji. So, who are the 'them' he talked of? Not wanting to waste time on the rantings and pantings of a totally confused, discredited and rejected former governor, it may be pertinent to remind Kalu that in a democracy, the easiest and best way to assess a man's popularity is through election. I hope Orji Uzor Kalu is currently in the Senate of the Nigerian Federation! I think he is because he contested election into the Nigerian Senate in 2011. This is how to measure popularity and, thereby, 'dwarf them'. If, however, I am wrong in my thinking that Kalu is a sitting Senator, it then means that Kalu should tell us where he has lost his popularity.
I worked closely with Orji Kalu and his mother; Eunice, in defunct United Nigeria Congress Party; U.N.C.P, Reality Organization, Still-born New Era, People's Democratic Party; P.D.P., as a Commissioner in Abia State Local Government Service Commission, and a two-time Special Adviser on Grass-roots' Mobilization. I know him as a man who is always economical with the truth. He may even claim not to know me before giving me appointments. After all, he has claimed that he only ran into Chief T.A. Orji. To prove my assertion that Kalu is an unrepentant liar, in the Guardian interview he said former President Olusegun Obasanjo called his mother to 'change his (Orji's governorship) candidacy to one of my brothers'. The question one may need to ask is; could Chief Obasanjo have called, Eunice to change the candidacy of Chief T.A Orji on the platform of People's Progressive Alliance when Baba was very busy with his P.D.P? Does Kalu want to accuse Baba of anti-Party activities or, as usual, he just wants to insult him?
Kalu claimed he is not corrupt and that he is known the world over. I am not an anti-graft agent so I will not say much on that except to remind him that he is currently being prosecuted on charges of corruption and since the matter is in the court of competent jurisdiction and, therefore, subjudice, he should be disciplined enough to allow the court run its course and, thereafter, Nigerians will know whether he is corrupt or otherwise. Declaring himself as not being corrupt before the court passes its verdict amounts, in my opinion as a lay man, to contempt of the judicial process.
Kalu claimed he has a house in London, which he bought in February 1992 and one in Victoria Island, Lagos, which he bought 1986. These are false claims by Kalu. He never owned any property in either Lagos or London before he became a governor. If he is not telling lies, let us go to Lagos and London and verify his claims. Kalu was not a man of substantial wealth before becoming a governor. The only thing he does very well is to lay claims to what he does not have. Kalu has also been telling people who do not know him well that he built his camp Nenya country-home in Igbere before' becoming a governor. This is naked lie. He started the project only in 2000, some months after his election.
Kalu's insinuation that he 'needed our governor to give qualitative leadership" is the imagination of a man that is both mentally and spiritually demented. There is no basis for comparison between Chief T.A. Orji and Orji Kalu. The governor is known to have been born and bred in a family that was not only associated with wealth, as his father; late Chief Tom Ikoro Orji, was a very influential colonial warrant chief who built the first storey building in Umuahia as early as the 1930s but was highly acclaimed for her insistence on discipline. The marital relationship that existed between the late father of the governor and his late mother was the envy of their neighborhood. Can Kalu tell us whom his father was and the relationship that existed between his father and mother? Chief T.A. Orji went through the rungs of fine academic upbringing; the primary school, the secondary school, Higher School Certificate; H.S.C and the University of Ibadan. After his National Youth Service, he sought for and obtained a gainful employment, where he distinguished himself as a career civil servant and got to the climax of his career and retired as a Permanent Secretary. Who is Orji Kalu, who has no pedigree, to say that Governor T.A. Orji 'was nothing and he made him Chief of Staff?' Kalu is just suffering from mental dilapidation.
The Minister of Information; Mr. Labaran Maku, who was on a tour of good governance to Abia State went round the state and saw, not heard, what Ochendo has prudently done with the very meagre resources of the State. We all know Maku as one Nigerian who does not hide his feelings. In the case of Abia State, the Minister, during a Town-Hall meeting with Abians at Michael Okpara Auditorium, Umuahia expressed satisfaction with the numerous achievements of Governor T.A. Orji. The National President of Nigerian Union of Journalists; Mallam Mohammed Garba, openly confessed that Abia State, under Governor T.A. Orji, had been grossly under reported. So, what nonsense is Kalu talking about qualitative leadership? Can be spell qualitative?
Kalu also said he is putting together an organization known as 'Njiko Igbo'. According to him, he wants to use the forum to advance the interest of Ndi Igbo. My reaction to this is that the worst insult that can be metted to the Igbo nation in this nuclear age is for anybody to think that they could listen to a man whose stock-in-trade is only deceit and opportunism. Orji Kalu has nothing to offer the modern man. Has he been able to put his family, in order? For the eight years he supposedly governed Abia State, did anybody see his wife Ifeoma? His mother, who introduced 'mamacracy' in the state, which we have successfully killed, shamelessly acted as his "first lady'.
Kalu's purported re-entry into P.D.P is to forment trouble against President Jonathan who has one hundred percent support of Governor T.A. Orji and Abia P.D.P. This is why he is attacking the Nigerian army so that they could-be withdrawn from the streets of Abia so that he could re-introduce kidnapping which Governor T.A. Orji has successfully stopped. He should, however, realize that as long as P.D.P in Abia State is concerned, he will remain a leprous vagabond.
Chief (Sir) Don Ubani; KSC, JP, Don Ubani is a Principal Stakeholder in Abia Politics.

