Recently Governor Rochas Okorocha of
Imo State was quoted to have told
State House Correspondents in Abuja
that whoever will take over from him
as governor may be stoned by the
people of his performance falls below
the standard he has set. His words: “I
am in this job not for the profit of it,
but for the honour and glory of the
job.
So I want to leave a legacy. I want Imo
people to miss me and they will
definitely miss me. Believe you me, they
have not seen such developmental
work before now and they will miss it.
“The only problem I have is that
anybody that comes after me and does
not perform will be stoned.
Because you cannot come to Imo State
now and say you want to abolish free
education from primary to university,
they will not accept that. I have spoilt
Imo people believe me.” However,
Sunday Telegraph learnt from multiple
sources in the state that the governor
may be stoned when he loses his
immunity in 2019, even as they noted
that the governor has set the state
further back in development.
The All Progressives Congress (APC)
Senatorial candidate for Owerri
Senatorial District in the 2015 General
election and former member of the
Federal House of Representatives, Hon.
Uche Onyeagucha, called on Governor
Rochas Okorocha to start sewing his
prison uniform, saying he will
definitely end up in jail when he lives
office in 2019 for allegedly looting the
state treasury. The APC chieftain, who
said that he was miffed by the alleged
comment by the governor that he has
spoilt Imo people with projects,
accused the governor of littering the
state with hundreds of abandoned
projects.
“I was a senatorial candidate, I should
be a leader in APC, while Rochas
should be in prison for the way and
manner he has looted Imo State. He
should rather be sewing his prison
uniform. This is a person who has
never gone on any commercial flight
since he became governor; he has
been travelling around on private jet at
the state’s expanse.”
Onyeagucha, who is also a civil rights
lawyer, said that it is time for the
deceit unleashed on Imo people by the
governor to stop.
He said, “What is this nonsense? He
said he built this and that in the state.
Is it Concord Hotel which he renovated,
Ikemba Ojukwu Centre was built by
Mbakwe and he renovated it; the Imo
State Commissioners’ Quarters, he just
changed the roof and renovated it; the
State Secretariat was built by Chief
Achike Udenwa, he changed the roof
when there was no need for that.
Today, there are many leaky roofs at
the secretariat.
Avutu poultry, which he renovated, has
collapsed under one year. At the
appropriate time, Imo people will
beam to the world, the many grisly
misdeeds of this cruel administration.
“When we in APC went on campaign,
we said we will build factories,
industries, and create jobs.
That is what we promised, even on
billboards then. When I told him he is a
fraud, he removed them and changed
the message. Show me one factory
built by Rochas and I will apologise. No
block industry, no toothpick industry,
no sachet water industry just the ones
that could be built with little amount,
none! “He has deceived our people for
too long, he has bamboozled them
with lies, and we have tolerated it long
enough.”
While there have been many
allegations of nepotism to the extent
that juicy positions have allegedly been
cornered by family members and
kinsmen, an Owerri based medical
doctor, Dr. Uzo Ewuru, added that the
state has become a home of
abandoned projects.
According to him, not too long ago,
the governor announced with pomp
and fanfare, the commencement of a
state carrier, Imo Air which flew few
weeks after the ceremony and
stopped operation.
“It appears the carrier has gone the
way of many other abandoned
projects littered all over the state.”
Ewuru also said that the moribund
multi-billion naira Imo Modern Poultry,
Avutu, built by the administration of
late Governor Sam Mbakwe, which
news went round before the 2015
election that its revitalisation process
was almost completed (with a giant
signboard erected at the Amambakwe
Junction announcing the completion
of the project then), has turned out to
be a ruse, even as the entire complex
has remained the massive forest that
has overgrown the place since its
abandonment in the 80s.
Governor Rochas Okorocha’s mega
project, the 44 City Gates, which
gulped hundreds of millions of naira,
has long been forgotten by the
administration.
This is even as the governor’s Young
Scientists College has joined the long
list of the white elephant projects the
governor will launch with fanfare but
not complete, 20 months to the end of
his administration.
