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Welcome to Orji Kalu Institute of Democracy
By
Nwokocha Okereke-Nwam


The Governor of Imo state, Ikedi Ohakim, elected under the PPA banner has pledged to set up a Dr Orji Uzor Kalu Institute for the Advancement of Democratic Practice. Few would begrudge his gratitude to the founder of the party that gave him the exalted seat he presently occupies considering that only the most reckless prophet could have predicted his meteoric elevation a few months back. Since this world-class facility is still at the dream stage, I can conveniently contribute to its establishment and I see nothing wrong in taking the reader through a metaphysical tour of what promises to be a unique school at which students are expected to understudy the genius of one of the most remarkable characters in Nigeria’s Fourth Republic. Welcome to the Dr Orji Uzor Kalu Institute for Advancement of Democratic Practice.

I guess we begin from the beginning; the Institute cannot be sited in Abia state not because there is no land available to host its proposed four faculties but due to the critical absence of access roads in the state. A tour of Ariaria through Ukwu-mango road or Ngwa road, Ohanku, Aba-Owerri road, Port Harcourt road, in fact any road in Aba Township would disillusion the project engineers and end our dream of honouring the former Governor. So Ohakim may have to locate the Orji Uzor Kalu Institute in his Imo state instead. This may not be a big deal after all, the two states are bonded by strong historical, ethnic, political, geographical and cultural ties. Now they are going to co-fund an inimitable foundation. In the eight years of his very unique brand of administration, Orji Uzor Kalu had several other more engaging priorities beyond roads and socio-economic infrastructures. In any case Abians did not elect him for such minor issues as provision of infrastructures but to engage in such life-and-death matter as confronting the Tyrant of Abuja, Olusegun Obasanjo, the anti-Christ of Abia civilization.

I also suggest the promoters avoid siting the Institute in Owerri since the Capital City is already congested with conventional schools. The Orji Uzor Kalu Institute is a very special foundation and needs an exclusive abode. Maybe following in the well-crafted tradition of his predecessor, Ohakim may site his first project in Okigwe, his own part of the state. He should however ensure it is not sited in the Obowo part to avoid leading researchers in the Institute to the temptation of having to compare Kalu with an Obowo great, the late Dr Samuel Onunaka Mbakwe, former Governor of the Old Imo state, which comprised the present Imo, Abia and the Afikpo end of Ebonyi state. Researchers can be mischievous at times, and their wandering mind could stroll into topics they are not paid to pry into. Dee Sam and Orji Kalu do not share much in common anyway; twice-elected Governors they may have both been, but each came into the job with different qualifications and from different routes and ultimately arrived at different destinations. That Ohakim would easily build a Foundation to immortalise not Mbakwe but Orji Kalu demonstrates a worrisome judgment that Imo state may have unwittingly exchanged a low-damage disaster for a volcanic tragedy. This is food for thought for Imo people and the very idea that their new Governor’s intellectual hero is Orji Uzor Kalu should quickly sober up those hallucinating about an Imo revival under Ohakim.

The Institute would need to be built according to the vision of the founder, whatever it is. Selecting a competent contractor should not be a headache. Nobody expects Julius Berger, RCC or other Abuja-based giants to go reap where they did not sow. Contracts in Abia state under Orji Uzor Kalu were exclusively reserved for Zerock Construction Company, a mediocre shovel-and-headpan company allegedly owned by the ex-Governor’s family. Here we also have to worry about completion and standard of work. If Zerock adopts the benchmark for executing projects in Abia state under the man whom the Institute is named after, Ohakim may not commission it before he leaves office, in four or eight years time unless he plagiarises a copyrighted Orji Uzor script by commissioning it uncompleted. For inspiration, Ohakim can take a guided tour of the Umuahia Township Stadium and its Indoor Sports Hall component. Or the Abia House in Abuja. Or even the appropriately named Dr Orji Uzor Kalu Specialist Hospital in Aba.

Where Abia state University Uturu and Abia Polytechnic Aba failed in course accreditation, the Orji Uzor Kalu Institute would excel. It would have four full-fledged faculties each manned by professionals of requisite qualification. On this site, dear reader, would be the Faculty of Mamacracy, where the ex-Queen Mother Excellency, Odiuko n’Abia, would teach female course participants the intricate subjects of political sorcery, shrine science and management of family asset under a contractor-financed gubernatorial tenure. Course participants would be enriched with the distinctive knowledge of how a strong-willed mother can nudge a never-do-well son into public office, solidify him with marabouts, help lace his untrustworthy aides with oaths at Ogwugwu and Okija for loyalty and thereafter proceed to exclusively corner the sanitation, water, environmental, market, road and other development levies accruing to the state treasury, without her signature appearing on a single sheet of paper. The Chief Priests of Ogwugwu and Okija would periodically be invited as visiting Professors to lecture on shrine procedures, practices and ethics in a modern democracy.

At the other end would be the Faculty of Election Science where Orji Uzor Kalu himself, the master-strategist, would write the standard textbook on how to elect a Governor without winning an election. I guess this course would be compulsory for all students. Professor Maurice Iwu would oblige with occasional lectures on a topic he is renowned to be the best in the developing world. Rigging elections should no longer be left for amateurs and adventurers, with the Orji Uzor Kalu Institute for Advanced Democratic Practice, the business of returning candidates outside the election route will be for core professionals who follow researched methods.

The Faculty of Financial Scam and Money Laundering already have five distinguished resource persons who just graduated from Kirikiri Maximum Prison. Chief Theodore Orji, who sat by Ohakim while he was promising this Institute, must have expected the deanship of this lucrative faculty as a prerogative. His co-accused in the 100-count charge of money laundering before a Federal High Court in Lagos, all former top Abia state government officials now have a chance to impact their knowledge to society. One of the course contents under this faculty would be how a sitting governor could see his personal business empire expand beyond his widest imagination while the fortunes of the state he governs contrasts in direct proportion. Students can also learn how to set up a sensational tabloid newspaper to fan out jobs to people outside the state by diverting the printing press bought in the name of the state-owned newspaper.

The faculty of Political Engineering would open the eyes of students to ways and means of controlling the State House of Assembly by ensuring that only those who passed with distinction through the faculty of Mamacracy ever get nominated into the House. The visiting Professors from Ogwugwu and Okija would stamp the candidates’ form for character attestation. The faculty would teach students tenure instability, impeachment of deputy governors, speakers and principal officers of the House, cabinet reshuffle, appointment and disappointment of aides on radio or at the slightest whimsical, how not to delegate power to subordinates while moonlighting on endless, fruitless foreign trips and how to spread poverty in an otherwise rich state that earned nearly N200billion in eight years as revenue without incurring the masses’ anger.

Recruiting top officials for this Institute should not be a problem given that in eight years of distinguished service to Abia, Orji Uzor Kalu has amassed a large army of resource persons through numerous cabinet reshuffles, dismissal and reconstitution of the State Executive Council. And for Governor Ohakim, he too may have an International Foundation named after him when he is through with Imo state considering in whose hallowed footsteps he has elected to walk.

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