Okorocha to Ihedioha: Leave me alone, face governance

By Damian Duruiheoma, Owerri

Former governor of Imo State and member representing Imo West in the Senate, Senator Rochas Okorocha has advised his successor, Chief Emeka Ihedioha to leave him alone and face governance.

Okorocha’s advice followed Ihedioha’s comments during the 2019 Ahiajioku Lecture on Saturday that the former governor’s eight years tenure was ‘years of locust’ because he had shunned the Ahiajioku Lecture, which was the Igbo intellectual harvest for the period he governed the state.

Ihedioha had also described Okorocha as a man “who rode on the popularity of an essentially Igbo party to beguile Imo people but who turned out to despise everything the Igbo hold dear, a man who limped into Douglas House Owerri on a lie of the garb, and never held the lecture; instead, the name of Ahiajoku Centre was changed and anything that could amount to an intellectual journey of discovery for the Igbo was shunned”.

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But, Okorocha, who reacted to that statement, advised Governor Ihedioha to face governance and stop abusing him, saying that the whole thing was becoming nauseating.

The former governor, whose statement was issued by his media adviser, Sam Onwuemeodo, said the reason Ihedioha was always complaining about his administration was because “Ihedioha is governing Imo State with a stolen mandate. Since then, he has never slept with his two eyes closed. He has remained haunted by that electoral mishap.

“What happened in Owerri on Saturday was not Ahiajoku Lecture but a get-together by the PDP bigwigs and they were assembled by Governor Ihedioha to abuse the former governor, Owelle Rochas Okorocha, the APC and the Party’s leadership at all levels.

“All those who attended the event including Fani Kayode, Chief Chidoka, Chief Peter Obi, Prof. M. Echeruo, Governor Udom Emmanuel etal, are all PDP chieftains. So, it was the first get-together of the Party after the elections, in the South-East. And they did nothing else than to abuse Okorocha, APC and other leaders”.

According to Okorocha, Ihedioha’s major achievement in the past seven months was the constant abuse of himself (Okorocha) “because he is cowed or intimidated by Okorocha’s existing achievements. He can’t cope and has no other option than to resort to abuses”.