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Although
the recent visit by a 30-man strong business delegation from Thailand
to Anambra State has come and gone, the full significance of its
five-day stay in what used to be the crime capital of South East Nigeria
will linger for a long time to come.
For
obvious reasons, the Thai Trade Mission to Anambra could be seen as the
final proof that Governor Willie Obiano’s acclaimed exploits in ridding
Anambra State of crime and criminal elements as widely reported in the
media is no fluke. In a sense, it is the longest test of the efficacy of
Obiano’s prowess in finding a lasting solution to an otherwise
intractable challenge that had blighted the stated and stunted the
economic growth of the entire South Eastern region for several decades.
There is nothing hyperbolic about this claim. Anyone who is familiar
with the economic map of Nigeria can attest to the pre-eminence of
Anambra as a major hub of economic activities in West Africa in spite of
the state’s profile as a crime-ridden wasteland carved into several
fiefdoms by vicious gangsters.
It
is a known fact that like the phoenix, Ndigbo rose from the ashes of
the Biafran War to reclaim their position as the pillars of commerce and
trade in Nigeria through a robust sprouting of outstanding
entrepreneurship in the industrial and trading outposts of Onitsha and
Aba. The once acclaimed Igbo ingenuity that manifested in the
flourishing of manufactured goods in the Seventies that were aptly
tagged “Igbo-made” came from these two illustrious towns in the Igbo
heartland. A carry-over of the inventive Igbo genius that sustained the
prolonged armed resistance of the region to the relentless bombardment
by Nigeria and her allies of world powers for 30 long months, the Igbo
inventive and entrepreneurial spirit was to finally surrender to
relentless regimes of arid economic policies that left it comatose for
decades.
The
colossal dispossessions of the war followed by a climate of scorched
earth economic policies targeted at areas where they had a comparative
advantage meant that an otherwise proud and industrious people had to
seek diverse outlets for the kinetic energy that lay bottled up in them.
The middle to late Seventies witnessed the runt of this energy show
itself in the sprouting of auto-parts manufacturing companies in Nnewi
while the bulk of the energy found expression in the successive waves of
criminal regimes which came to a climax with the rise of Boys Oyeah –
the first feeble attempt by Onitsha to cleanse itself of vicious
criminal overlords. Boys Oyeah was an epochal revolt by a society that
had grown weary of the ineptitude of its leadership. That was in the
eighties. History was to repeat itself again a decade later when Chief
Godwin Okeke of G.U.O Group of companies led the popular Onitsha Market
Amalgamated Traders Association (OMATTA) in another revolt against men
of the underworld. It was again another indictment on the government of
the day. The Aba equivalent was to come decades later with the emergence
of the dreaded Bakassi Boys whose cancerous influence spread across
Igboland like brushfire and left the region soaked in blood spilled from
extra-judicial killings.
A
continued lack of vision and endless tentativeness by successive
administrations ensured that Anambra State which hosts the largest pool
of self-driven Igbos never quite shrugged off the specter of criminality
which later took a sophisticated shape at the turn of the century when
Niger Delta militants began to keep expatriate oil workers in the region
in captivity in exchange for huge ransoms. Criminal elements in Onitsha
soon saw in it a more creative way to make more money from Anambra’s
many rich indigenes without the usual spilling of blood that came with
violent armed robbery. In came the kidnapping business – the ugly
phenomenon that drove away investors and anything of value from Anambra
State as many well-to-do citizens relocated their businesses and loved
ones out of the state.
Indeed,
for a long period of time, Onitsha which hosts the largest retail
market in West Africa and the surrounding commercial areas were better
known for the scandalous headlines that spewed forth from them. For the
same reason, Upper Iweka, which gained popularity for the preponderance
of many business concerns with territorial ambitions that stretch across
Africa, soon assumed the status of the crime capital of the South East.
For many decades, it was difficult to remember Onitsha for anything
beyond the absurd. Even when the bizarre security outfit known as
Bakassi Boys took roots in Onitsha, things took a grotesque shape with
the horrendous public execution of crime suspects that looked very much
like what ISIS has brought to the world stage today. In the intervening
years, many Ndi Anambra slowly became disinclined from returning home.
They
were disenchanted by the inability of the government of the day to
secure them from the torment of kidnappers and violent armed robbers.
Sadly, what the state lost to their disinclination became the gain of
other states, especially the neighbouring states. The massive growth in
real estate in Asaba and Enugu and other equidistant cities can be
traced to this scenario as wealthy Anambra indigenes sought to set up
half-way houses to home.
It
is within this milieu, this bleak landscape, this marshland of broken
dreams; that one begins to fully understand what Governor Willie Obiano
has done in Anambra State. That a 30-man Trade Delegation from Thailand
could spend five long days in Anambra, moving around freely and visiting
Onitsha of all places without an incident, speaks with unmistakable
clarity of the change that has come upon Anambra State. There is a
climate of freedom that pervades the state. No longer do we see long
security convoys trailing wealthy citizens who spend heavy sums on
personal security each time they decide to visit home. Where they exist
at all, the personages simply retain them to maintain their social
status; not that they expect any surprises as was once the case. All
around the state, citizens now come out of their homes at whatever time
of day and night to test their new freedom. There is a growing feeling
everywhere that this miraculous change has come to stay; that Anambra is
on the rise again.
But
seriously, that Willie Obiano has thoroughly cleansed the Augean Stable
that was Anambra State in less than one year of his regime, speaks to
the dearth of quality leadership that the state had experienced in the
last thirty years. One can’t help but wonder the priorities of those
before him. What mattered most to them? What could be more important to
the chief security officer of a state than the safety of lives and
property of the citizenry? And what exactly did Chief Willie Obiano do
to conjure the miracle that is the New Anambra State? These are the
questions that will continue to ring through the portals of time.
