Anambra Needs To Be Run As A Business –Ukachukwu

Prince Nicholas Ukachukwu is the candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC) for the November 8 governorship election in Anambra State.

In this interview monitored on Arise Television, he speaks on his emergence as the standard bearer of the party and his readiness for the election, among other issues, ANAYO EZUGWU writes

Some of your critics said you parade yourself as a businessman, but you have a failed factory in the state. How are you going to be able to surmount the challenge of business in the state?

When somebody sets out to invest in his state, it means he loves his state. Don’t forget, I live in Abuja, but it can take only us to develop ourselves.

I don’t think there’s anywhere in the whole of Igbo land where you can see a Yoruba man or Hausa man having an investment or building a factory.

It is only the Igbo that can do it in other states. So, I now said: What can we do? We have to go and develop our place.

And I set out. I’m happy they say I built 12 industries. Yes, it’s something no one can deny. What they say is that some of the investments are not working. I used to have 74 expatriate workers who lived and worked in those factories.

Six of them have been kidnapped at a particular time or the other and we paid heavily. Some of those factories, because of their nature, cannot function without those expatriates. So, we decided at a time that we have to increase their salaries and allowances as well as to get insurance and that.

But it got to a level that it couldn’t work anymore. Who is happy that such investment is not working? Nobody would be happy because I sank so much money into putting up that factory, but insecurity and other indices in place did not allow it to work. Don’t forget that Anambra State, and of course, Onitsha, used to be the biggest market in West Africa.

But can we actually say that things are still the same? Of course, the answer is no. The indications, the enablers, the things that make business function and attract people to invest in the state, are no more there. They’ve been eroded. That’s why many companies are leaving.

And that had to do with us too, because it’s not a small factory. It’s an international conglomerate that I put up. But unfortunately, the security situation and the other enablers were not there even as the huge amount we spent on light and other things could not help it.

So, I said: What do we do? We have to shut it down briefly, and then also see how those things can come to bear. It’s not only there. Many of the major factories in Nigeria are leaving, especially the ones as big as our own. So, that’s actually what it is. We used to export our products, but now it’s no longer the same, and that’s what we’re talking about.

Those things have to be on the ground if Nigeria’s economy has to grow and everybody has to play their role. I’m happy to say I built a factory.

I used to be the highest employer of labour outside the state government. It’s because of my love for my people, not because of anything. I would have built it in Lagos. I would have done it somewhere else. Like right now, we’re building a cement factory in Port Harcourt, because I won’t have to buy the water.

That’s what I’m talking about. We’ve been invested in the economy, not because of politics, but because our people have to be employed. Things have to change. A lot of things have to be done.

Can you tell us your influence in the emergence of most of the governors that have ruled Anambra State?

I did not say anything about being a godfather or not a godfather. I said I have been recognised as a leader of repute, not just being a leader, who has contributed one way or the other to anybody who has been a governor.

Anambra State needs to be run as a business because as a governor, you are managing the collective wealth of the people

And I said it to anybody who has been a governor in Anambra State, including this current governor. I have been supported them.

So, if you see that father playing a fatherly role, to those people who have been there, because when you want to run for governor, and some people go and say, I’m running, support me, because they are bringing something, but not they’re campaigning to and then those who play a role and brings on board, not just a few people, local governments to vote.

Since I’ve been in politics in Anambra State, and I’ve said this severally, there is hardly anybody, including the incumbent, who has won my local government without my support. It has never happened before. It’s something to check. When I was in Hope Democratic Party (HDP), I won it for HDP.

When I was All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP), I won it for ANPP. When I was in APGA, it was the same thing as well as the PDP. Now I’m in APC, by God’s grace, it’s going to be the same thing. So, I said, I’ve been playing that role to support people to win, and things have not gone the way I wanted them to go.

Now, I want to run, so that I can run the state. Every country worldwide, every government worldwide, every business worldwide, if you’re not running a government as a business, dividends and profits are not going to come out of it. You must set out to make sure that things are right. And that’s why I said, with my experience, I will turn things around.

Look at Nigeria, for instance, maybe we’ve not gotten there yet, but if you look at it, it’s the first time that we’re not relying on oil revenue to run the budget of this country because nobody knew that we can generate as much as what we’re generating now.

