Article: Orji Uzor Kalu And His Support For President Jonathan

Orji Uzor Kalu

By Olaniyi Olanike

The former governor of Abia State, Dr. Orji Uzor Kalu is a politician and business mogul whose interests cut across national boundaries. He is a Nigerian so concerned about his country, Nigeria. How to remake Nigeria has been his concern. He has to be restless at this stage, because according to him, he might not have such strength to do all that he is doing for Nigeria today in the next 10-15 years.

He loves the unity of the country and has been doing everything within his reach for that. He no longer talks about himself but the country. Evidence is that he has lived in the same house for a long time now. Kalu who believes so much in reconciliation has said that he thinks democracy goes with quarrels; however, the ability to reconcile is very important. He believes that democracy has a lot of problems and that is why the practice needs a lot of patience.

To Kalu, if there is any problem in the PDP, it is being handled, because the political party, PDP, is a very big family and, in a big family like that, there are always problems, because there are all kinds of people in the family. You know, he has said, it is like a Church, where some people come to know if they can see God in the Church, some come to know if God would solve one problem or the other for them immediately, some people come to show off their new dress in the Church, some come to show off their new car; some people are genuinely, in their hearts, in the Church to worship God. 

Kalu would say that this is what a political party looks like. Earlier last year when people were strategising for 2015, Kalu said that he had no political plans order than for an Igbo man to be president, which was what Njiko- Igbo was fighting for. But when the headship of Ohaneze, a socio-cultural group begged of him at his Abuja and Lagos residences for a period of about 6months to rescind his presidential decision, Kalu listened to his Igbo people, for the support of Jonathan in 2015. Apart from that, his people of Abia North Senatorial district bounced on him later, that he should represent them at the senate. And based on that, he was persuaded to pick up the PDP nomination form for that purpose recently.

It was obvious that before Kalu picked up his nomination form for the Abia North senatorial district, he was all voice that he had no political aspirations order than to making sure that Igbo became president. Kalu, however, said that he might have one as time goes on and, here he is today in the senatorial race of his people.

While his aspiration was initially to galvanise the people, get Igbo to be very purposeful than they used to be, both the youths, the market men and women, workers and everybody for the Igbo presidency, Kalu has thrown that energy and dexterity for the support of President Jonathan, a man he said that he cherishes, because Ndigbo love him.

Today, Kalu has been calling for all to support President Goodluck Jonathan in the event that he declares intention to vie for the 2015 presidential election. This pioneer of the political group – G37 and, the Founder of Njiko Igbo Worldwide, Kalu has said that the G37 which is still on course and a human-to-human group is making sure that Nigeria is peaceful and does not go the way of Rwanda.

Kalu would say that the members of the G37 don’t like to discuss the group’s activities; they have officers who speak on issues that bother the group. It is observable that at any time the group wants to give a press release, it has a secretary and some officers who do that for it. According to Kalu, it is only when the group sits that it makes a statement and issue a press release. So, Kalu would say that he was not even competent to talk about the group, because it’s a collective effort.

Kalu would say that he wants Ndigbo to understand the purpose of coming together. Kalu was crying before he threw his weight for Jonathan that when Njiko Igbo was talking about marginalization of the Igbo, people thought it was all about appointments. But it was not like that. It was not about who was made the Minister or not. It was about the fundamental issues like local government creation.

He pointed out that between Kano and Gigawa states, the local governments in those two states are more than the whole local governments in the South-East. He said that those are the fundamental things; you talk about the Senators, you see that the South-East has only 15 senators in the whole federation. Kalu would say that these were what he was talking about: You talk about states, you see that the South-East is the only zone with five states; these are constitutionally entrenched; other zones have six states each.

Kalu has vowed that he can’t stop doing what he knows is good for his people, because the government closed some of his companies. According to him, one of his companies employed over 13,000 workers, but it was shut down. He believes that it is a mistake for people in government to mix personal business with politics. His bank that they closed down lost about 5,000 workers and Slok Airline lost about 1,000 workers.

Our leaders should know that the country and the states do not belong to anybody, according to him; they belong to the Nigerian people. And if they belong to the Nigerian people, they should stop mixing politics with personal businesses of individual politicians. He has said that business is different from politics. They should be able to be conscious of other people being employed in these conglomerates.

Kalu has vowed that he appreciates all the efforts of President Jonathan in distancing himself from mixing business and politics. He has said: Let me also tell you the truth, Jonathan has been civil, unlike the other past presidents. The massive abuse of human rights is reduced in the Jonathan administration. This means the president is not attacking political opponents. Kalu hopes Jonathan can continue on that note so that more investors will be coming into the country.

 (Olanike wrote from Umuahia.)