By Oguwike Nwachuku
Today, December 12, 2022, the Governor of Imo State, Dist. Sen. Hope Uzodimma (Onwa Oyoko, Enyi Oma Mbaise, Ome Nma Ohaji), clocks 64. Congratulations Your Excellency.
The goodwill messages have been pouring in like a flowing river from family, friends, well-wishers, associates, et al.
And the messages share one thing in common: they speak eloquently about the kind-heartedness, generosity, friendliness, brotherly disposition, and unassuming and engaging personality of the man, Hope.
The prayers that accompany the goodwill messages from well wishers remind us of Onwa’s shared humanity. They remind us about his faith in God that is in action as he trudges on with the onerous task of recreating and repositioning Imo State as a better place for all of us through good, sincere and committed governance.
To many, Governor Uzodimma’s 64th birthday today may not be as important an issue compared to, for example, if he was marking his 65th birthday or any of the so-called “landmark” birthdays as people conceive them.
And that is exactly where yours sincerely wants to differ as we may soon discover.
Sen. Hope Uzodimma’s 64th birthday is not just historical, but appears even more significant to many of us, because it has all the paraphernalia of a “landmark” birthday than any other year one may be won’t to think or talk about.
In other words, today, there are so many things to talk about Sen. Hope Uzodimma which, fortunately, coincide with his 64th birthday. As Abraham Lincoln would say,
“leave nothing for tomorrow which can be done today.”
I once drew our attention to the fact that the circumstances and the vicissitudes of life that brought Sen. Hope Uzodimma to where he is today, occupying the coveted seat of Governor in our dear Imo State, was in keeping with what God said he would be. The hand of God in his life, you would say!
Even one of the greatest philosophers known to mankind, Aristotle, once reminded us that, “men are marked from the moment of birth to rule or be ruled.”
I am sorry if I have digressed, but let me return to the reason I said Sen. Hope Uzodimma’s 64th birthday qualifies as a historical or landmark one.
If your intuition is strong enough to perceive extraordinary things, you would come to the realisation that Sen. Hope Uzodimma’s 64th birthday is critical to the extent that by this time next year his re-election bid would have been concluded and Onwa Oyoko, nay Onwa Imo, the hope of Nigeria, returned elected for a second term in office.
So, Sen. Hope Uzodimma’s 64th birthday is simply a precursor to the period Imo people would gladly re-elect him as their Governor based on his obvious and proven track record of laudable achievements during his first four year tenure that began gloriously on January 25, 2020 and would terminate gloriously by January 15, 2024, the day he would again be sworn in for second term.
At 64, Sen. Hope Uzodimma has provided the society with the opportunity to further exmine his life as a public servant as can be attested to by Imo people whose State, he has now held sway for three solid years as their amiable Chief Executive.
I hope we still remember, as another great mind, Socrates reminds us, that, “the unexamined life is not worth living.”
As the number one man of Imo State, Sen. Hope Uzodimma leads by example – both in character and indeed.
He has demonstrated in unambiguous terms that leadership is by example and that satisfactory leadership should at all times be about service to the people.
I do not think there are Imo people today who are not in agreement that Sen. Hope Uzodimma is an outstanding, thoughtful, kind, patient, selfless and exceptional leader.
Even his most rabid critics appear confounded as Onwa daily, exhibits certain extra-ordinary tendencies in his sincere efforts to govern Imo State that place him ahead of his contemporaries in public service.
As an ideas man, a man with strong mind, he is always keen to discuss ideas as opposed to men of average and weak minds whose interests are in discussing events and people.
Sen. Hope Uzodimma’s kind and magnanimous disposition is infectious and worthy of emulation, just as his sense of contentment remains humbling and a lesson for all to learn. That is without recourse to the fact that he is a man of means.
But those are not the only reasons we are serenading him at 64.
We are celebrating Sen. Hope Uzodimma because under his leadership, Imo people are witnessing the type of recovery, rehabilitation and reconstruction that are strange but beneficial to them.
Under Sen. Hope Uzodimma’s able leadership, more than 100 key roads have been built to standard and still counting across the length and breadth of Imo State.
The signature road projects – Owerri-Orlu (completed), Owerri-Okigwe (Phase I completed and Phase II nearing completion), and Owerri- Mbaise- Umuahia ( work progressing at unprecedented pace), which he initiated have become the talk of the day across Imo State and beyond.
Under Sen. Hope Uzodimma, five kilometer roads are being constructed in each of the 27 local government areas of Imo State, public taps abandoned for more than 15 years have come alive again in Owerri while that of Okigwe and Orlu Water Schemes are receiving the required attention. Also, Adapalm that was moribund for 20 years has been revived through Public Private Partnership (PPP) and today, it produces 100 tons of Grade A palm oil, employs about 600 workers with the management working assiduously towards the employment of 35,000 workers in no distant time.
