Abia State Governor Okezie Ikpeazu spoke with reporters in Abuja, the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), on his achievements, the Independent People of Biafra (IPOB), and the agitation for restructuring. Assistant Editor GBADE OGUNWALE was there.
Your government has taken the made-in-Aba campaign abroad, although Aba itself is yet to assume the status of an industrial city or a business hub…
I don’t think the issue is to make Aba a business hub. Aba is a business hub naturally and nobody can dispute that. The only thing we are saddled with is to enhance the business environment, open up access, do something about security and ensure that there is steady electricity supply. One has to think about strategy. When I became governor two years ago, the greatest challenge by my analysis, was putting made-in- Japan, made-in-Taiwan, made -in-Dubai on the articles they produced locally and I felt that it was a fallout of some complex, inferiority complex. So you see along the spectrum of economic development, industrialization, promotion of small and medium scale enterprises, you have issues with the manufacturers themselves and you also have issues of infrastructure. But the most difficult is the social issue which is the psyche of the manufacturer. It doesn’t matter what you do, if somebody is not motivated, if somebody feels he is inferior, the person will hardly be able to market his article. So we decided, strategically, to begin to carry development from two fronts: one, do something about the basic infrastructure in Aba. We have completed 23 roads in Aba as I speak today. We are doing the first ever interchange or what they call flyover in Aba today and as I speak, fallout of our efforts in terms of the campaign of the made-in-Aba thing has attracted direct sales of about 1.3billion Naira. Remember the 50,000 pairs of shoes for the military, remember our campaign to the Customs, NYSC and all that; the direct impact from the Aba economy is that those shoe makers, those leather makers, those bag makers have seen an inflow of about 1.3billion Naira direct to them. Beyond that, we are building an industrial cluster which is purposely built for leather and garments. The perception about Aba today is no longer a no-go area. People are better known today for their creativity and what they can do with their hands and that is what I crave for when it comes to our youths. I don’t want people to see our youths as criminals and bandits. I want people to see them and begin to think about creativity.
You have not answered the question on why you decided to take the Made-in-Aba campaign outside the country.
Now if I want to answer your question directly on why we decided to take this Made-in-Aba thing to New York; first of all we started in Abuja. The first made in Aba fashion show was held in Abuja and on that day, I remembered vividly the American Embassy sent 30 delegates to come and see the kind of leather works, the kind of garments, the kind of bags that Abia people have produced and had on exhibition and it was very successful. Some people asked me also that day, why not hold made in Aba fashion show in Abia State. And I said if you have a good product and you are proud of your product; if you recall from the first day I assumed office, I said all my dresses would be made in Aba and if you want to advertise that product, the best thing for you to do is to find the highest point on the plateau. If you have a mountain, climb. If you have a 10 storey building, climb and on top of that building, begin to talk about that article or merchandise that you are proud of. Abuja is the melting point that brings both the licensing agencies, the controlling agencies, the funding agencies, government, the diplomatic family and everybody together. So rather wait for them to move to Abia as they say, let Mohammed go to the mountain and that announcement led to our seizing the opportunity of the Abia family meeting in New York where the entire Abia people in New York come together annually for a convention and we decided to begin to also make that statement there.
A few weeks before this Made-in-Aba fashion show, I was in North Carolina and I met the governor and the governor agreed and approved that his chief of staff, an American lady married to a Yoruba man would grace that occasion and other things happened. And then, there was an international agency that markets arts from Africa. So we said, well, I need to begin to do something about the psyche and the confidence of these shoe makers in Aba. If you recall, I have taken them to Turkey, to China and today, their New York experience has redefined how they perceived what they produce. Because my frustration was that a young man will spend 18 hours on a machine, producing something with his bare hands, wakes up in the morning and gives credit to somebody in Taiwan who was sleeping, who did not do anything and we have redefined all that now. So, they have come to realise that even the thing in America is not as beautiful as what we are producing in Nigeria. Even the one produced by Turkey is not as beautiful as what we are producing in Nigeria. As far as I am concerned, it is as important to build the confidence of the primary artisans as it is important also to provide basic infrastructure. If you provide basic infrastructure and you have not done anything about the psyche and the confidence of the average producer, what you have done is just to produce a timid child and send that timid child to Harvard.. So, this is why we chose to begin to showcase what we do even outside Nigeria.
