By Chinedu Opara
Being an elected legislator has its natural drawbacks. Prominent among those drawbacks is the problem of lacking executing or budgetary powers. There is no legal or constitutional provision that places funds which you can use to carry out capital or signature projects, that can serve as your sustainable legacies after leaving power.
All you are entitled to is paltry “intervention fund” At state level some governors have illegally and unilaterally abrogated that constitutional enablement . At national level it is still there but, these days it is being impacted negatively by deficit budgeting. Also, lawmakers representing large territories like Owerri and Orlu Zones for example, face the challenge of how to manage the little available resources to meet expectations and needs of their people.
In a country like ours while the constitutional stumbling blocks are bad enough for lawmakers, a worse challenge that dogs their development agenda is the winner takes all political mentality pervading the polity.
As we see everyday and especially, under the present APC government of President Buhari that policy has been very much alive and kicking. As a matter of fact the president himself announced to the whole wide world when he assumed office that, winner takes all is going to be his key priority policy.
That was what he meant when he declared that those who gave him 95% votes, can’t be treated same with those who gave him 5%.
Opposition lawmakers representing those areas that gave President Buhari 5% votes as he claimed have continued to bear the brunt of that patented apartheid policy. They have been left high and dry as they are completely denied of all manner of privileges which occupying national offices naturally should have bestowed on them.
Even their rights are not completely guaranteed. Sometimes their lawful rights are denied them simply on the flimsy and untenable ground of belonging to the opposition. Such ugly trends happen when the executive possibly in pursuit of legalization of perceived anti public policies decide to apply the carrot and stick strategy to waltz its way through.
At such times it is either you bow to them and get your rights or, say no and forfeit them! This has been playing out now and then in the last seven years. Since the South East is predominantly an opposition enclave, its national lawmakers are trapped right in the middle of that slippery web. Out of a total of fifteen senators the region boasts of twelve are opposition figures. Only three are in APC and they are Owelle Rochas Okorocha, Senators Orji Uzor Kalu and Frank Ibezim.
But, somehow mainly through divine guidance and legislative grit and experience some of the senators shackled by the winner takes it all philosophy, like Distinguished Senator Ezenwa Onyewuchi have been able to leapfrog the man made encumbrance.
Historically, this is the second time since 1999 that Owerri Zone is being led by an opposition senator. But, in practical terms it is the first because even though Senator Chris Anyanwu won second term on the platform of APGA she was more or less a mainstream senator having been a close associate of ex President Obasanjo who, midwifed the Yar’adua/Jonathan regime which succeeded him and under which she served her second term.
Besides, Jonathan ran an all inclusive adminstration which may have accounted for her chairing Senate Defence Committee which is a grade A committee.
This leaves the incumbent senator representing Imo East Senatorial District, otherwise known as Owerri Zone, standing out as the only senator of the zone saddled with the distressing fate of being the real and true opposition lawmaker.
The good thing however is that Senator Onyewuchi has borne the cross with great courage, calmness and unparalleled responsibility and diligence. It is possibly as a result of this rare leadership brilliance and excellence that history has it today that he is among the best nationally and best among his Imo counterparts and predecessors alike.
Like they say facts speak for themselves and do not lie. In the history of Owerri Zone Senate representation, he is the first and so far only person whose bill has been signed into law. No other senator from the zone has that record from 1999 to date. Two of his bills have been signed into law by President Buhari. They are “Older Persons Rights and Privileges Bill” and “Police Act Amendment Bill.”
He also has the best scorecard in total bills and motions sponsorship among his present colleagues from Imo and all his predecessors. As of today he has seventeen sponsored bills and motions.
In March this year, he made history by being the only Imo Senator, only three South East Senators and 28 nationally who voted in support of electronic transmission of election results. That patriotic duty is already raising Nigerians hope that 2023 elections will signal a new dawn in our electoral trajectory, as seen in the recent Osun and Ekiti governorship polls.
The man also stopped marginalization of South East in Nigeria Communication Commission, NCC by fighting for the inclusion of the region in the reconstituted board of the agency. Similarly, he fought for justice for slain Imo born but Germany based Oguchi Unachukwu murdered in cold blood by a trigger happy soldier at Imo .Airport. Today, not only has his killer been dismissed from service, he is also being prosecuted for the heinous crime.
To Be Continued. Watch Out!!!
NIGERIA NEWSPOINT
