From Ogbonnaya Ndukwe, Aba
Chief Alphonsus Udeigbo is President General of Aba Landlords Protection and Development Association (ALPADA), a body that ensures the overall wellbeing and good neighbourliness of Aba residents. In this interview, he speaks on the expectations from the incoming administration of Alex Otti, stating that it will be tasked to build good access roads, ensure regular power supply and create job opportunities for youths.
ALPADA, according to him, will in turn, help government collect taxes for development and ensure peaceful coexistence among the citizens.
You’ve been in the vanguard of fighting for the good of Aba society, what’s the passion driving you?
I have passion or calling to speak for the downtrodden in the society. Majority of such people including widows and orphans, have less people standing in to fight for them, that’s why we decided to stand in the gap. I always get challenged by my conscience everyday, on what I have done for the less privileged, and this makes me feel sometimes, that I may not be doing enough. It was this, that gave rise in 2014/2015, to our founding the Aba Landlords Protection and Development Association (ALPADA), and registering it with the Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC), Abuja, with a board of trustees, to take care of the affairs of the residents with the government and other arms of the society.
For weeks, Aba electricity power supply was disconnected from the national grid, by the Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN); one had expected that ALPADA, would take a stand and come out with a strong voice to mediate and ensure that power was restored. What happened?
We have been in the matter and are happy on its being resolved. The distribution company had alleged that Aba consumers do not pay for electricity supplied. We are not in their offices to know the actual truth, but we get bills in arrears of power supply consumed. Since the bills come after usage, it will be difficult for some people to pay, knowing what our society is like. Though the suppliers know how to relate with their customers to make sure that they pay. We were invited by Geometric/Aba Power Limited to visit their location, and we discovered that billions of Naira, have been spent to provide equipment and other facilities to give light to Aba. I thank God for the vision of the founder, Prof Barth Nnaji, to help alleviate the sufferings of the people. I called the project: “Industry for Industries,” or “Oga Ndi Oga,” in local parlance, because to me, it is gigantic and will be a major source, towards reviving moribund industries that could not survive hardships caused by high running fuel costs, and will attract new ones due to assured supply of electricity. We are striving to find out better ways of working together, so that both sectors, will succeed and remain afloat. They have a responsibility of supplying us with power, while ours is to pay for the energy we use. They pay for the power before receiving it, and supply before receiving payment. In that case, some consumers do not pay, a situation that compounds getting fresh supplies from the transmission company. As business partners, they are in business to succeed. We have to fashion out a way to assist them to succeed. Let there be no problem to them and us, knowing full well they can be sabotaged through any means. We will do all we can for it to work out.
As a body seeing to the welfare of residents of a cosmopolitan city like Aba, has there been any interface between you and the incoming Governor, Dr Alex Otti, regarding your views on his take off position, come May 29?
Yes, we are an organization with a peculiar position, in the sense that we are the only such group in the state, duly registered with the CAC, and with a board of trustees, made up of prominent captains of industry. All of us have very high expectations that Dr Alex Otti will do well. There are two major things we need from his government – building of access roads and regular, steady power supply. That’s all. Any other thing could be managed without much problem. If Dr Otti’s administration provides us with good, enduring access road network, and ensures that the powers that be, supply electricity regularly, we’ll be well taken care of. We will not disturb them. Prior to his being elected on March 18, Dr Otti, made several visits to Aba, and made promises. He went further to promise having a medical village in Abia, where various health challenges will be treated instead of people traveling abroad for cure. In my own mind, what is making us to go overseas to receive medical attention will be handy here in Abia, which will be a great success. All we are praying for, is that he gets people that are ready and willing to work with his own vision, not those that will deceive him and derail it. It’s only God’s special grace that will see him through. We know he has wisdom, and that he will have advisers that will work with him. The calibre of men and women in his transition committee, shows that he has a higher expectation of what he wants to achieve in the state.
On our part, we will give him no chance to fail. We will monitor and bring his administration to account in the course of governance. After a year in office, we will bring him and call his attention to the promises he made that were not being followed. This is democracy, and things are changing. We will not allow him to be in office for 8 years, before being called to come for appraisal. We are happy on the steps he is taking prior to being formally inaugurated. Recently, we learnt the Managing Director of Julius Berger Construction Company, and some engineers of the company, had visited him and some dilapidated roads, probably to see what they look like and prepare for the reconstruction of such roads. This is the kind of news that gladdens our hearts. It’s a good sign. Before his election, Otti, had told us that Julius Berger will be involved in building Abia roads, if he becomes governor, and with the visit, we believe the sky will be his limit.
Since you talked about roads infrastructure, and without prejudice, can you appraise the outgoing administration’s roads development programme, especially in Aba?
You know that no single administration can build all the roads and other infrastructure in the whole of Abia State. There’s one good thing Aba founding fathers did, which is creation of access roads into every land sold to developers. This leaves the city with so many access roads. The Okezie Ikpeazu administration has done its best, with the ability it has. I’m of the opinion that if those that governed before Dr Ikpeazu did their bit, his would have been at an added height. His contribution would have pushed us higher than where we are now. Let Dr Alex Otti, who is coming into office, start from there, and move us much higher. However, had Ikpeazu reconstructed the decayed Port Harcourt Road, among a few others, we would have given him a 100 percent pass mark on infrastructural development. Today, the Igbo living in other parts of Nigeria are facing challenges and need to come home to invest. In Yoruba land, it is not a secret that some people are asking them to go, the same in the North. Aba, and in fact, other Igbo towns, have not been developed, and those developing Nigeria are from Igboland. If Aba and other towns in the South East are developed, the people that are scattered in other areas will come home to invest. Charity, they say, begins at home and does not end there. People from overseas and those within the country will come home to invest. They are where they are, due to the fact that the home front is not good, conducive for them, as it is at the moment.
The third thing we need from the incoming Otti administration, will be to fix the security problems we are having in Abia at the moment. We know that because there are no jobs for the youths, no electricity for industries to operate, there are security issues in the land. Increase in criminal activities emanating from unemployment and idleness will greatly be checked if the power sector is boosted and people in the micro, small and medium trades, become fully engaged. Youths will be engaged in tailoring, shoe and other leather works and garment manufacturing, and this will help secure the land.
You have listed things you want the government to do for the people, what will the people do, in turn, to reciprocate the gesture?
Let’s be law abiding, doing the right things at the right time and shunning any type of criminal activities. Let’s pay our taxes – property taxes, personal income taxes, to the government. When we do that, we will have good conscience to tackle them on their responsibilities to the society. On my part, what my conscience asks me to do, for the good of the people, have always guided my actions to help uplift the downtrodden. Most of the widows and orphans we assist, numbering into tens of thousands, are not related to us by birth or nativity. It is our conscience and God’s spirit that lead us. Personally, I may have offended some persons while trying to reach out to a larger society. It is not deliberate, so I plead for forgiveness while we work to enthrone a better society for us all.