Basi Okoh
So many have asked the question why the public hearing on the bill for the creation of Anioma State has been taken to Uyo. An important reason for that move to Uyo, Akwa Ibom state is the fact of the received threat of disruption of the proceedings if held in Asaba. That threat of disruption is real and is now being planned to take place in Uyo, the venue of the public hearing.
Brigands are being recruited for the purpose and disrupters are being rehearsed and prepared for the encounter. So while the people of Anioma are joyful for the positive development on the creation of the cherished Anioma State, some persons using surrogates are organizing themselves to upend it.
It is on record that the members of the Delta House of Assembly have vehemently refused to sign on the papers for creation of Anioma State. They have insisted that they cannot sign the papers until they have the permission of the Governor Sheriff Oborevwori and the ex-governor Dr. Ifeanyi Okowa. Some of them have leaked the fact of Dr. Okowa giving them instruction not to sign.
Meanwhile, ex-governor Ifeanyi Okowa has expressed publicly that he supports the creation of Anioma State but his subterranean actions and activities, out of public view, has shown a deep animosity to the project.
Dr Okowa would not support Anioma State because he hates the leadership and efforts of Prince Ned Nwoko, which exposed his own leadership weaknesses. He has taken Ned Nwoko as a rival for political influence in Anioma and therefore an enemy. Working with Okowa, Governor Oborevwori is the one who expressed that he can never live to see his kingdom divided during his tenure, that Ned Nwoko’s main interest is to divide the state, reduce his influence and take away the only senatorial district of the state that he won in the last governorship election. So both men have been mounting the propaganda that Ned Nwoko is scamming the people of Delta North and that Anioma state will not be created. These disruptive talk has permeated their social media groups and helped plant cynicism in the very popular Anioma cause.
Okowa and Sheriff are playing on these doubts by Anioma people and the rest of Nigeria about the capability of a civilian government to create states. The process, everyone says, is long, arduous and raucous. So the settled belief is that only a military government can ignore the political rifts and create states by mere pronouncement. But that has brought its own troubles as states have been created embedded with deeper political issues. Take Kaduna state with a Christian South and Muslim North that don’t act together. The Midwest Region was created by a civilian government and remains till today the only legally created entity in Nigeria that followed due process.
In every social media group in the Anioma area, you have a very active cell of naysayers to the creation of Anioma State, but the youth of the state, taking the gauntlet, have organized a powerful pushback and mounted from every corner of the proposed state, a robust challenge to drown out the voices of the naysayers. The people now embrace the optimism that Anioma State will be created.
Now these active cells of naysayers are to be recruited to form the arrowhead of disrupters of the public hearing at Uyo. No longer members of the PDP and not yet APC, Okowa and PDP social media rats are without definition and affiliation. They are now confused about where to take their loyalties.
Okowa is from Anioma but Sheriff Oborevwori is Urhobo in Central Delta. Both are fighting to stop the creation of Anioma in order not to be separated, as separation will likely end their individual political careers. Sheriff lost the 2023 election in Delta South and Central and cannot win 2027 election there. Okowa can no longer wield influence or have relevance and access to power in the new Anioma, particularly if he doesn’t help in its creation. So Ifeanyi Okowa has set himself against the progress of his Anioma people and he is joined in this self-abuse by Governor Sheriff Oborevwori governor of Delta state to undermine the will of the Anioma people to have their state.
Okowa’s instruction that no member of the House of Assembly sign the state creation papers as required in the legislative process for state creation puts him down as a historical opponent to the will and vested interests of his own people.
No member of the Delta State House of Assembly has as of yet signed those papers. So it is imperative that constituents of these legislators make them sign the papers if they want Anioma State to be created. The peoples’ will must be made to prevail, not Okowa or Sheriffs’. In every constituency and every Local government, the Assembly man must be compelled to obey the will of the people and sign the documents. Okowa must no longer be allowed to thrive on his mischief against his own people and deny the them their due development.
The traditional rulers of Anioma have signed on for Anioma State to be created. The Council Chairmen have also signed on but members of the Delta State House of Assembly are waiting for the say-so of two men who have refused to say so. Their insistence on signing only on the instructions of Ifeanyi Okowa and Sheriff Oborevwori who have refused to give such instruction, tells of the story of underlying conspiracy and sabotage. As at the time of writing this, no member of the Delta State House of Assembly has on the papers for the creation of Anioma State. They must be made to comply.
Anioma people have always wanted Anioma State, but the fear of the unknown and the doubts in the possibility of its creation, as they have been inundated with the impossibility of its creation had made caution the wiser counsel. The public hearing will re-awaken the keen interest of the people and raise the momentum and intensity of the agitation by also raising the public awareness for it. So we await the public hearing at Uyo.
@basilokoh