But, how are you tackling critical infrastructure deficit like power, which is very key to the growth and survival of the industry?
Yes, we take it quite seriously. When I came in, I inherited the geometric project which is a private sector driven project to provide light for the Abia university area and I took up to speak with Emeka Ofor who is the EEDC boss and the Enugu DISCO which has the licence and franchise for distribution. The idea is that you have generated electricity but you cannot distribute because somebody else is holding that end of the stick. And then we brought them together and we encouraged the Federal Government and they reached an agreement. They are at a point where money needs to change hands now and one of them will take charge and Aba will begin to enjoy uninterrupted power supply. But beyond that, the problem was to raise the money that would change hands ultimately. So I had to be also part of a team that included Pascal Dozie, Prof. Nnaji, Gen. Omayi (rtd) to Afrixim Bank where we met the President of Afrixim bank in Cairo and the elements of our discussions was also to see how they could provide the resources to fund geometrix. I did not rest there, I also visited the Hon. Minister for Power and his own solution is the one we are test running now. He got us together with the rural agencies in charge of rural electrification and today they are unbundling. What I mean is that if you have an industry or a cluster of industries, they will do some survey and then begin to provide electricity specific for that area.
What is your reaction to the classification of IPOB as a terrorist group by the Federal Government. What role did the South East governors play in that controversy?
Fundamentally speaking, I think that if the questions we ask in this country today are whether there are inequalities, there are gaps, there are people who don’t feel that they have been fairly treated either as an individual or as a family or as a geopolitical zone, the answer is yes. There is agitation in the Northeast, there is a agitation in the Southwest, of course there is agitation in the Southeast. But I dare say that there is no other ethnic group in this country that has as much faith in Nigeria as a country, one united country than the people of the Southeast. That is why they are in Sambisa. You can count how many big businesses belonging to the south westerners that are in Aba. You can count how many big businesses belonging to the people from the Northeast, Northwest, North central that you can find in Owerri. You cannot find a four storey building belonging to somebody from the Northeast anywhere in the Southeast.
But, if you go to Kano, you don’t count three hotels before you count that of somebody from the Southeast. What it means is that we are the people that have demonstrated faith in a united Nigeria. Post war experience is that everybody started receding and then we started moving everywhere. And then at the end of the day, our people are beginning to feel that we are not being trusted enough with certain strategic positions despite the fact that we have demonstrated in particular times that we love Nigeria more than anybody else. We have faith in this country more than anybody else. That coupled with the fact that there is huge potential energy within the youth community in Nigeria that is unused because the problem of unemployment in Nigeria. For me as a biochemist, I look at it as mismanagement of energy; people have too much energy they can’t use it anywhere. So the idea is that all these agitations bottled up and all that created what you call IPOB. And then, the federal government over time started watching from the sideline because IPOB was getting money from elsewhere, setting up radio stations, indoctrinating people, all that went on. But while that was going on, at a point, the leadership of the Southeast through Ohanaeze, through the governors started engaging Nnamdi Kanu to say, we know that there are issues. Can we find alternative channels to discuss them? Can we make a studied and intellectual presentations and confront the federal government with these arguments. But Kanu felt that his own strategy was better and all that. So, I think it got to a point when the Federal Government began to feel that the red line was threatened. Unfortunately, some of us as governors were not taken into confidence as to the details and plans and intentions of the federal government and it is the irony of this thing they call governors as chief security officers. A chief security officer but you are not controlling the Commissioner of Police, the soldiers around you, the Navy around you, you cannot tell them to stop, you cannot tell them where to go and all that.. So that clash came up on us in Abia State and I was confronted as a leader to make a choice between the oath I swore to, what was politically expedient and what was right. And I think what was right was for me to do everything to protect the lives and properties of Abians and those that are doing business in Abia. So all that I did, the press releases, my actions, all that I did was geared towards fulfilling my mandate which was to protect lives and properties of not only Abians but of everybody that was within Abia doing business. I did not wish for one soul to die, whether IPOB or a Fulani man or a Kogi man. I didn’t want anybody to lose his life or for us to begin to spill blood in my state. Like I told some people, my mother told me that everybody should do everything to make sure that war does not ensue in his mother’s kitchen because the pots will break, the plates will break and after the war, with what are you going to eat? So, I do not want a war in my kitchen. If there must be war, let the war go elsewhere not in my kitchen. And then I thank God and I give him all the glory that he gave us the wisdom to take the steps we took.
