The above titled press release by one Chief Emeka Kalu, which has been sponsored by former Governor Orji Uzor Kalu to appear in the Sun Newspaper of 7th September 2017, betrayed Emeka as a man who is comfortable with lies and half truths.
While he unashamedly claimed that Orji Uzor’s administration did not owe workers, it is interesting to note that Sun newspaper, published by Orji Uzor Kalu, recently carried a report titled “Abia pensioners beg Ikpeazu over arrears”.
Part of that report published in the Sun Newspaper of 1st July 2017 and later republished by other mainstream and online media houses reads:
“Rising from a meeting at Umuahia Sub-Treasury Hall, the pensioners outlined debts owed as pension harmonisation arrears, five and half years pension arrears to retired primary school teachers from June 2002 to August 2007 and gratuities which had been outstanding since 1999.”
Who was Governor of Abia State from 1999 to 2007?
The answer is Orji Uzor Kalu.
The same Orji Uzor Kalu left a debt of N29.9b for the incoming Ochendo T A Orji’s administration in 2007. made up of borrowings from banks, outstanding salaries and money owed contractors.
How then can someone claim that he remembers “vividly that during Orji Uzor Kalu administration salaries were not owned and the civil servants receives their salaries with 25th and 26th of every month, the administration never borrowed money”?
By the way, under which political party did the so called Chief Emeka C Kalu contest the 2015 polls as Governorship candidate? An aspirant can never be same with a candidate and we know who the defeated candidate of APGA was in 2015.
The Emeka C Kalu (ECK) we know is a well known “gamji” politician who thrives on patronage by political desperadoes and losers for survival. At the beginning of Governor Ikpeazu’s administration, up to December 2016, he tried severally to attach himself to the Governor whom he sent several messages to praise as the best leader ever in Abia State.
One of his messages reads as follows:
“You have shown leadership, I applaud you for that, please keep up the Good work you are doing for ndi Abia.”
That the Governor was unwilling to allow him to attach his corrupt pipe to the state’s purse is possibly responsible for his new song and allegiance to serially defeated politicians of yesteryears.
Same Emeka Kalu sent the following message to the Governor in the heat of the matter between Uche Ogah and the Governor.
“My Governor, I will like to do a Press conference in Abia , concerning the Ilegal act of Uche Orga (Ogah), and some un serious Politicians , that have Plotted to disrupt our Dear State ,doing this i will have some students up to 1000 of them standing in fron of Government house , for the Press Release, Remember , this will also inform our people that reasonable Abia Sons , have rebuked that act , despite the fact that i cam out to run the same time Uche came out , under APGA, prior Alex Otti, ,it will make sence in the state, and i will also inform Ndi Abia that ,Ogah does not have, what it takes to be the chief servant of our Dear state. let me know if you approve that”
Of course the Governor refused to approve that request because he prefers to focus on his job rather than arrange “paid per person” crowds and press conferences at the expense of more urgent needs of our people.
If the reason for the emergence of the new Emeka Kalu, who obviously got the aides of a failed Abia North Senatorial candidate to write his so called press release while he was in the United State of America, was the refusal of the Governor to approve the request, the Governor has no apologies.
I wish him luck with his new victims.
Let it be known that all those conspiring against the people of Abia State because they are afraid that the projects that will be implemented with the AfDB loans will establish Abia on the rapid development map and end their desperate ambitions to rule the people of the state will be disgraced.
It is public knowledge that the state Government have prudently and transparently managed all the resources that accrued to the state and have not shied away from fully disclosing to the people of the state.
Reports released in 2016 by the Debt Management Office (DMO) of the Presidency showed that Abia was among the least indebted states with about N6b loan exposure which have since been retired by the Ikpeazu administration.
AfDB officials had access to and reviewed all the necessary information on Abia State’s finances before approving the $200b facility. Who then is Emeka Kalu and his likes to speak on whether the state should borrow for infrastructure development or not?
Shame to desperate politicians who continue to put their personal ambitions above the interest of the people of Abia State. If only they realize that the projects they are praising at neighboring states were executed with low interest foreign loans, such as the facility Abia State Government is seeking, they will judge themselves as enemies of the people of Abia state.
Of all the states that received approval to borrow from the National Assembly which other state are we reading about opposition politicians making baseless noise against their facility?
Emeka Kalu and his sponsors should wait for 2019 to come before unleashing their lies and deceits on the people of Abia North and the rest of the state. When it is time the people will choose again and those who have lost before will surely lose again.
Abians know who is who, beyond the noise.
-Ikechukwu Iroha wrote from Umuahia
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