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The public interest in Gov Ortom

By Utomi Jerome-Mario
12 January 2023   |   1:32 am
SIR: Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, popularly known as Mahatma Gandhi, an Indian lawyer, anti-colonial nationalist and political ethicist, had Nigerians particularly politicians in mind, when he, many years ago, remarked that seven things which had to do with social and political conditions will destroy a man.   Gandhi, who employed nonviolent resistance to lead the successful campaign against the colonial master in…

[files] Ortom. Photo/facebook/benuestategovernment

SIR: Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, popularly known as Mahatma Gandhi, an Indian lawyer, anti-colonial nationalist and political ethicist, had Nigerians particularly politicians in mind, when he, many years ago, remarked that seven things which had to do with social and political conditions will destroy a man.
 
Gandhi, who employed nonviolent resistance to lead the successful campaign against the colonial master in India, named these seven sins to include: Wealth without work, pleasure without conscience, knowledge without character, commerce (business) without morality (ethics), science without humanity, religion without sacrifice and politics without principle.
 
A great number of Nigerians are in their social, economic, religious, moral and political endeavours, guilty of these sins. While this state of affairs remains condemnable, there are however, some hopeful signs that not all politicians in Nigeria are without principle.
 
By lately throwing his weight behind the Labour Party (LP) presidential candidate, Peter Obi in the forthcoming elections, barely 48 hours after former President Olusegun Obasanjo released a six-page letter endorsing the former Anambra State governor, one will to a large extent believe that Samuel Ortom, Benue State governor, is among the very Nigerians that presently play politics not for private gain but the purpose of greater good for greater number, politics laced in principle.
 
Apart from being reputed for possessing nation building prowess and laced with burning desire to see Nigeria transform to a nation where equity, justice and peace shall reign supreme, Ortom has demonstrated that his sense of nationhood, public good, national cohesion and development is stronger than ethnic, religious and political consideration.
 
There are other traceable indices and critical creative leadership feats, attributable to Ortom. First, he is one of five aggrieved governors of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) known as the G5 or Integrity Group. The governors have refrained from campaigning for the PDP presidential candidate, Atiku Abubakar amid opposition to the party’s National Chairman, Senator Iyorchia Ayu coming from the same region as the standard bearer. Ortom in the opinion of this piece is a believer in fairness, equity and justice.

Ortom’s ban of open grazing in his state is important because open grazing is the first line of conflict between herders and farmers. The friction caused untold hardship as farms worth millions were destroyed, farmers killed for resisting herders’ influx into their farmlands; consequently, many farmers were forced to flee from their farms, farm yields dimmed and food inflation is gaining ground across the country.
 
Like Ortom, many Nigerians have before now argued that the President that Nigeria needs at this challenging time in the country’s history should be one who understands the urgent need to unite the people and speedily initiate policies and actions to redirect the ship of the nation on the path of growth and development.

Utomi Jerome-Mario is the programme coordinator (Media and Policy), Social and Economic Justice Advocacy (SEJA), Lagos.

 
 
 

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