So, where is Nnamdi Kanu?
I don’t think that is a fair question. I don’t have capacity to determine where Kanu is. I have never visited him. I have never called him on phone and he has never taken me into confidence as to what he does and where he goes. So, those who are close to him would answer. I don’t have capacity to monitor him and know where he is. May beJournalists, through investigative journalism will know.
What are you doing to ensure that prospective investors are not discouraged?
Well, before now, we have marketed Abia quite well. We are proposing three industrial clusters in Abia according to senatorial districts. The flagship industrial cluster for us is the one we call Eyimba Industrial City. It is sitting on a 9,000 hectares of land between Port Harcourt and Aba and on that land it has railway reticulation, it has oil and it has gas and is less than one hour from two airports. It is less than one hour also from two seaports. So, it is a manufacturer’s delight to come there. There is no other industrial city proposed that is as beautiful. So, these are the credentials and we have had relative peace in terms of security. Even during that IPOB thing, I had eleven Chinese investors who were in Abia and they were there and they weathered the storm with me and they are still there trying to begin one thing or the other. My message to them was that that thing was a one off thing and I give God the glory. What people thought would happened did not happen and in 24 hours, we were in firm control of the situation. It tells a story about the resilience of our people, the resilience of Aba. It is not a city that can snap and break down. So resilience is a very good quality for any investor.
What is your take on restructuring?
I believe in restructuring for several reasons. My definition of restructuring is that every state as a sub national government should be given the opportunity to fly not at half capacity, not at compromised capacity but at full capacity. In the first place, the greatest asset that Abia has today is human capital. Under a restructured framework, the first assignment of government would be to bring every critical stakeholder to the table, whatever you want to contribute, where are our engineers, our doctors, our fabricators, our artisans, everybody to the table and decide what they can do. If I find caolin beneath the soil in Abia and very early in the morning the following day and I see somebody digging and I confront the person and he brandishes an authority from the Ministry of Mines and Steel Development in Abuja which I don’t know about. And there is an electric pole standing beside with which I reticulated electricity to a village nearby, I cannot give the man quit notice. Will I watch him collapse my electricity project? This is the best graphic picture to paint this restructuring issue.
Every state has something to bring to the table; if I cannot produce millet and I want to enjoy millet or I want to bake bread, I will have to go to my brother in Yobe State that is producing it. If today we restructure, I am not going to think about refinery for the oil we have at Ukwa. I will look for a petrochemical industry. Why am I selling crude. What is the man I am giving crude going to do with it? Anybody coming to ask me to sell crude oil would be insulting me. What are you going to do with crude oil that I cannot do? When the United Nations decided to sanction Iraq, what Iraq did was that you won’t buy our crude, okay. But you will buy our insecticides and all kinds of by-products. So they were selling for twice the amount of money they sold crude. So if the world says they don’t want crude again, yes, it is good but for me. Restructure today and no drop of crude oil will leave the shores of Abia. If I cannot do something with it let it stay there.
