Results from November 18 Anambra governorship elections will shock Nigerians – Ojiba

Comrade Akunwata Ejoh Ojiba is the governorship candidate of the Allied Congress Party of Nigeria (ACPN) in the November 18, 2017 election in Anambra State. An indigene of Onitsha in Anambra North Senatorial District,Ojiba is a senior member at the Institute of Public Diplomacy and was a Staff Officer General of Customs at the Tin Can Island Port, Lagos State, until recently. In this interview with PATRICK OKOHUE he speaks on his carrier with the Customs, state of affairs in Anambra and why he wants to replace Governor Willie Obiano in the Anambra Government House.

You only recently retired from the Nigerian Customs Service, how was life as an officer?
In my service to the nation through the Nigeria Customs Service, I’ve been opportune to administer as a Staff Officer General of Customs in Tin Can Island Port of all places.

Anybody that knows Customs and their administration should know that Tin Can used to be a very difficult terrain, but I happened to work with Area Comptrollers, especially the last person I worked with, Comptroller Yusuf Bashir, who happened to be one good administrator, and I learnt a lot of things.

Those things I thought I knew better, when I started working closely with him, I got a lot of improvement and we were able to team up to make Tin Can what it is today – no more everyday riot. I was in that position until I retired last September 1.

Was it by voluntary retirement?
Statutorily, after 35 years of service. Not only in Tin Can that I worked. Other places I worked include Onne, my profile still speaks. At Lillypond and even in that Maiduguri that I stayed for four years, it was another thing.

My profile is there for anybody to go and see. I happen to work in an organisation that because of the old perception requires a lot of reforms. In fact, at the inception of the last CGC, whom I respect so well, he improved on Customs on daily basis.

In revenue, the records are there. Initially, people will think that the organisation collects money to put in their pockets.

But when they started coming, even the National Assembly, some of them are still ignorant on the collection of Customs revenue. People believe that the Custom Service is one of the most corrupt organizations, where people go in to just steal money?

But duties are collected electronically. Every single kobo that is collected goes directly to the Federal Treasury. You don’t have anywhere to collect money and put in your pocket.

Though there are areas where an officer may overlook certain procedures, but there are equally checks and balances. We have in the job Internal Audit Departments, and Headquarters Audit.

All these people, all the job you do are watched either in Abuja or somewhere else, somebody is watching the job, and when they bring you in as an officer and give you the record of all the jobs you have done for the past years, you will baffle.

If you are giving a duty payment of N300, 000 on a consignment and a similar consignment comes and you give a duty of N200, 000, the records are all there. They will record, and when they show you the records, you will start weeping.

So, it’s an organisation I am proud to have passed through and I’m sure with time, they will get to where others are in the World Customs Organisation are fact, everywhere you are in the World Custom Organisation, Nigeria is rated very high. They have very intelligent officers.

I’m happy to have passed through that organisation and that’s why I will always put it in my profile that I passed through the Nigerian Customs Service.

You retired last September and here you are running for an office as high as the Number 1 citizen of Anambra State. What is the motivation?
Actually, I will tell you that the project is a divine one. Divine in the sense that this is me going to retire first day of September and this is a party, though I have sympathy for the party while in the service because of their programmes, which I have seen before now. But my retirement coincided with the period of their primaries.

There were two other aspirants, but majority of the delegates and the party leadership in Anambra supported me. One of the leaders even paid for my expression of interest form.

We went to Abuja, collected the form and he dished out the cheque, I was surprised.

So, on the day of the primaries, the two other aspirants were there but one of them stepped down, and I defeated the other.

We have about 153 delegates from the 21 local governments, everybody shouted Ojiba! Ojiba!! Ojiba!!! That was how I emerged as the flag-bearer of the Allied Congress Party of Nigeria (ACPN).

We know there are moneybags in the Nigerian political system and many of them have been coming, with my souring popularity, asking me how do you want to go about it?

How do you want to prosecute this? Are you sure you have the means? But as I usually tell them, it’s not about me having the means, this project is a divine one and I know that we must get to where God wants us to be.

The terrain is very rough, but I’m a faithful Christian. Even within the system, many have come, some will want to give you something that you will eat and you will be strong, that is nothing, even bullet, will enter your system.

But I said to them, I did not eat such things for my 35 years in the Customs Service and was standing on the road all those years and nothing happened to me, is it in the political terrain that things will start happening? But they insisted, ‘it is dangerous o’.

But I said to them, ‘forget it’, the Lord, the good God I worship will equally see me through this and I don’t need to do that. Some will even come and would want to administer oath on you.

These are the things you see in politics that at times, people like us will look at the system and say there must be change. We need real change. So, we need change in our attitude, approach, and in everything we do.

Like I said few days ago, when I was growing up, there was water everywhere. There was Water Board. What happened to this Water Board? What happened to the pipes that were laid on the ground then? Why is there no water?

Why is it that if you don’t have money for borehole, you will suffer before getting water? And the funniest thing is that our big men in leadership move round the planet and everywhere they go to, in Europe, Asia and other places, they see that things are working. They see discipline; they see accountability. But why is our own different?

Go to London, the gas you use, is piped to the house. The water you need is piped to your house. The electricity is also piped to the house. So, what have we been doing over here? Is there no money for all these things? Are there not budgets for them?

We have internally generated revenue and we have federal allocation. Is it that it is not enough to do all these things?

