No to National Honour for T.A. Orji BY EMEKA OBASI

Despite the fact that I see Nasir El-Rufai as a member
of the Northern oligarchy, I am sometimes forced to
agree with him on some of his politically motivated
tirades against some unbelievable administrative
blunders of the Goodluck Jonathan administration.



How can any right thinking administration in Nigeria
ever imagine that it should confer one of the
supposedly revered Nigerian National Honours,
Commander Of the Order of the Niger (CON) on the
governor of Abia State, T.A. Orji, who has been under
fire from well meaning stakeholders in the state for
many weeks now, on account of his shoddy
performance in office? If I may ask, what “good” has
Goodluck Jonathan and his men seen in the
maladministration by Abia’s T.A Orji, which should
attract a National Honour? This is a governor who
epitomizes “misgovernance” by all standards; a tyrant
at the helm of affairs in the state that now hosts the
dirtiest and most dilapidated city, and Umuahia, the
pathetic excuse of a state capital in Nigeria.

Why honour a vindictive man under whose watch,
Aba, once the commercial pride of the South-East
region and nicknamed “Japan Of Africa”, became the
pigsty of Nigeria, simply because Aba traders and
residents pelted him with sachet water, because of
his lacklustre governance of the state and negligence
of Aba city?

This is a man who has spent eight years in office
doing nothing other than enforcing the extortion of
sundry levies ostensibly for dividends of democracy,
that are clearly non-existent. What the people have
in Abia is nothing but the ‘legacy’ hogwash from the
governor. This governor is a “joker” who
unashamedly pays hype agents on electronic and
social media platforms to disseminate contemptible
lies of the most despicable order. He is a person
whose name should permanently rest in Abia’s
trashcan of history. Maybe, someone should appeal
to the very influential oil mogul, Chief Arthur Eze,
who recently sent T.A Orji to the cleaners, to send a
word to President Jonathan to rescind the decision to
make T.A Orji one of the 2014 National Honours
awardees.

If T.A Orji is conferred with the CON, then, it will be
an official confirmation that Nigeria’s National
Honours scheme has gone to the dogs. If T.A Orji’s
name is not removed from that list, it will once again
reiterate the opposition’s stance that Jonathan’s
administration is perpetually engaged in
goofs. Goodluck Jonathan is “DOING IT”, but he
shouldn’t do it on this one. He should not give T.A
Orji the leeway to hide in the Senate in 2015.

What's your opinion on this??