The Enugu State Local Government elections are slated for 21st September, 2024, across the 17 local governments of the state. The elctioneering process has begun, and the atmosphere is charged with political activities as the parties seek votes from the electorate, having chosen and elected their candidates: charmanship and councillorship candidates, in readiness for the elections.
Governor Peter Mbah of Enugu State is given to due process, and the processes leading to the local government elections have all been credible and in line with the Electoral Law of 2022. The electoral body responsible for the conduct of the election, Enugu State Independent Electoral Commission(ENSIEC), whose chairman is the erudite professor of Political Science, Professor Chris Ngwu, is well-prepared and ready for the conduct of free and fair elections. Professor Chris Ngwu and his commissioners at ENSIEC were appointed based on their proven track records of integrity, experience, objectivity, high inclination to justice, equity, and fairness, are poised to deliver creditably on the job. The Commission has lived up to its expectations, and the various parties obviously repose much confidence in it.
Governor Mbah wants free and fair elections, and so has explored every trajectory that would lead to credible local government elections in the state, such as are devoid of rancour, violence, and electoral malpractices.Everything is ready and the lines have fallen in pleasant places for all the parties: the ruling party in the state, the Peoples Democratic Party; the All Progressive Congress(APC), the Labour Party, the All Progressive Grand Alliance,(APGA) and others. There is this understanding of a level playing ground for the parties, and they are campaigning vigorously, seeking the votes of the people at the 17 local governments and the 260 wards of the state.
In all this, the PDP seems to have a wide edge over the other parties. It is not necessarily because it is the ruling party. Far be it! The PDP, among the other prominent parties in the state, is the only one whose house is in order. The party had recently and successfully concluded party congresses at the state, local government, and ward levels, leading to the emergence of new party executives at these three levels. The congresses were peaceful, and the outcomes were acceptable to members of the party. All this could not have been possible without the uncommon leadership abilities of the leader of the party in the state, Governor Mbah, who was able to galvernise the party into a common front, cohesively bound together.
For the APC in Enugu State, it appears an inauspicious moment for elections. Besides the economic situation that seems to have defied the reformative efforts of the APC-led presidency at the centre, the party is factionalized in the state. It is like the two knives in Odobo's house. The one with a hilt has no sharp edge; the one with a sharp edge has no hilt. Okoro cannot see, and Ugwuoke is deaf. The electorate has no inclination to think in the direction of the party. The economy is biting hard, and the people are hungry. Food inflation has hit rooftops, as transportation costs get unbearably uncommatable, following the removal of fuel subsidy and the resultant effects of unprecedented high cost of petroleum pruducts, especially PMS.The glaring incompetence and mismanagement of the APC in Enugu State by those on whom its leadership is thrust is yet again the bane.
Labour Party in Enugu State clearly lives in its short-lived past glory. Peter Obi was the driving force, and there was a kind of mobbish followership Obi did garner during the 2023 electioneering process. But all that has petered into thin air, as Tinubu ostensibly won the 2023 presidential election. Many of those who eloped to the Labour Party in the state were already stymied and so staged a comeback to the PDP in droves. Many were enamoured of the transformational leadership of the Mbah Administration and had returned to the party, including about six members of the state's assembly who rode on Obi's back to victory in the 2023 general elections. Adding salt to injury is the fact that the party is torn apart at the centre. The national chairman of the party, Julius Abure, is at cross purposes with Obi and the only governor from the party in the country, Governor Alex Oti. Accusations and recriminations are flying the sky and fanning the party cold. Such a scenario gives the party no chance of any victory in the forthcoming local government elections in Enugu State. The Enugu State governorship candidate of the party in the 2023 elections obviously lacks the leadership and political capital to hold the thawing party together. He has yet to recover from what appeared to many as his desperate pursuit of shadows when he should have given up and congratulated Dr Mbah, who beat him roundly at the polls and courts.
The other parties in the state, such as APGA, NNPP, and APP, have no active life. They have nothing with which to strike any electoral pose in the forthcoming local government elections in Enugu State.
Above all, the PDP's bright horizon is honed by Governor Mbah's sterling development agenda driven to the grassroots. And Mbah is bullish about it. Ndi Enugu hold the unleashed projects to a gaze and wonderment. Someone had on X handle wondered how Mbah came about the financing of the massive multibillion naira projects being executed across the state.