What will somebody do with N20 billion in his account when his neighbour next door and his children are suffering.

The man next door, you see him that he looks very wretched and he is living next to you and you are happy having N20 billion in your account shuttling from one country to another, is it life? Is it what will make you happy? And these big men live in perpetual fear in the midst of these same people.

Today, they are all talking of security, security, security, and I said security that will make me not to visit my neighbours? People will come and write names to see me.

Well, if it is Nigerian situation, when we get to the time of security, I will know. The masses will be my security by God’s grace.

Some people may think that you are saying this because you are seeking an elective office. They are used to hearing politicians talk like this. How have you touched the lives of the ordinary people to justify your position?
Thank you very much. You start from people around you. All around me today, in my village, in my working place, any place I have lived, my relationship with the people speaks very loud and clear.

How you know that you are truly doing well is when people around you are happy. In any place I stepped into, in any function I stepped into in my village, you will see the young ones, the old, everybody carries chair just to make sure that one is comfortable.

Some of them will even stand to even guard you. That is enough for me; that is what has made me know that I have touched many lives and that I am well accepted.

Even as I was retiring in September, some group called me – “Oga Ojiba, what do we do? What do we do as you are going? I said to them that the officer that is taking over from me is a good officer, work with him as you worked with me. But they said, “eeh, can anybody be like you?” I said many people like me are there in the Service, don’t worry.

Our happiness should not be from how much we have, but from how many lives we have impacted positively. It’s not my own making; it’s the Lord’s making. Let me take my family for example.

When we were growing, we saw a lot of family wrangling; brother against brother, and problems all over the place, but when we grew up, many people wanted to champion their own course. But I said no.

I looked at my family and said we cannot move forward with all these wrangling and that the best approach is to unify all of them.

I started calling for meetings and we started dialoguing. Today, if you go to my village, to my family, you will see things for yourself.

My uncle, who was born in 1929, about 88 years now, was still in Lagos. I called him and said you have to come back home. Why are you in Lagos? Come back and help as a father.

I made sure that I put up an abode, a place for him to come down and he’s back to town now. And this is a very senior civil servant that worked with the Ministry of Communication and rose to Director Level before he retired. And because he had no place to live down home, he had to stay in Lagos, but today he’s back home.

So, what I’m trying to say in effect is that you have to start with touching peoples’ lives wherever you are. It is not about how much you have; it’s about change of attitude to life. Start from your neighbours, start from your family.

In all my contributions, I don’t look at just my nuclear family, but the larger family. That is why I am not afraid to live among my people.

I have cordial relationship with my people, both the ones that were not in good terms with my father when he was alive and the ones that are in good terms with him. We all live together now very happily and I’m sure they are all happy with me.

So, I will carry the same virtue of one happy family to the larger Anambra State as the governor of the state. One divine thing is that I belong to Anambra in general, because my paternal grandmother is from Nnibo-Awka and my maternal grandmother is from Nsugbe, that is, Tony Nwoye’s place.

We will carry our campaign to Nsugbe, Nibo, to everywhere, in fact, all over Anambra State. I have in-laws in Osimowo, Okija, etcetera.

So, I belong to Anambra, fully Anambra and I’m sure where we are going to is a divine project. I retired on September 1, took flag of a party on September 2nd. Is it not mysterious?

There are big political parties in this governorship election, what are your chances?
Big parties?

Yes, there is APGA, PDP, APC and others?
They are self-acclaimed big parties. They are contesting in this election, but none of them can stand a chance in a free and fair election in this state. The people are already tired of the impoverishment by the ruling APGA government. So, nobody is talking of APGA in this election.

The same is goes with the PDP, because the PDP is in disarray in Anambra State. And when you talk of APC, they are not existing anywhere on ground in this state.

The people at the grassroots, who are going to vote on November 18, don’t know them. They have long rejected the broom.

So, the only alternative choice for the people is Comrade Akunwata Ejoh Ojiba, and come November 18, we all shall see that the people have made their choice. I tell you this because we have taken our time to reach out to the electorates.

All along, we have been at the grassroots working, while some of the self-acclaimed big political parties are contesting the election on pages of the newspapers and holding rallies with hired crowd.

They are competing among themselves who has the largest crowd. The same people rented by different political parties. Politics has long passed the age of rallies and sharing of cups of rice to electorates.

The electorates have become wiser. I can confidently tell you that our political structure will deliver in Anambra State; that is why the outcome of the November 18 governorship election will shock the world, because ACPN will defeat what people now call the big parties in Anambra State.

Most importantly, it may interest you to know that I am the only candidate in this election that has the three Senatorial zones as my hometown.

Let me explain: Anambra Central is where my paternal grandmother is from. She is from Nibo and that is where I have most of my friends. In Anambra South, an Azia man, in Ihiala Local Government, is my in-law.

They are marrying my sister there and I have many friends there too beside my in-laws. Onitsha in Anambra North is my hometown. So, you can see that I am not only on ground in the state but at home in all the senatorial district.

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They are competing among themselves who has the largest crowd. The same people rented by different political parties. Politics has long passed the age of rallies and sharing of cups of rice to electorates. The electorates have become wiser. I can confidently tell you that our political structure will deliver in Anambra State; that is why the outcome of the November 18 governorship election will shock the world, because ACPN will defeat what people now call the big parties in Anambra State.