“Everything that has a start, must have an end…”, so sang the 70s rock band, Sweet Breeze, in their track titled, ‘Confidential Bye-Bye’. The sense in that sound holds a lot for Senator Uche Ekwunife and her present political circumstances.

Emerging on the highly competitive, combustive and cash-intensive Anambra politics from a rewarding banking experience, Uchechukwu Lillian Ekwunife, nee Ogudebe; did not look back as she clinched victories and laurels in electoral contests.

Barely two years after leaving the University of Calabar from where she bagged a degree in Business Education. Mrs. Ekwunife secured a job in the defunct Equatorial Trust Bank Limited. She transitioned from ETB to Standard Trust Bank Limited. From 1997 through 2003, the young banker circulated around Onitsha and Awka. Her girlish good looks and ageless frame, gave her advantage in the days when banking was all about deposit drive, she knew the rich and influential. So before attaining the age of 30, Uche had seen money, the monied people and what money could do!

It was from that auspicious background that Uche decided to join the trade of politicians, with most of whom she had had contact, acting as their accounting officers and performing sundry duties on their behalf. That may be why by 2007 when she appeared on the ballot to contest the federal constituency seat of Anaocha/Njikoka/Dunukofia (ANDu); she had learned and imbibed the theories, cunnings and strategies of political combat from the playmakers. Winning the election to represent one of the largest federal constituency in the country opened a new vista for the ‘eaglet’ politician. Being a candidate of the ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), things came out very easily for her. The garrison commanders in the state knew her and she was known by them!

In 2011, it was easier for her to come back for a second term. By then she had become Iyom Ugochinyeleze-na nwata of, Nri, in Njikoka local council of the state. Roughly translated that title means “damsel favoured by God, with a crown at a tender age”. Perhaps emboldened by the ease with which she won the PDP ticket and seat of ANDu federal constituency, Iyom dreamed big and drifted to the Progressive Peoples Alliance (PPA), to contest the 2010 governorship of Anambra State.

When she signaled her intention to run for governor, many people thought she was merely posturing or rehearsing her strategies for a future contest. But no sooner had the PDP governorship ticket proved elusive to her, than Ekwunife moved over to PPA and campaigned with great gusto. She was the only woman in a line-up of masculine heavyweights such as the then incumbent governor Peter Obi, senator Andy Uba, current Labour Minister, Chris Ngige; former Central Bank Governor, Professor Chukwuma Charles Soludo; Prince Nicholas Ukachukwu and chairman of GOCUZ, Dr. Obinna Uzoh.

One year after that failed ambition to become the first elected female governor of the state, Uche returned to the PDP, on whose platform she returned to the House of Representatives to serve ANDu for a second term. As a ranking legislator, Iyom became the Chairman of the House Committee on the Environment, an ‘active’ committee. Back in Anambra State, she jumped from the PDP to the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA) yet again to contest the 2013 governorship. As in her first trial, most people in the state saw her gambit as an unserious chase calculated to serve as a bargaining chip for a possible senate ticket. Her quest to become governor was despite the declaration by the exiting Peter Obi that the 2013 governorship seat had been zoned to Anambra North Senatorial district.

But trusting her ability to sway delegates and carry the day, Iyom purchased the expression of interest and nomination forms, filled and returned same to the appropriate quarters. She was screened, cleared and participated in the APGA governorship primary. But on the day of the primary, she was kept in the dark about the list of delegates. It was yet another failed venture. Many a politician in the state had known what the woman can do. They dread her. She sulked and strutted. In the end, she was pacified somehow.

However, shortly after the new administration was inaugurated in the state and noticing that her political future no longer lay in APGA, Iyom retreated to PDP. To her, the cock had stopped crowing and she thus needed urgently to take shelter under the red and white Umbrella, if she must survive the impending democratic heavy rain in the state. It was her return to PDP that paved her way to the senate. Not only did she become the first woman to be in the senate in Anambra Central, she was set to equal the record of the other great female political amazon in the state, Senator Joy Emordi.

