Lawrence Nwimo, Awka
The failure of South-East governors to form a common front towards the implementation of key regional initiatives was Thursday blamed for the continued struggles and underdevelopment of the region.
The Executive Director of Development Specs Academy, Professor Okey Ikechukwu, who spoke at the Ikengaonline June TownHall meeting said the absence of the cohesive strategy and cooperation among the leaders is impeding coordinated efforts towards the region’s growth.
According to him, the disunity has led to fragmented approaches to governance and stalled the implementation of key developmental projects and initiatives that could have benefited people of the region.
Ikechukwu whose keynote centered on “The Performance of South-East Governors and Citizens’ Accountability Demands,” decried the existing hardship occasioned by the poor performance of leaders and poor accountability to the people.
He noted that the disunity among the leadership class has made it challenging to address common issues as infrastructure development, security, and economic growth, resulting in missed opportunities for the region to realise its full potential.
According to him,“The failure of the governors to see themselves as equals who are working for the benefit of the region is the problem we are having today. Some think why must the other be the one calling meetings.
“Senator Uche Ekwunife is the Director-General of the South-East Governors Forum but one wonders how many times the governors have met. Despite the forum, there is still no cohesion or unity of idea. The governors do not know each other’s view on the issues in the South-East.
“It is true that anyone can get what individual governors are doing no matter how senseless or sensible they are but the South-East position on issues is still lacking. They are also not in touch or support Ohanaeze.
“The last time that Ohanaeze Ndigbo organised a summit, no governor was in attendance. Apart from the host governor, the rest all sent their deputies to represent them. There was no Senator, no House of Assembly member, and even youths were not represented.”
He continued, “Last year, South-East governors held a security summit ostensibly to design a strategic outlook on policy on security that will design an umbrella template for the entire South-East region. To begin with, it was not all the governors that attended it. Secondly, the few that came arrived about three hours late; they were there when somebody made a speech and later, they came out, took pictures and left.
“In that summit, none of the governors heard what was said because the few that came left. As it stands, nothing from that summit has been deliberated upon by any governor as an individual or all of them put together.”
Ikechukwu said doing business in the South-East has become difficult due to the multiplicity of illegal taxes occasioned by the absence of clear policy on taxation, a balance between looking for taxes and creating an environment to make businesses viable.
On the growing erosion of values and morals, he accused religious leaders of abandoning their duties in church to pursue political gains. He also accused community leaders of abandoning their roles of safeguarding the culture of the land, calling for community engagements, cultural rebirth, value reorientation and regional reintegration to achieve a better governance system in the region.
