Revolutionizing the South East – Abia set the rules
By Njoku SaintJerry A.
Leadership genuinely committed to the welfare of its citizens and organized environment suitable for living, commerce and industry remains the criteria to rebuild Nigeria’s industrial region and center of SMEs’ and Abia State under the leadership of Gov Alex Otti (OFR) has set the rules to achieve that milestone without undue politicizing of the socio-economic situation of the region.
The common cries has always been ‘marginalization and non-alignment’ with federal government provisions distributed to other regions excluding the South East which on many occasion has continue to serve the sole political narratives leaders of the South East stock has lay hold on as cause for the lingering underdevelopment of the region while exonerating themselves of the responsibility of leadership the electorates has bestowed upon them to build their own homeland.
The Otti’s Labour party led administration in recent years till date has proved that whatsoever political leaders and people of the region has laid claim as reason for the underdevelopment and lack of federal presence in the South East is redeemable under conscientious and sincere leadership.
Beginning from road infrastructure, (one of Nigeria’s unending nightmare), education, healthcare, fiscal responsibility and the welfare of people of the region whose primary activity is woven around commerce and industry.
It is not enough to make campaign promises, represent your political party as a good politician and prove your loyalty to the ruling Abuja forces in order to attract development to your region, that has become one of the false narratives of political administrations both past and present, therefore you see the governor exerts excess energy in building elaborate government house to impress Abuja, gifting luxury cars to supporters, always at a knee-jerk beck and call of Abuja to exemplify his loyalty to the Center even at the security risk and environmental decay of his region.
The man at the helm of affairs in his State must have the political will to put the people first and deliver a service-oriented leadership. That is what the Abia State government under Gov Alex Otti has done to gain prominence and admiration from his people.
In setting the rules, the governor has demonstrated a consistent commitment in the service of governance beginning from what matters most to the citizenry and development peculiarity of the region and that is commerce, industry and agriculture.
The road infrastructure revolution embarked upon by the governor has remained a primary concern previous political leaders has merely used to deceive the people just to get their votes and abandon everything under the excuses of federal related infrastructure and state-owned infrastructure.
If the South East must overcome its acclaimed marginalization and federal government negligence, its political leaders must adopt the Alex Otti principle of economic and social development. It would be clear to state that, there is nothing that the claim of ‘federal negligence’ of regional infrastructures in the South East will bring other than more complains and deeper rot.
Minister of Works under the ruling APC at the center Mr. Dave Umahi visited Abia State in the month of June 2025 and could not hide his admiration of the Gov Otti’s administration for the initiative and responsibility to reconstruct key federal roads in the state. More so, it must be made clear that, each so ‘acclaimed’ federal roads runs across a state in the South East and connects to roads leading to our communities, market places and farmlands and the primary users are not the elites and residents in Abuja but majority of residents and visitors to Abia and other South Eastern regions.
Another revolutionary impact the Gov Otti’s administration has brought into governance in the region is the rule of law and order, fiscal discipline and accountability. In Aba, you do not eat or drink and carelessly throw your refuse into the street, you will be arrested.
There is a standing rule of operation for articulated vehicles driving in the city, you break the rule, your vehicle will be seized, and you pay a heavy fine before it is returned to you, you destroy any public facility, you will be arrested, repair the broken facility and fined for your lawless behavior and citizens have been made aware of the presence of a functional government by this lawful activities.
This is the same law the Nigeria government even Lagos state with all its ubiquitous task force has found so herculean or near impossible to implement, in Broad daylight, you will see articulated vehicles loaded with fuel and loose containers of goods, struggling for space with Tricycles and Commuter buses in heavy populated market areas, despite they have existing laws that bans this lawless behaviors.
In Abia State, you will not see that happen anymore neither will you see the taskforce contribute to the lawless behavior of individuals who are accustomed to break the rules and order.
To buy a clean iced fish, open the gills. The popular truth remains, the fish begin to rot from the head, The Governor Otti administration had begun with a sanitized civil service structure where ministries, parastatals and government workers are trained to replicate what the Governor is doing with governance, you cannot get such quality result of governance if the political leadership is disconnected from the realities of life of the ordinary civil servants, farmers, the business people and residents – these are the primary economic drivers of the South East, industrious and focused in every little endeavor they found honorable to do and taking them for granted or abandoning them to fate is one of the greatest undoing of most South east political leaders.
Majority of people of the South East resident in Lagos and Abuja are relocating to Abia State because of the organized environmental system the leadership of Gov Alex Otti administration has set in place. Of a certainty, loopholes do exist but the primary responsibility of governance must be accountable to the people and such accountability is only measurable by what we see and not mere propaganda.
In Abia State today, you are bound to see measurable outcomes of a government that is working for the people and not entertaining the media with political jargons and rhetoric on what is not visible anywhere
One of the greatest challenges of the future in this side of the world is sustainability of any progress covered at any phase of our lifetime, the Otti’s administration in Abia may have begun a new phase of governance, political leaders in the region should emulate, but his administration is constitutionally tenured and continuing in this momentum will definitely pose the big question when his curtains are drawn.
On that basis, the government had organized and set up a futuristic replacement strategy under a programme initiated by the Otti’s administration, the Abia Leadership Academy, an immersive in-residence programme deliberately designed to usher in and expose young people into the realities of politics of good governance and economic development.
The programme, designed to train over 1,000 young people of Abia state origin, is aimed to prepare them for the demands of leadership in a country that appears to be sleeping while the world is on speed with technology and development.
It is obvious, if political leaders of the South East stock do not have the discipline to abide by their own rules of responsible governance and engagement with the citizenry but will rather be pursuing vain validation by the Abuja power block, party loyalty and vain self-importance in the midst of growing insecurity in the land and the ‘acclaimed underdevelopment and neglect’ of the South East by the Federal government, they will remain isolated and abandoned.
Abia State under Gov. Alex Otti is in the news today because he dares to do things differently for the people first and for his homeland before any political appendages, although a dauting decision, this is the origin of development and economic revival in the New Abia.
Njoku SaintJerry A is the Nigeria Ambassador State of African Diaspora and State Publicity Secretary LP, Abia, He writes from Ohafia