Chief Kalu Umeh is Abia State Attorney-General and Commissioner for Justice. In this interview with Vanguard, he addresses issues such as the alleged gang rape of a university student in the state, the dismissal of non-Abia State citizens from the civil service and the face-off with a telecommunication outfit. Excerpts:

By Ogbonna Amadi

VIOLENT crimes such as kidnapping have reduced in Abia State. How did this happen?

We have consigned kidnapping to the past in Abia State. And I can tell you that the ugly incidence of kidnapping in the State has permanently been arrested and we can never get back to that era where people could not go about their normal duties without fear of being kidnapped.

I can emphatically tell you that so much was spent in resources, time and planning to get us to where we are today. The credit must go to the Governor, Chief T. A. Orji, who did not spare anything to ensure that Abians and all others who live and do business in Abia State could have a safe place to carry on their legitimate business without fear of falling victims to the antics of these criminal elements. The various security agencies, especially the Army, the Navy, the Nigeria Police, the Nigerian Security Defence Corps and the State Security Service, must be given credit for the prevailing peace in Abia which I know will endure.

What are your findings on the alleged gang rape at Abia State University?

The immediate response of Government on getting knowledge of the alleged gang rape in ABSU was to summon the vice-chancellor who is the administrative head of the institution for explanation. I am aware equally that Government drew the attention of the Commissioner of Police to the alleged rape report and advised him to investigate same. Preliminary reports from the school authorities yielded no useful clue as to the authenticity of the report as the authorities claim that no incident of that nature occurred within the university campus and that the persons in the said video are not students of the institution.

The Commissioner of Police in Abia State has equally not been able to unravel the identity of the victim nor that of the culprits in the said video episode. Speaking to you as the Attorney-General of the State, the entire thing bothering on the widely circulated rape video tape remains in the realm of public conjecture.

The offence of rape as contained in our criminal code is a very serious offence attracting very severe sanctions. No civilized society would condone or habour a rape culprit. In all criminal investigations which will normally culminate to a prosecution and eventual conviction or acquittal as the case may be there must be a complainant in the person of an identified victim and then an identified culprit who is usually the accused person or persons and then finally witnesses who will assist the police in their investigation and eventually give evidence during the trial. In the case at hand, nobody has shown up as the victim not to talk of identifying the culprits. Herein is the problem which unfortunately nobody appears to be addressing.

What informed the recent civil service reforms in Abia State especially the retirement of permanent secretaries and the sack of non-Abia State citizens?

The present reforms in the civil service of Abia State are intended to inject fresh blood and ideas into the system. A situation where a permanent secretary or a director will remain in office for upwards of ten to fifteen years or even more is unacceptable.

Desired zenith

By so doing, the younger ones are either frustrated or not given an opportunity of attaining their desired zenith in their chosen career in the civil service. The kernel of the reform is that Permanent Secretaries and Directors do not stay in office for a period of not more than eight years.

On the issue of non indigenes, the general public has been grossly misinformed on the reasons behind the policy. Some years back, Abia indigenes in the civil service of some states within the Southeast and South-South geo-political regions, specifically Cross River, Enugu, Imo and the rest were sent back to Abia State including in some cases the pension files of retired civil servants from Imo State.

These returnee civil servants were absorbed into the civil service of Abia State even where there were no vacancies in order to save them and their families from the hardship occasioned by their sudden disengagement.

There were suggestions then that Abia State Government should equally disengage citizens from these neighbouring States working in our civil service in order to balance the scale. This suggestion as strong and reasonable as it was to check the over bloated work force was bluntly rejected by the former Governor, Orji Uzor Kalu, who was bent on pursuing his now elusive bid for the Presidency of Nigeria. Today, the wage bill of the State is nearing N1.8 billion and with the acceptance of government to pay the N18,000 minimum wage bill, the wage bill of the State would in no distant time be in the neighbourhood of N2.5billion and for a State with a monthly allocation of below N3billion. One can imagine what crisis would evolve.

Furthermore, the recent crisis in Jos, Plateau State and Maiduguri has displaced hundreds of Abians who are back to the State and desire to be gainfully employed. The first law of nature is self preservation and what the government has done is to seek for a way of attending to its problems as having a legion of unemployed persons would equally create some social problems for the State especially violent crimes.