At 64, under Sen. Hope Uzodimma, a certain revolution is taking place in the health and education sectors of Imo State. Apart from the Mobile Clinic arrangement, the first of its kind in Imo, 305 Health Centres are today up and running in all the 305 Electoral Wards. That is not all.
Sen. Hope Uzodimma has renovated and equipped the Imo State University Teaching Hospital, facilitated accreditation of the College of Medicine that saw to the graduation of 400 student doctors after 11 years due to lack of accreditation, and approval given to the Federal Medical Centre, Owerri to serve as the Teaching Hospital to the College of Medicine of the Federal University of Technology, Owerri, among other critical interventions in the health sector, courtesy of the Governor.
Under Sen. Hope Uzodimma at 64, Imo can boast of additional tertiary institutions like the Kingsley Ozumba Mbadiwe University, Ideato, Orlu, the University of Agriculture and Environmental Sciences, Umuagwo, the Imo State Polytechnic Omuma, and the final approval granted to the Alvan Ikoku Federal College of Education as a Federal University of Education, among others.
Besides, design work has been completed for the building of 305 modern primary schools in the 305 Electoral Wards as well as the renovation of dilapidated structures in the secondary schools in Imo State, ideas also conceived by the Governor.
We are not celebrating Sen. Hope Uzodimma just because he is 64, but we are doing so based on the capacity he has demonstrated in almost all areas of governance structure –
Agriculture, commerce, industry, security of lives and property, women affairs, transportation, environment, youth development/empowerment, tourism and hospitality, civil service reforms, local government and chieftaincy affairs, to name but a few.
Exactly a year ago, Sen Hope Uzodimma did what has never been done in the history of Imo State, paying civil servants 13th month salary. Today, under his watch, payment of salaries and pensions is taken for granted, priincipally because of the automation process he introduced into the system.
Only last week, he announced that civil servants whose elevation has been stalled in the past for no cause of theirs are to be promoted.
At the Secretariat where the bulk of the civil servants are accommodated, it will be at the detriment of any one to portray the governor in bad light beacuse of the way he has positively etched himself in their consciousness with programmes and reforms that have improved their lot and restored their hitherto lost confidence as the pride of the bureaucracy.
The beauty of what Sen. Hope Uzodimma is doing in Imo is that they are in sync with what is contained in his election campaign manifest when he sought for the people’s mandate, and also in accordance with the oath of office he took to serve the people sincerely and with the fear of God.
Lest I forget, many people, both from Imo State and outside today bear us witness that Sen. Hope Uzodimma has proven the naysayers who thought his government will be far from being focused wrong. With his 3R mantra – reconstruction, rehabilitation and recover – in action, he has made Imo State the focal point for serious political, economic/business, social, religious engagements.
No wonder under his watch, the Bishops in Nigeria were here for their week-long conference. The Golfers in Nigeria were here. The Nigerian Army was here. The Accountants in Nigeria were here. The Police, the Guild of Editors, the Nollywood Actors and Actresses were also here as they saw in Imo a home away from home.
The list of groups and associations that has identified Imo State as the newest destination point and haven for conviviality despite the perceived insecurity, and seeking the nod of the Governor for approval to have them hold their event in Owerri is endless.
At 64, how can we not talk about the well deserved laurels that Sen. Hope Uzodimma has been appreciated with by groups and associations who keep tab on his leadership style? The honours have come from the Sun Newspapers, Crime Reporters Association of Nigeria, the United Agency for North South Cooperation, an agency of the United Nations in Geneva, and others too numerous to mention. They honour him for good leadership, accountability and creativity in governance, pursuit and promotion of peace, security of lives and property of the citizens and so on.
Is it therefore a surprise, that when President Muhammadu Buhari came to commission the Owerri-Orlu and Owerri-Okigwe roads as well as the rebuilt Imo House of Assembly Complex, he told Sen. Hope Uzodimma that he is “writing his own history in Imo”? What a statement of fact made by Mr. President!
There are indeed so many things to credit Sen. Hope Uzodimma with today as he marks 64, but space failed us. However, what is obvious is that by this time next year, God willing, we will be here to still refresh our memories about this incredibly good man.
As I leave us with this famous thought line by the former President of the United States of America, Barrack Obama, “I have always believed that hope is that stubborn thing inside us that insists, despite all the evidence to the contrary, that something better awaits us as we have the courage to keep reaching, to keep working, to keep fighting,” may your days be long, Onwa.
… Nwachuku, Chief Press Secretary and Media Adviser to Governor Uzodimma write from Owerri.
