Òsárétín Òsádébàmwén – Abuja
Governor of Abia State, Okezie Ikpeazu has said the advocacy of the G-5 governors for inclusiveness of all shades of Nigeria was far beyond the 2023 presidential election.
He said the G-5 governors are pursuing a national agenda of unity as the greatest challenge to national development was not corruption but national cohesion and respect for one another.
Ikpeazu said this while fielding questions from journalists in Abuja after the public presentation of the book “The Biochemistry of Environmental Pollution.”
He maintained that National cohesion was topmost to rebuilding Nigeria as mutual suspicion was denying the country of the right development.
His words: “Let me say this to us, how I see G-5 is that what we try to bring to the fore is beyond the 2023 elections.
“It is about inclusiveness, it is about what we think is at the root and jugular of what we think is Nigeria.
“If I come to a point in my life as a politician and you produce two or three critical officers of my party and they are coming from one particular geo-political zone, I will still agitate, even if it comes from my geo-political zone.
“I am talking about how we can bring everybody to the table. If you exclude Igbos from Nigeria I will ask the question, I will also protest. If you exclude people from Western Nigeria, I will still protest.
“For me, it is about everybody, the youth, the women. People from the North, People from the South. All of us need to do social mobilization in order for us to solve the economic problems of this country.
“Social mobilization to solve the security problem of this country, you do not put the cart before the horse, everybody enjoys it.
“The greatest problem of Nigeria Today is not security. Neither is it economic. It is a lack of cohesion. It is disunity. It is because there is mutual suspicion and a lack of mutual respect. We must come together, women, youth, people from the south and people from the North stating that this country belongs to all of us under one God.
“The parameters must be the same. A criminal in Zamfara must be seen as a criminal in Abia. A criminal in Enugu must be seen as a criminal in Lagos. So G-5 is what it is because it is beyond 2023.”
Addressing the media on the importance of the book “The Biochemistry of Environmental Pollution,” to the body of knowledge, the governor said he was inspired to fill in the gap in the area of human endeavour especially by providing resources or biochemists in Nigeria.
According to him, “You have heard the professor of environmental studies at the university of Portharcourt declare publicly that he has been teaching that subject for over 20 years without any material for teaching and I needed to fill that gap. It is a very strong inspiration and drives me to stop that gap.
“It was a very strong inspiration and drive to ensure that, that gap is filled. The essence of our being, here, is to solve problems. My study and sojourn in the area of biochemistry will be in vain if I cannot contribute to the body of knowledge. It is this drive that propelled me to keep at it till I achieved it.
“When I came over to the flip side of public service, to serve as governor, I thought that that would have been a point of divergence and disconnection from my first love – Biochemistry,
“Each time, I look at every issue and every problem from the perspective of biochemistry.
“In 2013, I had the opportunity to serve as the deputy general manager of the Abia State Environmental Protection Agency. As we were managing domestic waste I also saw the dimension of Biochemistry in terms of trying to explain the causes and the disease.
