I find it extremely laughable when some people describe Chijioke Edoga as a Labour Party man as though being a Labour Party man is like removing one dress and putting on another. When are we going to learn our lesson?
In Britain, Labour Party is the party of the masses, of the ordinary people. British Labour Party is considered welfarist: mass housing, free universal healthcare, free education etc. In fact, the universal free healthcare, which the British people enjoy today became a reality in 1948 under Labour Party Government with Aneurin Bevan as the Labour Party Minister of Health.
In the US, the Democrats are analogous to the British Labour Party. The idea of OBAMACARE, for example, was to make healthcare available to poor Americans. So, Labour Party all over the world is aligned to the masses, and to the poor. Labour is centrally about the working class. It is an ideology, not an emergency survival mechanism.
In Nigeria, we describe Peter Obi as a Labour Party man because all his life he has been very close to the masses: as an employer of Labour, he is a poverty alleviation champion; as a philanthropist, he has invested so heavily in the development of our hospitals and schools; as a youth empowerment driver,
Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC), Trade Union Congress (TUC) and indeed most Labour Unions in Nigeria endorsed and supported Peter Obi, not because he scampered to Labour, but because his life bears out Labour ideology.
Where does Chijioke Edoga fit in all this? Nowhere at all! Chijioke Edoga has never belonged to the working-class, and has never managed any business, and so has never created jobs, and by that fact he is not an employer of labour. Edoga is not a philanthropist, and he is not known to run any Foundation or to be donating to any charity cause. He has not built one school in Isi-Uzo, or invested a dime in the cottage hospital in his LGA.
He is historically a non-performer, and has never distinguished himself in any office, whether as SSA to the President, or House of Reps Member, or Commissioner. He is glaringly incompetent, and cannot take Enugu anywhere beyond payment of salaries and tarring a few kilometres of roads.
Chijioke Edoga cannot become a performer overnight because he has never been one. Since the campaign began what has he told us about ICT, Job creation, agro-allied industrialisation, commerce, roads? He is just an average politician, and cannot by any means be compared to a sparkling entrepreneur such as Peter Mbah.
Labour is an attitude, it’s a way of life, a world-view. It is not a dress or a tag that you put on when you need it, and remove when it is no longer needed.
On the contrary, Peter Ndubuisi Mbah’s life and career are in tune with the philosophy of Labour. He left Government to build a private business from scratch; and became an outstanding success making him the leading employer of labour in Nigeria’s Oil and Gas Sector, and a poverty alleviation champion.
Peter Mbah has donated magnificent edifices to academic institutions like the Law Auditorium at Godfrey Okoye University or the sprawling buildings donated to several churches. Mbah built schools for the community and invested in hospital projects in his community.
Ndubuisi Mbah had devoted himself to human development a long time before he showed interest in Enugu State Governorship election. That makes him a Labour man, one who is particularly committed to human welfare.
With Peter Mbah, we are on the verge of a new era. Let’s not be deceived by emergency labour man.
Dr Hyginus Eze
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