The Mbah Administration has, within one year, awarded the construction of 260 smart schools in the 260 wards of the state. According to Engr Gerald Otiji, the Enugu State Commissioner for Works, each smart school from start to finish would cost about N1.2 billion, meaning that a total sum of N312 billion has been awarded for the construction of the 260 smart schools in the 260 wards of the state. Each smart green school is a state-of-the-art architecture fully equipped with modern pedagogical tools with which the pupils, from cretch to JSS3, are taught robotics, artificial intelligence, augmented reality, mecatronics, ICT and vocational skills, science and technology, mathematics and other aspects of cognitive education. It aims to mould the Enugu child into a total resource person who can compete effectively in the global market, even if they would not further their education anymore. And it is open to every child, as each smart school takes up to 900 pupils. Enugu communities are enthralled at this development brought to their places, some for the first time since man was put on earth. The people have seen and believed the Mbah Administration, and so naturally are disposed to follow any political path to which the working governor points.
In the same social sector, Mbah unleashes type 2 primary healthcare hospitals in the 260 wards yet again. Each of the hospitals would have residential quarters for doctors and health workers, the same way the smart schools also have teachers' residential quarters. The level 2 primary healthcare centres also embody telemedics and other modern medical facilities uncommonly availed to the locals at the wards.
The Mbah Administration also does exploits with road infrastructure. In less than one year, and in line with his campaign promise to construct 10,000 kilometres of roads in 8 years, Governor Mbah commissioned completed 71 roads within Enugu metropolis, in addition to 10 more roads interconnecting the three senatorial zones in the state. The target is to construct and rehabilitate 1,250 kilometre roads every year. This target is met and surpassed. In the second phase, the Mbah Administration awarded another 141 roads in Enugu city and 20 roads, many with bridges, in rural areas, bringing it to 161 roads at the awarded cost of N183 billion. In the life of the people of Enugu State, this is unheard-of. Again, Mbah is set to construct a 10-kilometre road in each of the 260 wards in the state.
Meanwhile, the presidency recently bestowed Governor Mbah an award of excellence in public service with regard to his exploits in road infrastructure. One week after, the same presidency poured yet again ecomiums on Mbah with another award for his uncommon achievements in Micro Small and Medum Enterprises (MSMEs) in Enugu State. It should be born in mind that these were awards as merited, bereft of politics, given that Mbah is an opposition party governor.
There is no one in Enugu State who does not have a feel of the good governance the Mbah Administration has brought to bear. Recently, the Mbah Administration disbursed grants, seedlings, fertilizer, and farm implements worth N4.6 billion to farmers in the state in order to boost food production and alleviate the pangs of food insecurity in the state.
In the area of security, Mbah has brought to bear world-class metropolitan security architecture on ground. He built Command and Control Centre at the Government House Enugu, from where the state is monitored, policed and secured. He set up the Distress Respond Squad, specially trained, and procured over 300 vehicles with installed security cameras that have capacity for name and plate number recognition. Cameras of the same hue are installed in strategic areas of the state, which transmit data to the Command Centre for effective intelligence gathering, surveillance, and communication. As it stands today, Enugu State is arguably the most secure and peaceful state in Nigeria.
Governor Mbah promised the residents of Enugu water in 180 days. Before the advent of the Mbah Administration, a total of about 2 million litres of water was l generated for use when the total daily water need of the city was 70 million litres. Governor Mbah achieved the target of providing water to the city in 180 days as he revved up daily water generation to 120 million litres, which is far more than the daily water need of the city. That achieved at the upstream, the Mbah Administration began to replace weak asbestos pipes installed during the colonial days with modern pipes, as reticulation is ongoing with many places having water run in their abode for the first time in history. Water is also being extended to the rural areas, as many boreholes are drilled in rural communities and water reticulated to homes.
Mbah has, within one year of his administration, given life to all dead assets in the state. The abandoned Enugu International Conference Centre opposite Okpara Square at Independence Layout, Enugu, is now fixed and set for commissioning in a few weeks' time. A 5-star hotel Mbah has also awarded for construction, within the premises of the International Conference Centre, to Chinese Communication and Construction Company(CCCC), and work is ongoing there. Hotel Presidential Enugu, which was overgrown with weeds for years, is now being revamped. Such other moribund assets like Nigergas, United Palm Products Limited, Sunrise Flour Mill at Emene, Alluminium Company Limited at Ohebedim, Igbo Etiti, to mention no more, are all being revitalised. The New Enugu Smart City is also being constructed by CCCC. A whole lot is unleashed to the delight and amazement of Ndi Enugu.
Need the Enugu PDP campaign in the forthcoming Local Government Elections? Of course, no! Mbah’s disruptive innovations speak for the party. The PDP also carefully chose chairmanship candidates in ideological order of what Mbah holds for grassroots development. They are candidates who have bought into the developmental spirit of the Mbah Administration and so are burning with the verve to replicate the agenda in their local governments.
