The African Democratic Congress (ADC) gubernatorial candidate for the November 8 election in Anambra State, John Chuma Nwosu, in this interview with LEO SOBECHI, joins the call for restructuring and condemns the fiddling of Local Government Council funds by state governors.

Integrity is like pregnancy. You are either pregnant or not. You either have integrity or you don’t. If you lose your integrity, it’s like a miscarriage. There is hardly any recovery. Pedigree is a given. If you have it and protect it, there will always be benefits.

Integrity and pedigree work in tandem in leadership recruitment. But, above all, we must restore faith and trust in our leaders. The distrust gap between our leaders and the led remains quite wide.

The past two years have come with real challenges. While the President and his team have shown commitment through certain reforms, gaps in execution have held back the results Nigerians hoped for. With better coordination and a more aligned strategy, there’s still strong potential to move the country forward.

Yes, I do. We need to restructure to stabilise and develop fully. Our present structure has made the nation dysfunctional and our federalism very weak. Power and resource sharing remain contentious. If need be, let us formalise the seven political zones structure. Each zone has some comparative advantages that it enjoys and can bring to the table. The present over-centralised power structure weakens the zones and states; clearly, most feel there is no equity.

We should not be overly concerned about individuals, as we should be about weak national institutions. But, given our sad past national electoral experiences, we must put into electoral offices people who are credible, accountable, show moral probity and respect for the rule of law.

Since the INEC chairman is a referee, he should not be appointed by a player, in this case, the president. There should be a way of communally selecting or electing the INEC chairman, so he is not beholden to the person who appointed him, but to the Constitution.

That is correct. By fiddling with Local Government funds, the concerned state governors disobey existing Court orders and provisions of the 1999 Constitution.

The 1976 Local Government reform made the Local Governments the third tier of government and a federating unit. I believe certain provisions of the 1999 Constitution also provide the LGs with legislative and statutory powers similar to those of the federal and state governments.

Local Government autonomy gives them the discretion to regulate their affairs. The aim is to promote rapid grassroots development.

Governance is simply about expeditious and sustainable service delivery. I am bringing into governance a commitment to best practices and efficient service delivery with our Security, Health, Education, Economy, Environment, Markets and Social welfare (SHEEEMS) governance platform.

We will replicate and improve Peter Obi’s ANIDS (Anambra Integrated Development Strategy) governance model. Most of our leaders no longer have the fear of God.

So, they make promises they don’t intend to keep and siphon public resources that are not theirs. I offer, with all humility, a different approach to governance. Our governance performances will always be grassroots-friendly, benchmarked and measurable.

I’m an entrepreneur, a good creator and manager of wealth and people. I have effectively operated in the organized private sector for over three decades.

I understand the business culture and practices, what works and what does not work. In both business and governance, we must strive for cost-effectiveness.

While in business, the bottom line is the profit margin; in governance, frugality and effective management of resources will always be a priority. Operating within available resources means not spending frivolously or borrowing carelessly.

Anambra as a state should be first amongst equals. We have the financial and human capital resources. We are an oil-producing state. Historically, Onitsha, Nnewi and Awka, the so-called ONA-axis, default naturally to commerce, industry and enterprise.

We need to leverage these core areas. We are mindful that there are problems which are peculiar to Anambra. Therefore, those governance needs peculiar to Anambra must be accorded the highest priority. There will be less window dressing. We will consult broadly and listen to advice and superior logic.
We shall also walk the talk!

It was His Excellency Peter Obi who asked that question. Anambra is not cursed. The value disorientation you refer to pervades the entire nation. In response, we will continue to rejig our mindset and our priorities.

There are core values that must be respected and upheld at all times. Leadership is by example, and I’m sorry to say that some of our past leaders have not exactly been exemplary

Those remarks are attributable to the incumbent, Governor Charles Soludo. Interestingly, he is either struggling or working hard now to fix a state he said was not broken.

There are inherent contradictions or elements of deceit and mischief at play. Today, he is focusing on infrastructure at the expense of peace, security and quality of life in Anambra. He promised the people of Dubai and Taiwan and delivered zilch.

Governor Peter Obi developed and bequeathed to his successors an optimal governance model, called ANIDS. The model was aligned to the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

That blueprint remains available as the best option and model for developing the 21 local government areas and 179 communities of Anambra State simultaneously.

What is being done is not working, and it can never work. It has never worked anywhere. Today, we are talking about technology. You must marry technology vis-à-vis the conventional security system. You must train the conventional security men, pay them well, and equip them with the right modern paraphernalia.

Then we have to apply the use of technology in areas of command-and-control centre, putting Artificial Intelligence, power, CCTV (Closed-Circuit Television), in the key locations of our state, especially Onitsha, Nnewi, Ekwulobia, Awka, the state capital.

And then, our airport, it is unbelievable that our airport, the only airport we have in the state, has no CCTV. So, we don’t know who comes in, who goes out. As a matter of fact, the people we are fighting may be coming in through that with ammunition and going away.

So, talking about security, again, light is a major factor. If you light up the state, then 50 per cent of the security problem is solved.
I remember that His Excellency Peter Obi, during his term, was involved in a Public-Private Partnership to build a power plant in Onitsha, which is a major industrial centre for our state.

I don’t know what has become of that. We are going to revive that and make sure that there is electricity in the state. With that, we will light up the cities overnight, and I can bet you 50% of security will be solved.

Without security, you can’t talk of bringing in both foreign and local investors. The state must be secured before anybody can do anything meaningful in the state.

Anambra State is endowed with natural resources. We have the Niger River, we have the Orashi River, bordering around the Ihiala, those areas. In fact, apart from water transportation, we will look at light rail, linking Onitsha to Nnewi.

Onitsha is the commercial centre of the state, Nnewi is the industrial hub, and Awka is the administrative capital, to link them together with these things in the first instance. And then linking the state down to Port Harcourt, linking Imo, Abia State down to Port Harcourt, so that in order to improve the commercial activities of our people, people who import goods can be cleared at an Onne Port in Rivers State, and then transport it through the waterways down to Onitsha.

So, what can be done with the waterways is enormous, so it is part of the, in fact, by the time we release our manifesto in the coming weeks, you will see that it is well captured in part of the things we must do.

Each sector is vital and constitutes an integral building block to effective governance and sustainable development. Each sector requires an enabling environment to thrive. Ease of doing business will facilitate investors’ confidence, whether they are foreign or domestic investors. Investors bring in capital and create employment opportunities. Each sector working optimally translates to sustainable development.

INEC manifested fully the weakness of our national institutions. Its handling of the 2023 general elections was suboptimal. As an umpire, the blame for the less-than-stellar performance and the resultant electoral outcome rests squarely with that institution.