WITH SENATOR OKEY EZEA, ENUGU NORTH CAN NOW MAKE POSITIVE MOVE

WITH SENATOR OKEY EZEA, ENUGU NORTH CAN NOW MAKE A POSITIVE MOVE

 His first voice at the Red chambers was soul-lifting. None from Enugu North has been a minister for two and a half decades!

The marginalisation has been deeper: From denial of VC of the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, from inception to replacement of Dr Daniel Ikechukwu Ugwuja in SEDC, and now Abba Kyari as the convocation representative, UNN, against the run of play, plus many more afoot. The blind hear their footsteps and chants of victory, the deaf feel the weight of their strength on ground as they return to their base of oppression. Enugu North is lying prostrate under the manipulative skill of the lord they supplied the paraphernalia and supervised his coronation. 

With Senator Okey Ezea leading the charge in the Senate chambers when he dared the powers for an explanation on the sharing formula that kept Enugu North unfit for a ministerial position in decades, he has caused the spark. At a point, the brave challenges the gods when the tide of fortune turns against him. 

When the ministerial nominee from Nkanu, Enugu East senatorial zone, was called up for screening and Enugu state senators had the floor for expressions on him, his heart skipped its natural beat as the LP senator, Okey Ezea, stood up. He was wrong.  The senator rather demanded equity, fairness and justice, and he pleaded for recognition of Enugu North senatorial district as one of the three legs on which Enugu State stands and walks. The zone, with a population higher than the other two senatorial zones put together, parades the brightest in the academic field -- it boasts the highest number of professors and other professionals, yet...

Enugu North should rise  now and scorch the roots of this tree of suppression before it casts its shadow on our children, placing them on the stool of servitude.  Let's stand as a coalition for balance and justice in governance with our placards in demonstration at the Government House, Enugu, and in Abuja. Let's march with the banner of the senatorial zone -- not LP, PDP or APC -- and confront head-on this monster that has held us down for decades. The avaricious among us would choose a continuation of this state as they continue to feed fat from it. But not so the patriots. Let Nigerians hear and tell us who shares this fate with us. "Anyone can make mistakes but only an idiot persists in error." [Marcus Tullius Cicero] 

To our brothers whose political value dropped to pawns on the state's chessboard, the time to assume the status of a queen is now. Let our voice be at the tip of our sword. At the end, we shall return to Martin Luther King Jr's truism: "We shall remember not the words of our enemies but the silence of our friends."

Poverty is not a night you spend"without food"; poverty is a day you spend "without thinking." [Dr Ali Shariati] This definition of poverty stirred Ideke out of his comfort zone for a fight to liberate Nsukka and set a pedestal for a free zone where each can provide for himself and think independently. This brought him face to face with the political terrorist whose regime left a trail of anguish and blood. 

Regrettably, after many years in the political trench, ndi Nsukka still have their eyes on the corn purposely dropped by the political merchant, leaving them in tatters before other zones and the public. Otherwise, how can an Abba Kyari from a distant part of the country be "chosen" over our own Onyedikachi Ona (Alligator) as UNN's convocation representative? How? In Nsukka?  Now that the demonstration and injunction have put the management in reverse, same can earn us the other two and more. 

-- _Comrade Sam Okwa_