Soludo’s burden of stemming disruptive change

SIR: Anambra State in the past seven months of Professor Chukwuma Soludo’s watch has witnessed measures of tugging between his government and various sects in organised crime, including some sub-sects in the informal sector, whose operations diminish the quality of life of the people and the states revenue receipts. The governor’s devout insistence on strategic engagements bordering on the primacy of life, governments revenue yields and systemic sanity are fundamentally responsible for the sustained tussle.

He would not tolerate parallel structures that undermine the state’s economy and challenge the authority of the government to protect the people and ensure a sane polity. He takes no prisoners! But such distracting windows like brazen kidnapping for ransom (some for heightened savage lures), ruthless touting, cultic gangsterism, park and market fiefdoms were Soludo administration’s abhorrent inheritances. They would not cheaply give in to a new order. Yet, only systemic change would soothe his agitated mood.  

Till date, Soludo has maintained an uncompromising eagerness to turn things around in the singular pursuit of making Anambra State a prosperous, livable and pleasurable habitation for Ndi-Anambra and other persons who opt for the state desirous of the accruable deliverables therefrom. As the governor of Anambra State these past seven months, Soludo cuts the impression of a leader in a hurry to make things veer to his predetermined conclusions in direction and urgency. Since the system would not freely yield to his compulsions, the ongoing struggles test the audacity of the governor to impress his authority and convictions on the Anambra political ecosystem.

Those who gave the governor no chance of any success (and they were many) in his fierce charge against kidnappers and other harbingers of death, who earlier held sway in the state, now join other Anambra residents in celebrating the assured boost in the people’s sense of freedom and safety. Every passing day furthers the governor’s superior power.

While the governor’s profile is unarguably on ascent on this count, the worrisome incidence of touting has continued to gnaw at the image of the government as the legitimate authority to protect its citizens and maintain law and order in public places. Evidently, whatever the state government might be doing to rein in the unwieldy menace of touts in parks, markets and everywhere in Anambra is yet to translate to the envisaged result. Touts still loom large all across the state harassing transporters and commuters, and embarrassing the government.

So far, Ndi-Anambra have no cause to doubt the benefits of the overwhelming electoral victory they handed Professor Chukwuma Soludo in the 2021 Anambra gubernatorial poll. They eagerly look forward to better days in a prosperous, livable and pleasurable smart megacity homeland in the course of their treasured Soludo’s administration.
Okechukwu Anarado writes from Adazi-Nnukwu.