By Emmanuel Aziken, Political Editor

A state branded as the coal city state has its top stakeholders sitting on hot coal as intrigues shape issues emerging from the prolonged absence of the state’s governor.

For a state renowned for its reputation for extreme politics, the unfolding intrigues around Enugu State are remarkably extreme.

Governor Sullivan Chime’s absence from the state on account of an accumulated five year leave has sent shudders across many established political foundations in the Coal City State. With varying media reports and verbal assertions of ill-health surrounding the governor, it is now feared that the high expectations and geopolitical permutations of many political power mongers in the state could be sent into a tailspin.

Governor Chime had proceeded on an accumulated vacation on September 19, 2012 after formally handing over power to his deputy, Mr. Sunday Onyebuchi after a meeting of the state executive council.

The governor’s action was largely seen as the constitutional process. He had also allegedly transmitted a letter of his leave to the State House of Assembly in line with constitutional provisions. However, neither the letter nor the date of resumption from office has been divulged to the public by those in possession of the letter.

Gov Chime

In the absence of documented evidence on the governor’s condition, rumours have engulfed the polity around the state fueling speculations about untoward circumstances around Mr. Chime. The only response from the state administration has largely been assurances from the state commissioner for information, Mr. Chuks Ugwoke who has repeatedly asserted that Mr. Chime was spending his accumulated leave having not gone on leave since his advent five years earlier.

Noting that the governor’s absence was not impeding any function of government, Ugwoke in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria, NAN last November had said that that Chime handed over to his deputy, Onyebuchi, who was fully in charge of the state’s administration before proceeding on vacation. “Activities have been on. There is no activity of government that slowed down because you realise that there is an acting governor who is fully in-charge.

“Work is in progress at the new secretariat and on some ongoing road projects. So also with the rural development, where some communities are being connected to the national grid,” he said. Mr. Ugwoke’s assurances nonetheless, the effect of the governor’s continued absence and the web of conspiracy theories arising there from, have continued to unsettle political currents in the state.

Despite assertions of a plot to impeach the governor on account of his continued absence, Vanguard learnt that there has been no formal or informal discussion on the subject among the state’s lawmakers, majority of whom are believed to be loyal to the governor.

The only concern that was expressed albeit subtly, was the concern on the delayed presentation of the state’s 2013 budget proposals. Expectations from those holding the forth in Chime’s absence that the governor would return to present the budget, it was learnt, delayed the presentation until December 21, 2012 when a delay could no longer be sustained.

However, beyond imagery are reports that the absence of the governor has led to a tie down of many administrative functions of the government.

Unconfirmed sources say that unlike the Goodluck Jonathan scenario when he was empowered by the National Assembly to act as president, that the deputy governor is only acting governor in name only as power continues to reside in the hands of a few people in the Government House.

Remarkably, the deputy governor just like Jonathan at the federal level during his own crisis, has been largely numb on the issues around him. It is not as if he is a political neophyte. The acting governor would be very conscious of the large intrigues around him and is apparently working to keep himself away from political harm. Any effort towards creating a vacancy in the office of governor is laced with serious geopolitical implications for many political stakeholders in the state.

A vacancy in the office of governor would automatically lift Onyebuchi to the office of governor. The effect would be that Onyebuchi who is from Enugu East, and had until now had not be reckoned with in the 2015 gubernatorial jostling, would automatically become the number one contender for that office in 2015.

That would inadvertently become a serious burden for the Enugu North senatorial zone which had until now been regarded as the next senatorial zone to produce the next governor of the state in 2015 after Chimaroke Nnamani (Enugu East) and Sullivan Chime, (Enugu West).

However, any untoward circumstances around Chime would inadvertently return the governorship to Enugu East where Onyebuchi hails from. Even more remarkable, is that a possible promotion for Onyebuchi would lead to the reassertion of the Ebeano Phenomenon and its chief apostle, Chimaroke Nnamani.

Onyebuchi like Chime was drawn from Nnamani’s Ebeano family. He had also silently kept away from the bust-up that followed the parting of ways between Chime and Chimaroke. It is as such not surprising that Chime’s loyalists now pulling the levers have not been able to reach accommodation with him.

Gubernatorial ambitions
Remarkably, the Speaker of the State House of Assembly, Eugene Odo who is from Enugu North and is also said to habour gubernatorial ambitions would also be loath to follow that path of impeaching Chime as that would allow Onyebuchi to become governor which would inadvertently cripple his own gubernatorial aspirations.

That scenario has now led to further suggestions for the impeachment of the governor, deputy governor and speaker which would create the situation for the present deputy speaker, Chime Oji from Enugu West to emerge as acting governor. That scenario would sooth those who say that it would allow Enugu West to complete its eight years.

Mr. Oji who represents Enugu North State Constituency is Governor Chime’s nephew being the son of the governor’s sister, May Oji. But, alas, any such appointment as acting governor is only for three months during which the speaker acting as governor can organise a substantive election.

That is the extent to which the web of intrigues shaping political thoughts in Enugu are now going. But beneath the veneer of all such calculations are the thoughts of the re-emergence of Chime and the pulling of all such castles now in the air.