ANAMBRA GUBERNATORIAL GLADIATORS

By Don Peter Okoro

As the winner of the Anambra State Governorship election breast the tape in less than 72 hours, the question on every lip is: Who could this be? Who emerges as the Governor of the most volatile and politically sophisticated State in Nigeria? Anambra as a state is home to a lot of eminent statesmen and politicians like Rt. Hon. Nnamdi Azikiwe, first President of Nigeria,Rt. Hon. Abbysnia Nwafor Orizu, first Senate President,Dim Chukwuemeka Odumegwu-Ojukwu, first graduate to join the Army, Dr. Chuba Okadigbo,a former Senate President,Dr. Chukwuemeka Ezeife, and a host of others, both living and dead.

As we approach this touchy and epoch-making moment in the political history of the state, the question begs for repetition, who is the annointed man that God has designed and ordained to take over the mantle of leadership from the incumbent Governor, Chief Willie Obiano?
Now that the men are being separated from the boys, there appears to be just two candidates standing and they are, Prof. Charles Chukwuma Soludo of the All Progressives Grand Alliance and Senator Andy Uba of the All Progressives Congress. Chukwuma Soludo, a former Central Bank of Nigeria Governor emerged under controversial circumstances as the flagbearer of APGA in a primary election held in June 2021. Some Aspirants like Chukwuma Umeoji, Smart Okafor Akachukwu Nwankpo, Thank God Ibeh and a few others were disqualified due to reasons best known to the party stakeholder.
While Nwankpo later went on to pick the ticket of the African Democratic Party, Smart Okafor decamped to the APC and Chukwuma Umeoji continued to assert himself as the authentic APGA Candidate until the court affirmed Soludo as the duly elected candidate in October 2021.
Before we take a look at Senator Andy Uba, let us take a quick look at Soludo and his antecedents and find out how prepared he is to take over the mantle of Anambra state leadership. Born on the 28th day of July 1960, he is a very celebral fellow and a professor of Economics. He bagged a First Class Degree in Economics from the University of Nigeria, Enugu Campus, did his Masters and Ph.D in record time and became a lecturer in his Alumni, rising to the position of a Professor.
He equally became a Visiting Professor to a number of Universities abroad including, Swarthmore College in Swerthmore, Pennsylvania, USA. He later became the Chief Economic Adviser to President Obasanjo and eventually was appointed by President Obasanjo’s Government as the Governor of Central Bank of Nigeria. He is credited with the policy of merging and restructuring of the Banking System, whether such policies yielded the desired results or not is a matter to be discussed some other day. Soludo later delved into politics in 2009, and aspired for the seat of the Governor of Anambra State; and PDP chose him as their consensus Candidate, only for him to lose to the then incumbent Governor, Mr. Peter Obi of APGA in the General Election. Today, Peter Obi is in PDP while he is in APGA.
In July 2013, he resigned from the PDP and joined APGA in preparation for the November, 2013 Governorship race, but was disqualified along with five other aspirants by the APGA Screening Committee. In February 2021, Soludo officially declared his intention to run for the position of Governor of Anambra State, and after the primary election, was declared the winner.

Though a technocrat and management expert, he is not known to have held any political position of any sort and his major weakness is that he is said to be out of tune with the people at the grassroot level, who form the bulk of the voting population. His greatest strength is that if voted, he is capable of attracting foreign investors from far and wide, considering his high level of connections and reach. He has even promised to turn Anambra State into a Dubai sort of.

We now move on to Senator Andy Uba. Originally known as Emmanuel Nnamdi Uba, the Uga, Anambra State born politician was elected as a Senator for the Anambra State Senatorial District in April 2011 under the platform of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP). His educational career is sketchy.
But that is by the way, after working for President Obasanjo as Special Assistant on Special Duty and Domestic Affairs for almost 8 years, he contested for the Governorship of Anambra State in 2007 and won. However, the then incumbent Governor, Mr Peter Obi challenged the election and in June 2007, after about 14 days in office, his election was nullified.
In the February 2010 Election, Uba contested for the Governorship of Anambra State again under the Labour Party, and came third. Uba returned to the PDP and was unanimously adopted as the PDP candidate for Anambra South Senatorial District, and won overwhelmingly.
He later left the PDP apparently due to the squabbles he had with his younger brother Chris Uba to join the APC to recontest the Senatorial election, but lost to the incumbent Senator Ifeanyi Ubah of YPP.
Today, Senator Andy Uba is the APC flagbearer for this upcoming Anambra State Governorship election. Will he be able to wave the magic wand that gave him victory almost 15 years ago.? The answer to this is in the womb of time. And the time is not far. Let’s watch and see.