Abia Begs For More NDDC Projects

Posted by: Our Reporter on February 19, 2013 in News Leave a comment

As the senate committee on the Niger Delta visits Abia state to inspect NDDC projects as part of its oversight function, the state governor, chief Theodore Orji has asked the committee to site more projects in the state.

One of such projects he said was very dear to the people of the state was an incinerator in Aba the commercial nerve centre of the state to cater for the huge volume of waste produced daily in the city.

The governor who noted that the project keeps reappearing in the NDDC budget regretted that noting concrete has been done in that respect.

He stated that other projects like water, good roads, irrigation, sanitation etc were also needed in the state.

He solicited for early passage of NDDC budget and funding of projects as well as the consideration of Abia unemployed youths in the training and retraining programme of the NDDC and described the commission as a veritable partner in progress with the oil producing states.

Earlier in his speech, the chairman of the senate committee on the Niger Delta, senator James Manager explained that their oversight activities covers the NDDC,the Niger Delta ministry and thethe Amnesty programme adding that the committee had visited Rivers, Bayelsa and Delta states.

He said that they were in the state to see things for themselves and to ensure that what is budgeted is actually channeled into projects and stated the readiness of the senate to complement the executive.

He commended the governor for doing well in the area of security and assured that they will present their findings in the floor of the senate.

HE, Chief T.A. Orji speech at the 7th Joint World Bank/FGN FADAMA Project.




AN ADDRESS BY HIS EXCELLENCY, CHIEF T. A. ORJI (OCHENDO), EXECUTIVE GOVERNOR ABIA STATE, ON THE OCCASION OF A COURTESY CALL TO GOVERNMENT HOUSE, OF THE 7TH JOINT WORLD BANK/FGN SUPERVISION MISSION ON THIRD FADAMA DEVELOPMENT PROJECT, HOLDING AT THE EXCO CHAMBERS OF GOVERNMENT HOUSE, UMUAHIA, ON THE 18TH DAY OF FEBRUARY, 2013





PROTOCOLS





DISTINGUISHED LADIES AND GENTLEMEN!



It is indeed a great pleasure to welcome all of you to Abia State on this memorable occasion of the Seventh Joint World Bank/FGN Supervision Mission on Third National Fadama Development Project, covering the South-East Zone, and holding in our Abia State.

For us, this marks another milestone in the history of our several fruitful collaborations with the World Bank and the Federal Government of Nigeria, in our passion to quickly develop Abia State



I want to say a big welcome to the World Bank and the FGN Teams for the deep interest you continue to show in Abia, ‘God’s Own State’, especially for giving us this singular honor and privilege to host this august gathering. To the officials of our Sister States who are participating in this epoch-making event, I say ‘Nnoonu, Unu Abiala!’



You will recall that just a few weeks ago, our State played host to the Good Governance Team of the Federal Government, led by the Honorable Minister of Information, Mr Labaran Maku. It is instructive to note that our many legacy projects inspected by that team, truly attested to our Government’s sincere desire to transform our State and make a difference.



But I can clearly state here that some of these acclaimed legacy projects will not achieve their full effects, without a sustained healthy and well-fed citizenry, which the FADAMA Projects seek to emphasize.



Therefore, the agricultural sector and other goals of the FADAMA Projects will remain in the front burner of our march towards transforming Abia State.



I acknowledge the noble objectives of FADAMA, which is targeted at the rural poor. This is why our Government had taken the lead in quickly keying into the programme, when it was launched at the Federal level. We had immediately released N15 million Naira as our preparatory FADAMA Project-fund in 2009.



We will continue to honor our obligations in-spite of the paucity of funding, and I have directed the Accountant General of our State to make all outstanding remittances to Abia State FADAMA 111, without further delays, beginning from the end of February, 2013.



I have also been reliably informed of the high level of commitment of our Local Government Areas to ensure the success of the project in Abia State, and our Ministry of Local Government and Chieftaincy Affairs, has been accordingly instructed to ensure that all funds accruing to the FADAMA 111 project from the LGAs, be deducted at source, in order to ensure a steady cash-flow into the project.



It has been of immense joy to see the huge impact that Abia State FADAMA 111 is making in the lives of our people, especially through the sub-projects that are spread throughout the State. I therefore make bold to say that the Agricultural Revolution, which we have embarked in this State, has received a great push from FADAMA 111 projects, and will be absolutely incomplete without them.



