No continuity For Gov Obi’s Anti-Workers Government By Uju Okeke. Why on earth will a state government that has refused to pay its workers the nationally agreed Minimum Wage and whose doctors have remained on strike for months be sounding hopeful that it has any chance at all of winning a re-election? That is the surprise which close watchers of the November 16 2013 Anambra gubernatorial election have to contend with. Most of all, why would the person contesting on the ticket of the ruling party in that state not flee from the embrace and endorsements of such a failed Governor but not only takes pride in the company of such a Governor, but that ill-performed Governor is the one leading the contestant on his party’s ticket around the state - like a dog on a leash. This is not a game to keep you guessing. Actually anybody who knows what trouble Anambra has been wading through since Governor’s inauguration four terrible years ago will not be hard-tasked to know that Anambra state and the ruling All Progressive Grand Alliance (APGA) and under the microscope here and now. Does it sound like I am being hard on Governor Peter Obi? Then look at just a few facts, and you will be able to make up your own mind independently. The first one is the minimum wage. This is a fruit of a hard-won fight championed by the Nigerian Labour Congress (NLC) – that no Nigerian government worker will earn less than N18, 000 monthly. This victory for the long-suffering Nigerian worker has so far eluded the Anambra worker. No attempt, whether feeble or serious, has ever been made by Governor Obi to wipe this shame from the face of the Anambra worker by putting him on an even keel with his fellow workers across the country. The Anambra civil servants has been made to dwell in the past as though they have been stuck and frozen in a place even as the rest of the country keep racing more and more ahead of them. This is made all the more degrading because price of goods will not hug the skies in other states but dive into the mud, where Anambra workers reside psychologically, so that the Anambra man and woman would be able to buy. No, they buy from the same markets and their children attend schools and are subjected to the same set of school fees like other Nigerians. To make matters worse, or according to the local parlance, to add insult to injury, Governor Obi has recently begun to show that acute lack of money was not the real reason why he has not started the nationally agree upon minimum wage salary. This is because he suddenly appeared to have woken up from a long slumber during which government activities were in limbo, and with the election only weeks away, began to scatter money here and there in a brazen effort to, as it were, bribe the public. Thus, he has turned unorthodox and began to spend whimsically with no input or authorization , flinging it at schools to purchase, for instance, school vans. It does not seem to matter to Governor Obi if the school he is flinging money at for school van is so dilapidated, as is common in the state, that it has no roof. All that appears to matter to him is that this is an election period and anything to make him appear good in the eyes of the public is all well and good. But this should matter to the average Anambra voter! This is especially so because Obi has been taking the APGA candidate around the state, and the man himself has been singing only the “I’ll follow in Obi’s footsteps” song. But these footsteps are those of an era so troublesome that Anambrarians should well do without. To continue in that same accursed way is to remain impoverished in the less than N18,000 minimum wage era in Nigeria. This is like a man campaigning in an election and his manifesto is that he would take a whole state back to a dark past. The truth is that Governor Obi know that his party cannot produce the next governor of Anambra state in a free and fair election owing to his own track records. This is why the long suffering Anambra worker should ensure that every vote counts on that election day by making it impossible for election riggers to ply their deadly trade. Also this has made it imperative that questions should be raised as Governor Obi traverses the state to sell his handpicked “Willie Boy” to the voter. He should be asked why he is insulting the people for a second time. The first time was when he refused to pay the minimum wage to the state’s civil servants. The second time is in the campaign for November’s election where Willie Obiano is vowing to continue in Obi’s footsteps. Anambra people deserve better than that; they at least deserve the government that would not waste any time in paying them the minimum wage. Now that the constitutionally mandated term limit is about to free us from the slavery imposed by a Governor, we should not elongate this slavery by voting in someone who has vowed to continue in Obi’s footsteps, which of course includes the refusal to pay the minimum wage.
Posted on: Wed, 30 Oct 2013 12:04:52 +0000
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