When “wise men” gathered in Owerri in search of opportunity

By Ochereome NNANNA
It was one of the most hyped government programmes ever seen on these shores. Billboards were mounted in Lagos and Abuja announcing the Imo Investment Summit. The organisers sent text messages to the mobile handsets of people almost every hour. The Imo State Government was holding its first investment summit in its 34 years of existence.

Gov. Ohakim in a warm handshake with Mrs. Tapgun, Hon Minister of State for Commerce who represented the Vice President at the Imo Investment Summit held in Owerri recently.

Come June 8 and 9, 2010, the grounds of the Imo Concorde Hotel, venue of the event, was agog with activities, as contingents from the 27 local government areas of the state came to exhibit the agricultural, industrial, mineral and even cultural products for which each of them was famous, for the benefit of investors looking for opportunities.

Inside the conference hall of the hotel, contingents from many parts of the world were gathered for the summit proper. Among these was a former Prime Minister (Taoiseach) of Ireland, Mr Bertie Ahern, who introduced himself as having served in that capacity for “ten years, ten months and ten days”. He is currently still a member of parliament, where he has served for 23 years, 18 of them as a cabinet member. Leading a group of investors from the United States of America was Mr. J. C. Watts, a former congressional Minority Leader and frontline businessman. Also in attendance was the representative of Vice President, Namadi Sambo, Mrs Josephine Tapgun, who holds the Minister of State, Commerce portfolio.

Three states were represent
ed. The governor of Zamfara State, Alhaji Mamuda Aliyu Shinkafi, attended in person, while the Deputy Governor of Ebonyi State, Professor Chibuzor Ogbu, stood in for Governor Martin Elechi and the Chief Servant of Niger State, Dr Aliyu Babangida, sent a representative. These are just to mention but a few.

An investment summit idea from an Ikedi Ohakim regime should not come as a surprise because this was the guy who, as Commissioner for Commerce in the late Governor Evan Enwerem cabinet some eighteen years ago, drew up the first economic masterplan for Imo State. Since he found himself on the gubernatorial seat, he has pushed ahead with an ambitious dream of making the state one of the most industrialised in the country and among the big five economies.

According to his text of keynote speech, the government decided that investors can only be attracted to safe and secure environments. This informed the launching of the Clean and Green initiative, which appears to have yielded result as, according to Imo State government officers, Owerri has been ranked as the cleanest state capital in Nigeria. Here was a city where, some three years ago, refuse heaps were used to block road junctions. The governor also boasted that the security policies of his government has made it possible that “today, verifiable statistics from Police Headquarters in Abuja shows that Imo State has the lowest crime statistics in the federation”. This bit of information will surprise many, what with the reported spate of kidnapping and violent robberies in the whole South East and South-South.

The governor also has a dream to transform the state into what he calls “one city-state”, linked to adjoining states through the opening up of rural roads by the Imo Rural Roads Maintenance Agency (IRROMA).

The state’s educational ranking in Nigeria is without parallel. Owerri is the only state capital with three tertiary institutions, while the state has continued to lead the pack in terms of candidates seeking admissions into universities and like institutions.

With such a massive turnout of executive level manpower every year, the economy of the state must be expanded to accommodate the over five million resident, highly literate Imolites, while improving its political climate to avoid a socio-economic chaos.
Noted the governor: “As I
said at the 5th Nigeria-China Business and Investment Forum in Beijing, China, in September 2007, of the over 80 million Igbo in Nigeria, about ten million of them are Imo citizens with about five million of them resident in the state. Our citizens are dynamic entrepreneurs scattered all over Africa, forming the largest distribution network in Africa. When a people are called the Jews of Africa that tells you about their business acumen”.

In his word of encouragement, the former Irish PM, Mr. Ahern, pointed out that if his country could rise from it mediocre economic standing to its present enviable position, it can be done by anyone who has the vision and determination to succeed.

“In 1986, the year in I which I was elected Lord Mayor of my native city. Dublin, Ireland had a higher debt per head than Ethiopia or Sudan.  We had the lowest standard of living in Western Europe.  On the day I retired as Irish Prime Minister, in May 2008, we had the second highest standard of living in Europe.  During my time as Minister for Finance, the Irish economy created 1,000 new jobs every week.  This was the beginning of a massive transformation of Ireland’s economy that became known as the Celtic Tiger.

During the period I served as Irish Prime Minister from 1997-2008, Ireland was Europe’s most successful economy. Ireland had the lowest level of unemployment in the EU; the second lowest national debt, the second highest minimum wage; the biggest spend in the EU on infrastructure; the fastest growth of all OECD countries in spending per capita on health; and, the most generous tax and welfare system in the world for single income families on the average industrial wages”.

Governors Ohakim and  Shinkafi shared the opinion that Nigeria must shift its attention from crude oil and gas to other equally rich but untapped natural sources, especially solid minerals and agriculture. Zamfara is reported to harbour more gold deposits than South Africa, though this has not been independently confirmed. But it says much for the possibilities that await investors outside the hydrocarbons area.

Owerri’s new bubble

One of the ways of knowing whether the economy of an entity is growing or otherwise is to check out the commercial bustle rate during the day and night life during the after hours. In Owerri, more and more choice hotels are springing up, and from Thursday to Sunday every week, most of them are fully booked, with events bubbling in many venues.
Day time traffic in the city has turned into a nightmare due to its congestion and slow pace, and this is one area the state government has has to work on. Most of the hotels have night clubs, and some of them are beginning to offer what can be termed as “exotic” entertainment.

Truly, Owerri is beginning to don the toga of “the entertainment capital” of Nigeria (the state government says it already is).

However, more attention needs to be paid to other towns apart from Owerri, such as Okigwe, Orlu, Mgbidi and Oguta. Moreover, the inner city roads are begging for attention.The Ohakim government has made a lot of giant strides but evidently, a lot of work is still waiting to be done.