By Ochereome Nnanna

THE simplicity of the Governor of Anambra State, Mr Peter Obi, never fails to shock on first encounter. Take this sampler. Sometime in November 2010, The SUN organised an economic summit for the South East in Owerri. It took place at the Hotel Concorde. Obi was to give a keynote address as the Chairman of the South East Governors’ Forum. He came late to the event.

When Obi came in he quietly took his seat at the back of the packed-to-the-rafters auditorium.  He was eventually spotted by one of the protocol officers who virtually raised an alarm that the governor was here unacknowledged. The event had to be immediately interrupted to bring Obi to the high table on the insistence of the organisers. Left to Obi, he would have stayed put at the back because (as he explained later) he, as a late 0comer, had no right to disrupt the event.

About thirty minutes after this furore had died down; there was another stir in the hall. The very familiar, diminutive but charismatic figure of Obi’s immediate predecessor, Dr. Chris Ngige, was in the doorway. Ngige disrupted the event, moving from one person in the hall to the other to shake hands and soaking up the cheers showered upon him by his admirers. It took about fifteen minutes before Ngige took his position at the high table.

What a contrast of characters! Obi is big of frame, speaks with a tiny, hoarse voice, is clean-shaven and simple to ridiculous extents. Ngige is birdlike but larger than life, heavily bearded, moustachoid, rambunctious and colourful. Between these two, the high and mighty of Anambra State, the billionaires, the godu-faddahs, the lords of the political establishment and the political wheelers that used to hold Anambra State to ransom were put in the political doghouse since July 10th 2003. The door was slammed in their faces, and it became possible for the state to begin the march to development.

Today, due to the sidelining of these cankerworms, Anambra has one of the best networks of roads in the federation. Ngige and Obi have, between them, made it possible for you to travel round the state within six hours.  While Ngige concentrated on roads, Obi also did roads and bridges as well as rebuilding of schools, hospitals, and virtually touched every aspect of development without giving priority to any particular sector, a strategy he called Anambra Integrated Development Strategy (ANIDS).

Obi realised that the only way to develop his state with the meager federal allocation it gets every month was to block wastages and save funds. He started in his home front. He called his wife, Margaret, aside and told her although she was the First Lady, only one person (between two of them) was voted for by the people. There would be no office of the First Lady, and no budget for it. Imo State spends more than three billion Naira on the “office of the First Lady” under Governor Rochas Okorocha, for instance.

Obi travels virtually alone. He carries his own bags. He flies mostly economy class. Whenever he travels with his children, he puts them in the economy compartment, telling them they can fly business class when they grow up and make their own money. Obi does not disturb the peace with elaborate, siren-blaring convoys. Anambra state has the largest number of millionaires in Nigeria, and each millionaire and political heavyweight has his own armada of “sirened” convoy. Peter realised, early in his days in power, how futile it was to tamper with their lifestyle. So, he simply decided to ignore them.

And because of his frugality (someone once called him the former Chairman of “Araldite Bank”) musicians and praise singers at social events don’t like him. He does not give them anything.

Obi is the longest serving Chairman of the South East Governors. He is a fighter for Igbo interest. He attends every meeting, and has the patience and the salesmanship to alter settled positions. He has done so much to preserve Igbo language, culture and values. Obi does not address Igbo meetings in the English language, and he is truly at home speaking in vernacular in a world where few members of the elite can communicate fluently or sensibly in Igbo without veering into English or Engl-Igbo.

Obi is widely blamed for not playing the Bola Tinubu in the South East: funding the takeover of the zone by the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA). But those who say this fail to realise how difficult it was for Obi to keep APGA in power for eight years and succeed in transferring power from himself to another APGA governor, namely, Chief Willy Obiano. The political mentality of the people of the South West is not the same as those of the South East. The South West moves, unquestioningly, like a herd of cattle into any direction dictated by their current political leaders.

But in the case where APGA was able to add Imo State to its repertory, what happened next? Okorocha framed his Deputy, Jude Agbaso, of contract scam and got him impeached in a shameless abuse of constitutional processes. Then, he took the mandate given to APGA by the electorate of Imo State and jumped ship to APC in his quixotic chase of the presidential seat. With the benefit of this experience, can one really say Obi was not wise to mind his own business in Anambra State?

Come March 16th 2014, Mr. Peter Obi’s era will be over. Nobody knows exactly what Obiano will do with the opportunity Obi gave him as his successor. But Obi has made a bold statement that even in Nigeria, a governor can live the life of a normal person; that capital vote can be made to take the lion’s share over the recurrent, and that the high and mighty who used to stick to the public treasury like malicious leeches can be put at bay without spilling blood or even raising dust.