People might not feel it now, but with time we’ll get there. So, Anambra State needs to be run as a business because as a governor, you are managing the collective wealth of the people.

Valentine Ozigbo, who came second in the APC primary election described the exercise as a charade and a fraud. Can you comment on how the primary was conducted?

At times, the way people picture things might not be the way it is actually on the ground. And also, it’s like my mother used to say to me that if you are going to market and you are carrying your product to the market, you also know those who are selling the same product you are selling.

You don’t price yourself out of the market, so that you don’t carry your goods there and carry them back home because it’s not what you want that matters.

Your product must be right, and then the price must be right. The same thing with politics, people who are buying you know you. You can’t sell the chicken if the leg is broken inside the same compound because they know the leg has been broken.

They can’t cover it. One obvious thing is that the final day of the primaries is not just the first day. The exercise doesn’t start that day. Before delegates emerge, they contest to be delegates in their wards. People will vote for those they want as their representatives during the governorship primary. That’s what the primary is all about. And then people queue.

If you are supporting Ukachukwu, you queue. If you want Ozigbo, you queue and otherwise. And when those things happen, those that emerge from that process will come to the mainstream to vote, where everybody will watch. And now, APC members are tired of giving their tickets to people who are serious and don’t have what it takes to win the state.

Don’t forget why, it is people that make the party, not the party that makes the people. And they know who among us can has the capacity to get it done. And then when you are not within these indices, it will not work. And somebody said that people who voted said that some of them are not APC.

No, they are not putting it forward the way it is. Let me also say this. We joined the party. Don’t forget I was a member of APGA, not only being a member but a member of the party’s Board of Trustee for that matter.

And then I moved, other people moved. I moved from APGA with all the APGA people who were with me. Don’t forget that I ran an election in APGA and then I moved back to APC. Normally, the constitution of APC says that if you move and every year or two years or three years of age, they do what they call revalidation.

Revalidation means all the people who join us now will go and register in the ward and be part of it. And then our people and all the other people that joined the APC, everybody went and registered. Meaning in the ward, it can’t be just the former APC members. New people joined, and they pay for revalidation, which is N200 per month, depending on how many months you have been a member.

And all this will become APC people, the same people who can vote and also vote for other people. And they now say that they are giving a waiver for everyone that joined the party to be able to vote and be voted for. Ozigbo also knows that there’s a waiver, which was he also contested.

So, at that point, who is APC and who is not APC Anyone who has joined APC and has been revalidated as an APC member is qualified. His case is not having a crowd because he joined the APC without any followers. And because you came in without anybody, nobody can vote for you. If you are joining APC, you come with the crowd that will support you.

APC members on ground know those who came with the crowd and those they have been talking to for them to join the party. APC has been talking to me to join them for over a year since the party was formed.

If you came with the crowd to the APC and the crowd voted for you, why are there defections currently happening in the party?

It is just being stage managed. It’s a whitewash. It’s like somebody who puts underlay and then puts makeup on top of it. You might not see what is inside. Let me talk about Paul Chukwuma, who resigned from the party and joined Young Peoples Party (YPP).

In his local government, there are 15 wards and each of those 15 wards have 27 member executives but only two chairmen left with him. Others did not leave because they’ve seen that APC is going to get it right.

Let me also talk about those that you see on television endorsing the current governor, members of Ifeanyi Ubah Foundation, it is jus a few persons because the director general of the Foundation was not part of it.

The truth is that members of the foundation have rather endorsed me and all the structure will come out and make a statement very soon, So, what you saw about endorsement of the governor is just a charade, it doesn’t exist.

You’ve gone from PDP to HDP to APGA now APC. In case APC does not favour you and you fail to emerge as governor, where next will you go?

You see, when I was in PDP, it was a nation but its inability to do things right and not following the doctrine of the party and doctrine of democracy, forced some of us to leave because we were not happy with the way affairs of the party was ran.

We wanted to make impact and that was why I said if it’s not working with PDP let’s try another party that can make it work. So, why I decided to join APC is because it’s a collective merger of every other political party.

Meaning the ideology was right. And I’ve come to APC to stay. Don’t forget part of APGA is in APC.

I chose not to join them at the point of the party’s formation because I feel I can still make impact in my state. But now it’s not working that way. I have to join the mainstream to bring democracy dividends to my people.