Governor Willie Obiano of Anambra State best kept secrets has been exposed by his close associate and former Secretary to the State Government (SSG), Oseloka Obaze…

Oseloka Obaze, former SSG to Anambra State

“I have worked for the incumbent governor, so you can either look at it that I’m stupid or courageous. I have no quarrel with the governor as an individual. I have vast differences with his policies because that is not what we planned when we brought him in. He is a beneficiary of the campaign we did to bring the governor to the north. We planned that we will deliver good governance and services. The whole trajectory that was set in place is not being followed.”

“As at the time Governor Obianor was selected as a default candidate, because he was not in the race or amongst us, he had no blueprint, he was not running. The blueprint that he started implementing was my blueprint; I was a candidate in 2013. But that aside, let me give you a specific reply. On the 30th of August 2012, President Jonathan declared Anambra State the 10th oil producing state. As I speak to you, we have not earned a naira or a dollar since then. In contrast, Lagos was declared in January 2016, the 11th oil producing state. By the December of 2016, they had started earning. If you had a functioning government, you don’t need 2012 to 2017 to sort out the process that will enable your people to earn their right as an oil producing state.”

“When I became the SSG then, I sat down with my principal then, Governor Peter Obi. We agreed to help the old people who are indigenes. We passed a law that allowed old people who have never earned anything from the private and public sector. At the end of the month, they earn N5,000 for social welfare backed by law. We got people from Lagos to set up the database and started the protection, we started the budgeting but they took over and bastardized the system; rather than using the database and the system, they started using pen and paper and doing it manually. The project, is say for a thousand people and also add two thousand more, and they pay the money to those people and the two thousand more people whether accounted for or not, they take the money.”

“The IGR of the state, they will tell you has fallen and that’s a lie, the only thing that has fallen is the amount of money given to the state from the federation account. In the last two years of Peter Obi’s administration, that government earned a N178 billion from the federation account. In the first two years of Obiano, the figure was N298 billion. What he has done is to increase the window of taxation, sometimes resulting in multiple taxations for some and there have been a lot of complaints. I can tell you a fact, the majority of the money in the private sector, are not always related to the government. And because you don’t have reinforcement capacity, you are losing revenue. I know that it is in the interest of the rich people that the banks do not publish how much they get on withholding. You have a BVN, whether it is a company or an individual account. At the end of every year, you find out that the banks have withheld XYZ amount. If they remit that amount, your tax burden lowers. But some of the rich people don’t want that to happen. Because if they report that, the government will know that you made N25 million and you must pay tax on that money.”

Governor Willie Obiano

“When Obiano was coming in, I was leaving with the Peter Obi administration. I wasn’t going to stay because that wasn’t my plan. They asked me to stay for six months and I told them no, that I had to do other things. About three to four days to the hand over, the incoming governor called me, I told him that my answer was still no. But because I was part of the last two years of the Peter Obi administration, we had a plan and strategy, so I agreed to stay for six months. After six months I said to the governor that if he finds a replacement, that he should let me know; that I will ease myself out and the person can take over. The six months went to 15 months. I could sense some changes although it was all about continuity. But even those that were heads of the government were being washed out gradually.”

I do not discuss political issues outside especially when I have a higher principal. So I asked the governor why we are doing this, and that it isn’t right. The final decision is his, I am an appointed official not an elected official; my job was to advise, I gave advise and in certain times you asked for one on one meetings and told him that it is not happening. I sat down with him and had a two hour meeting, I wrote a one page memo and gave it to him, told him that everything that will go wrong eventually is in it. It is hypocritical for someone to pay for your ticket to come here, do everything for you and helps you become a governor and you do not consider him a godfather; that is pure hypocrisy. Obiano did not put a penny in his campaign, he didn’t put a penny of his personal money on his campaign, and you can quote me on that. My brother ran the campaign; I know how much that was spent.”

“If I was a spoiler and not a team player, when I was disqualified, I would have gone to court and Obiano would not have been governor of the state. I made a statement; when you travel and you come back to your house and you sense that something has died inside, do you close your door and runaway? You open the windows, disinfect the place, find the lizard or the rat and take it away, and that’s what I did. I got offers to go to other parties, I said no. I did not leave the Obiano government to go to another party. I waited for months before I decided to go to another party, I did it quietly.”

– Culled from The Sun