Our Administration is committed to transforming the agricultural sector of our State and Nation’s economies, and in line with the visions of the Federal Government. This is why Abia State wasted no time in accessing and disbursing to genuine farmers, the N1 billion agric-loan backed up by the FGN/CBN efforts. We have equally continued to provide some improved cocoa seedlings, fertilizer and other required agro-inputs to our farmers to improve farm products.



Right now, we have commenced the establishment of our Liberation Farm Projects in our 17 Local Government Areas of the State. This is to revive interests of the youth in farming and create young agro-entrepreneurs. We have equally continued to make remarkable efforts in our rural infrastructure to help drive rural development, create wealth, and raise the level of food security in our State.



Finally, I wish to most sincerely, commend the World Bank/FGN Team for this initiative, and appeal to you to ensure the project is extended for its immense benefits to our citizens, and especially in sustaining the agricultural value chains we have commenced building for the sustainable development of our State.



On this note, I wish you a very fruitful deliberation in all your subsequent sessions while in the State. May God guide and protect you throughout your stay in Abia State.



Thank you and God bless Nigeria!

Abia State and her challenges...Bridging the Gap.
Although the State has challenges because for the first time in the history of the state, the foundation for the take of a modern is being laid by Governor T. A. Orji. But some of the reaction has been relatively hysterical and un constructive.
You read people that are not on ground criticizing our Governor too quickly. There are people out there telling false stories about Gov T. A Orji and the State.
It does not help much. I have been extremely disappointed by some of the comments by those who will not acknowledge the progress made so far by the Governor. Aba for instance, used to have several inappropriate dump sites. Now one can drive from Osisioma to Alaoji Aba/ PH express way without covering his or nose. Umuahia was commended as one of the cleanest capitals in Nigeria by the Labaran Maku led NGGTOUR. Environmentally, the State has been cleaned up to promote healthy environment. Security is no more a major challenge as security measures put in place are yielding very positive outcome. Abia State remains the most peaceful State in Nigeria. New Structures in the health sector, commerce, education and other infrastructural development are being developed to drive sustainable development in the state. To promote commerce and Industry while encouraging Small and Medium scale Enterprises. Today, Abia State began the first made in Abia products exhibition. It's hard time we begin to promote our State and the entire Igboland, having in mind the progress made so far and challenges common amongst States. Rome was never built in a day. Abia State is in safe Hands. Thank you.

Nnaji Obed Asiegbu

Medical Council begins Accreditation of Abia Specialist Hospital
ABIA SPECIALIST HOSPITAL UMUAHIA ABIA STATE

The medical and Dental council of Nigeria has commenced the process of accrediting the Abia specialist and Diagnostic centre for the purpose of training house doctors.
The Registrar of the council, Dr. Abdumuminu Ibrahim and the team leader,prof. Wole Atoyebi who spoke in Umuahia when the accreditation team paid a courtesy visit on the governor said they were in the state on the invitation of the state government to look at the facilities at the specialist and Diagnostic center and the Amachara EYE CENTRE FOR ABIA STATE SPECIALIST HOSPITAL UMUAHIA. ABIA STATEspecialist hospital in the state for the purpose of internship for medical graduates.
They commended the government for upgrading the facilities at the specialist hospital for training adding that the decision of the government to provide a place of training for medical interns is laudable.
According to them, the team in line with the policy of the council will look at the facilities on ground, personnel, provision of accommodation for house officers after which they will send their report and disclosed that the council is eager to get more places for new medical graduates to train.
In his remark, governor Theodore Orji said that there are many Abia sons and daughters willing to become medical doctors hence the need for the government to provide a place of training for them.
Chief Orji stated that his administration places priority on the health sector and maintained that a major part of its resources have been channeled towards provision of healthcare for the people.
According to him, the state needs doctors and paramedics to man the 250 health centers built by his government and pointed out that his administration has been doing its best in terms of provision of medical facilities, personnel and accommodation for the doctors.

People have been misinforming the public on a so called Miss Purity contest which was said to be promoted by the governor of Abia state,but the truth is there was never a car gift by the governor to any winner of the so called Miss Purity. And the Governor never sanctioned such contest. Please be well informed. The said Purity Organization is an NGO led by Mothers working to protect the girl child from unwanted pregnancies and diseases. The government of Abia State never promoted such contest

People have been misinforming the public on a so called Miss Purity contest which was said to be promoted by the governor of Abia state,but the truth is there was never a car gift by the governor to any winner of the so called Miss Purity. And the Governor never sanctioned such contest. Please be well informed. The said Purity Organization is an NGO led by Mothers working to protect the girl child from unwanted pregnancies and diseases. The government of Abia State never promoted such contest

abia is peaceful...we don't support this claim
......