…says being a woman aspirant is added advantage
The member representing Owerri Senaorial Zone in the Senate, Senator Chris ND Anyanwu has vowed to stop the brazen drain on the treasury of Imo State by Governor Rochas Okorocha, saying the state is bleeding with reckless spending.
She accused Governor Okorocha of spending the state’s money on projects that add no value to lives of the people of the state.
Senator Anyanwu made these comments today when she led a team of her supporters to seek for the blessing of frontline politician and member of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, Board of Trustees, Chief Emmanuel Iwuanyanwu, for her 2015 governorship ambition at Atta in Ikeduru Local Government Area of the state.
She said she wept any time she saw money being abused in the state by Governor Okorocha, adding that most of the projects done by the Okorocha administration were very unnecessary and added no value to the lives of the people of the state.
According to her, the building of 27 general hospitals across the state was a height of financial recklessness as according to her, no right-thinking man would think of building such structures and abandoning the existing ones.
“Why should any right-thinking governor construct a civic centre on Assumpta Avenue when we have government house near-by and the Ahiajioku Centre and other centres like that?”, she queried.
The governorship hopeful lamented that Imo had consistently made very wrong choices in selecting and electing their governors in the recent past despite the caliber of human resources available to them, vowing to stop the drain on the state’s treasury and stop unemployment which she added had been ravaging the state.
She said her administration would organize Imo into a more modern state because she knows the problem of the state as someone who had been around governance for decades.
“I’m not coming out just to be counted as one of the contestants. I want to transform Imo. I want to touch lives here because I know the problems of the people. I’m coming out to open Imo State to the outside world so that real investors could come in because there has not been enough effort to open up Imo for industries to thrive. There will be massive skills acquisition to take care of our youths”, she said.
Anyanwu lamented that many people were interested in opening their companies in the state but nobody wanted to make land available for them. “You can imagine that an oil company wanted to site its operational base in Imo but nobody thought it wise to avail a land to them to do that. You can imagine what we would have gained by having such a company around. This was the same thing that happened when Festus Odimegwu wanted to build Nigeria Breweries here. But because of no available land he had to take it to Enugu who had to make land available for such a gigantic project. Today, that company is offering Enugu people over 500 real jobs”.
She said she remained the most qualified for the post of Imo governorship not because of her senatorial position but because of her past involvement in governance.
She added that many people contesting the position with her did not know what they were coming to do as according to her many of her colleagues thought governorship was showmanship business.
The senator, who admitted it would take some hard work to unseat the incumbent governor, told her host that she had the muscle to push Okorocha out of the office.
On her being a woman, she said it is an added advantage for her aspiration considering the fact that all over the world including Moslem countries, there had been female presidents and governors giving their people good governance
Reacting, Chief Iwuanyanwu commended her for her efforts at trying to develop every corner of Owerri Zone, saying she united the people of the zone in many ways.
He described her as a very honest man woman who had been working very hard in the Senate.
Iwuanyanwu said Owerri people would want get a quality candidate that would not only win election, but deliver dividends to the people