But unlike Emordi, Iyom could not last more than six months in the senate. Like Emordi, however, she was removed via the court. Like Oedipus, she got entangled and liquidated by what she was running away from. It happened that the very obstacle on her path to the senate which made her change platform became her nemesis. The APGA national chairman, Victor Umeh coveted what she schemed for: the senate ticket. She crossed over to PDP to teach Umeh a political lesson. She succeeded. But the victory proved short lived. Umeh’s petition cut her stay in the senate short. But convinced she would always “beat any rival silly”, Iyom waltzed into the ruling APC. The same APC she traduced and tongue-lashed, eight months before.

Although she rationalized her defection on the gang-up and mischief lined up against her political ascendance by envious adversaries, the move, as a tactical error that may lead to her strategic collapse. If the little song bird has proved that she could dance, a new song was improvised for her. Her books were opened. The apostles of change in APC regaled her with records of her past exploits. They reminded her how she had been prancing around on different political platforms, winning laurels amid impunity. The new masters told her that unlike before, a new sheriff that neither drinks nor laughs, a friend of sinister operatives and cutter of lofty ambitions, was in town. In beautiful but plain language, they informed Iyom Ugochinyeleze-na nwata that though her reasons for joining the change bandwagon was convincing, they were not amused by her changeling posture in politics. “We would not encourage your belief that party politics is similar to monkey antics, where you can jump from one tree to another, eating and throwing banana peels about as you go,” so they told her. And her smile faded, just as the dance step jaded! What a day of reckoning for the electoral amazon, who had wined and dined with the mighty only to be downed by upstarts and cheeky manipulators. “If it were to be in the former platform, where juggernauts know how to name a price; it would not be so,” so she must have thought. But the light was out. And from the distance, the rock band, Sweetbreeze, could heard singing the next song: “…now my happiness is gone, I don’t know; but from hence we must be known and called, Mr. and Mrs. Fool…”

In the eight years Iyom pervaded the political frontiers in Anambra State, she became a phenomenon. She matched men in their intrigues and took blows as they did also. She tongue lashed those who got on her wrong side of political calculations and dodged those who could demystify her. She was friendly with the poor and became a champion and rallying point of women.

Iyom assisted many of her constituents in cash and candour, was a shoulder to lean on by the poor and hungry. She also brought in developmental projects to Anaocha/Njikoka/Dunukofia federal constituency. Through these avenues, she maintained close touch with the masses. And being the real citizens that vote at elections, they usually reciprocate. That was part of the secrets of her winning ways in the constituency. But when she wanted to extend her influence to the senatorial district, it seemed the godfathers gave her a boundary she could not cross.

While in the bank, Ekwunife served as business officer and profit centre manager. Her present temporary setback in politics will provide her ample opportunity to refresh her memory on the principles of risk management. Unlike when she was hovering in her thirties, she is now climbing down the other side of forty; as such, maturity has set in. She would hence forth discover the wisdom of looking before leaping. Was her hasty decision to make the latest change of platform a wise one? No expert opinion would be appropriate in the present circumstances. Rather the product of her quiet introspection should serve her purpose.

Iyom should in that mental contemplation visualize her ascent, past glory and conquests. Above all, she should define her philosophy of politics. If retreat simulates surrender, would she remain in her new political abode, despite being a total stranger? And in the light of the inglorious way the party chieftains opened her past, would she not suffer psychosis that could lead to eventual loss of direction?

Having received a rough birthday through removal from senate and chairmanship of the lucrative Senate Committee on Petroleum Downstream sector; the sad New Year handout of APC frustration, should not be allowed to compound her situation. And coming at a time when the savour of senate has been opened to her, the loss of APC return ticket to the senate would remain a sting on her wings of fortune in a seemingly fair weather!

Iyom may not forgive the APC screening committee, which in its report conveyed her rejection with the suggestion that she was “more of a fair weather hen”. Alas; did they forget so soon that they were referring to the Ada-Ugo, (First She Eagle) of Igboukwu and the Akwa-Ugo(Eagle’s Egg) of Ojoto? But whatever turned an eagle to a hen must be magical or desperate!