Where Art Thy Promised Prosperity, O’ Delta? Why It Needs A Reset From False Promises, Must Hit The Refresh Button
The Oasis Reporters
December 18, 2022
As it usually occurs every month of December, Deltans who reside in the ‘diaspora’ within and outside Nigeria travel home like pilgrims to savour what newness and the familiar homeliness the state has to offer.
Eight years ago, most Deltans were greeted with an unusual avalanche of billboards and the People’s Democratic Party, PDP had the usual upper hand. They’ve always governed the state anyway. They thus control what Adverts from whichever party should be displayed and even the number that should be displayed per party including the locations.
2015 was most unusual. Dr. Emmanuel Uduaghan was leaving office, even though his being voted in fairly was a matter of contest from the voting centres to the courts.
Delta as a state had a surfeit of billboards promising prosperity for all Deltans with a new governor, Dr. Ifeanyi Okowa.
It is almost seven and half years now and there is no better time to ask Deltans one question.
Delta Waa doó as some of the billboards lovingly screamed in salutations to Deltans.
So we ask the people, Where is thy promised prosperity, Oo Deltans?
How long shall you be conned with billboards that largely display only the PDP ?
Are your roads any better now?
Has there been any fresh thinking in the state ?
Movement is much easier now in the Niger Delta city of Port Harcourt because a smart governor constructed Fly-overs in several parts of the city.
But how do you negotiate the traffic gridlock in Ughelli this year because only one link road leads to the hinterlands of Isoko, Ndokwa East and Ndokwa West.
Where is the imagination to construct Fly-overs from Warri to different routes and make the oil rich Delta resemble even one- thirtieth of Dubai ?
Before the money comes, it goes to service debts, yet there’s hardly any elevated thing done to offer the promised prosperity to the people.
There’s hardly any transparent accountability over what has come in and what is being expected. Where it not the exposure that Rivers State governor, Barr. Nyesom Wike gave on what the governors of the region have been collecting, nobody would have known anything!
Thanks to Governor Wike for compelling them to talk, even if they try to hoodwink us the more with their sophistry.
Deltans, where indeed is your promised prosperity ?
Although floods are nothing new in Nigeria’s often densely populated cities, the 2022 flooding was in a class of its own – the worst in a decade. It killed over 600 people, displaced 1.4 million residents and destroyed 89,348 houses, while not sparing 70,566 hectares of farmlands and crops.
Olasunkanmi Habeeb Okunola, visiting scientist at the Global Change Institute at the University of the Witwatersrand and the Institute for Environment and Human Security has unpacked how the capacity of Nigerians to cope with and reduce flood risks is determined by factors such as housing, drainage, transport infrastructure, education and income.
How did Delta State fare ?
Most Deltans fled from government inspired IDPs because they were largely like concentration camps with no committed desire to ameliorate the sufferings of the people.
The floods are over. All farmers have rushed back to their farms where they lost all their crops that they couldn’t harvest due to the sudden surge.
The sensible thing a government should have done would be to ensure that farmers wanting to replant their cassava crops ought to get cassava stems that are early maturing. Say, nine months. That way, before another flood comes, they would have uprooted their cassava root crops, food that is a main staple in the state.
Such stems for replanting ought to come through ADPs (Agricultural Development Program). Kano state used to do that faithfully years ago through state owned KNARDA (Kano Agricultural Research Development Agency and KASCO (Kano State Agricultural Supply Company).
But check Delta State ADP offices in the local government offices through the internet.
At least that is where to start the search from.
This is what you get.
N/A.
Meaning, not available on every query you serve. Not available!
People want to replant their cassava farms and they get no help from the government! Yet their billboards scream, Prosperity for all Deltans.
Where is the prosperity now?
Little wonder that THE WILL in it’s December 4, 2022 edition screamed:
Revealed: Despite N625.43bn Derivation Windfall, Extreme Poverty Ravages Oil Producing States
THEWILL -December 4, 2022
Governors Live Large While The People Suffer
Infrastructural Development Not Commensurate With Available Resources
Federal Government, States Trade Blames
Must we continue like this? For the governance by deceptive billboards to continue?
No.
For Delta State to find it’s bounce with vitality, we need fresh thinking as we just have to switch to governance with capacity even if Labour Party would not have space to fix its billboards.
Delta needs a refreshing change away from the stench of the old that has not lifted us.
Peter Obi showed great capacity as governor of neighbouring Anambra State. Let Delta State hook up to the Labour Party (LP) train this time around. Allowed to display sufficient billboards or not.
