AS ANAMBRA STATE TURNS 20

The division of Nigeria over time into multiple states has been informed not less by the underlying urge of the arbitrating power at each prevailing time to curry subtle political gains than by the genuine recognition of the people's honest clamour for making the benefits of smaller states more reachable.

These two features, to various degrees, collaborated in the creation of Anambra State. While the people indigenous to the state nurtured the idea of a new state, it took the benevolent warrant of the then military Head of State, General Ibrahim Babangida, for the geographical enclave to be declared a political entity on the 27th day of August, 1991.

The growth and experiences of the state have been anything but usual. At early infancy, Anambra State could be likened to a traumatized child; no eventful mark of selfhood was impressed on the landscape, except perhaps the fact of its geo-political delineation as a distinct entity among Nigeria's comity of states.

The ill luck of sustained military rule, with its characteristic profligacy in the first eight years of the state's creation (baring the colourless twenty two months civilian interregnum of Dr. Chukwuemeka Ezeife) ensured a malnourished and unstable infancy. Such was the gratuitous funfair in the state that while the gladiators increased, the polity maintained a steady decline towards oblivion. But for General Abdulsalam's vintage statesmanship in restoring democratic government in 1999, Anambra State would have literally turned a wasteland with piteous preys and insatiable predators.

The new democracy, born May 29th 1999, with Dr. Chinwoke Mbadinuju as the State Governor, dawned with reinvigorated hopes and fresh opportunities to recreate the state. But the rebirth process had to contend with the impetuosity of the beneficiaries of the military dispensation. These fellows with deep pockets and covetous love for naked power cashed in on the crass timidity of Mbadinuju's sense of governance, and abrasively intruded in the affairs of state.

The early sparks of enthusiasm which Dr. Mbadinuju exuded, more in lofty oratory than in positive acts, dimmed when it became too obvious that he lacked the political will to effectively discharge his responsibilities. His failure was total as he failed to lift the state from the doldrums where the military and its collaborators confined it. Neither government structures nor socio-economic infrastructures received any meaningful boosts. Reason was ignobly sacrificed at the altar of flippancy and sycophancy. It was therefore an extended round of bazaar for the inglorious cult of expanded government apologists. The glaring failure compelled the People's Democratic Party (PDP) to abandon Dr. Mbadinuju for a seemingly pragmatic Dr. Chris Ngige, with whom they sought re-election in 2003.

Thus went one decade and two of Anambra's early years; a period Ndi Anambra would have wished to reclaim but for the absoluteness of determined pasts.

As if the state was jinxed to reel in an unhealthy politics, PDP's Ngige was erroneously declared the winner of the 2003 Anambra State gubernatorial election. This was a blatant imposition on Anambrarians who overwhelmingly voted for Mr. Peter Obi of the All Progressive Grand Alliance - APGA. But for the defiance of Mr. Obi and the dedication of APGA leadership personified in their dogged National Chairman, Chief Victor Umeh, the historic legal battle which led to the epochal reformatory judgement that ruined the continued stay of Dr. Ngige as the governor would have been lost.

It is however pertinent to note that the three years (2003 - March, 2006) of Obi's struggle in court to free Anambra from INEC's treachery witnessed recognizable political activities in the state, albeit more in the realms of notoriety.

AsAnambra state turns 20 While Ngige enjoyed some appeal (nuisance-value, some would insist), largely for his efforts in roads construction, the fact of his malevolence, exemplified in his unenviable record of institutionalizing instability and anarchy in the polity, are not lost in the documentation of the history of Anambra State.

When the judiciary installed Mr. Peter Obi as the governor of the state in March, 2006, the spontaneous exultation among Ndi Anambra signaled high hopes and great expectations. Anambra State was born anew. For the critical realists however, anxiety welled up as they weighed the scary implications should Obi renege on his avowed social contract with the people. Awake to his responsibilities, Mr. Obi deployed all in his armoury towards a comprehensive enhancement of the state. He started first by exhorting Ndi Anambra to rediscover themselves and wriggle out of the psychological quagmire they had lived with in the years past.

A structural re-orientation programme was instituted to cleanse the contaminated world-view of Ndi Anambra and enable them both appreciate the unfolding development strides of the State Government and partner with it in making the state work. The launching of Anambra Integrated Development Strategy (ANIDS) marked a turning point in the history of Anambra State. Through ANIDS, all aspects of the state - health, education, sports, civil works, public utilities, government structures etc - simultaneously started feeling governance in terms of development.

This novel approach to governance in the state has attracted national as well as international appeals for the governor who has remained consistent in his determination to give the state a credible, purposeful and model leadership. The transparency of the governor has led to the amazing presence of myriad of foreign donor agencies: the World Bank, UNDP, WHO, UNICEF etc who are all partnering with the state government to improve the lives of the people.

Mr. Obi's continued acceptance by his people was loudly attested to when in the gubernatorial election of February 6, 2010, they generously recharged his mandate to further administer the state for the next four years. The Governor has long ceased to sulk over the mismanagement of the early years of the state, as he battles favourably with the daunting challenges of strategically positioning the state in the forefront among the few states nationwide whose surefooted march towards virile statehood is both incontrovertible and unassailable.

Okechukwu Anarado writes from Adazi-Nnukwu.