The concept of power with responsibility underpins the tour of duty of Prof. Charles Chukwuma Soludo, CFR, as Anambra State Governor. In a world teeming with power without responsibility, Governor Soludo is that rare exception of a leader who puts into practice the beauty of responsible power. The power perspective of Mr. Governor emphasises what the celebrated author, speaker, coach, and developer, Dr. Maria Spindler, lionises as “the positive potential of power when used for good, such as creating positive change, fostering innovation, or promoting justice.”
Governor Soludo’s policies and projects are all-inclusive, but the crucial targets that deserve attention here are the erstwhile excluded and underserved communities and people in Anambra State. It still astounds so many people that Soludo began his governorship tenure in the slums of Okpoko, the damned suburbia near the city of Onitsha. Okpoko in Ogbaru Local Government Area used to be seen as a baleful terrain where even angels feared to tread, but Governor Soludo stepped into the place immediately after his swearing-in. Today, a revolution has been wrought in Okpoko with paved roads, a general hospital, streetlights, etc., such that the place bears a new name: New Haven. It did not matter to Governor Soludo that Okpoko is in Ogbaru LG, where his party used to lose elections before his advent.
In the course of Soludo’s governance of Anambra State, he has put in place and sustained comprehensive policies that cater to the poor, such as free antenatal services for pregnant women, free education, payment of teachers in schools returned to the missions to keep school fees within the reach of the poor, etc. It is noteworthy that Governor Soludo has built five new general hospitals, all in Anambra North, whereas he is from Anambra South. Mr. Governor deals with Anambra as one entity. Soludo’s Anambra stands firm as one state, one people, one agenda, and one destiny.
But limiting it all to Anambra State per se does not properly project the Soludo essence in its true quintessence. The current news is that Governor Soludo has just appointed a man from Abia State, Joachim Achor, as the Acting Accountant-General of Anambra State. For Soludo, Anambra State is that one state in all of Nigeria where the best hands can find a home without any discrimination whatsoever. Soludo is justly celebrated all over Nigeria as a non-discriminatory leader. His philosophy is all-inclusive and all-accommodating. This philosophy is reflected in his administration’s policies and programs and also his personal life. For him, healthy competition among all the people is what makes the society triumph in progress.
When Mr. Governor employed 8115 teachers, he went for the very best, not minding where they’re from. As far as he’s concerned, once the teachers are capable of giving quality teaching, they can come from anywhere. The important matter was for the teachers to excel through competitive tests across the board.
This sterling attitude was again demonstrated when Governor Soludo hired doctors and healthcare personnel. None of them was asked for his or her state of origin. According to Governor Soludo, a sick person does not ask for his/her doctor’s state of origin. The trainees for “One Youth, Two Skills” were drawn from all parts of the land without asking where they are from.
As Governor Soludo does not discriminate in his accommodation of natives and residents alike, he insists that it is incumbent on all to pay taxes and avoid criminality so that his plan of a livable and prosperous Anambra State can come to fruition. It is little wonder, then, that every government project in Anambra State now bears the legend: “Your Tax Is Working For You.”
When it came to the attention of Soludo that some mayors, presidents-general of town unions, and market leaders were taxing the owners of businesses with less than N100,000, he acted fast by putting a stop to it. He declared such a taxation illegal, stressing that anybody indulging in it will face severe music. He exempted the group of businesses, such as petty traders, artisans, truck-pushers, cart-pushers, vulcanisers, etc., from paying any taxes whatsoever.
All over the country, people are used to state governors flying in celebrated dignitaries to do the tape-cutting while commissioning important projects built by the governments.
Governor Soludo played a different ball when he got the ordinary people to undertake the tape-cutting ritual in his stead. For starters, at the commissioning of the 5.1 km Niger Street and Port Harcourt Road in Onitsha, Governor Soludo surprised the protocol officers by uttering the following words: “I appreciate that these stakeholders you have listed here have to speak. But I think today should be strictly for and about the people. We are not here to praise or score ourselves. I think I want to listen to the people’s reaction, and I am not commissioning any of these roads. Get the leader of the Keke and Shuttle union in the area or their representatives and the leader of the Market union to speak and commission the roads. Ours is to get the job done to their satisfaction. We are here to listen to them. It is their project.”
Mr. Governor was not awed by the prospect of allowing the downtrodden people to speak their minds on live national television. His directive was followed to the letter, and the locals had their day in the sun by undertaking the talking, tape-cutting, and commissioning. The limelight went to the people for whom the roads were built.
The dramatic disruptive change allowed the traders and the residents to share their minds on the works of the Soludo Solution administration. Given the opportunity offered by Governor Soludo, the chairman of the Onitsha Market union, who spoke first, confessed that relative to prevailing rates across neighbouring states, they, as tax-paying traders, are “cheating the Anambra State Government!” According to the traders’ leader, the traders pay the lowest taxes when compared to the other Southeast states. He then assured Mr. Governor that the traders are willing and ready to up the ante in paying taxes, having seen visible developments undertaken by the Soludo Government.
Let’s end by returning to Okpoko. When Governor Soludo went there to commission the 12 km of roads he built in the area, he equally requested that representatives of Keke drivers and shuttle buses should cut the tape, assisted by the clergy. The underlying meaning behind Governor Soludo’s action is so edifying because the people are put at the epicentre of governmental projects.
In Governor Soludo’s scheme of things, there are no excluded and underserved communities and people. That is the beauty of responsible power.
· Law Mefor, PhD, is Anambra State Commissioner for Information.
