Former Minister of Interior, Navy Captain Emmanuel Iheanacho (Rtd), has reiterated the need for Owerri zone to produce the next Governor of Imo State in 2027. This, he said, is for the sake of equity, fairness and good neighbourliness.

Speaking on the Imo Harmony Project (IHP), a pressure group set up to actualise the realisation of the Owerri Governorship Project, Iheanacho lamented that ?since the transition to civil democracy in 1999 and in that time, we have had several people who have governed Imo State, but none has come from Owerri zone. That?s 26 years after the transition-after from the seven months of Emeka Ihediora.?

The business mogul and politician noted during a media chat on Tuesday in Lagos, that apart from Owerri zone, Yewa zone in Ogun State and Idoma zone in Benue State are the only senatorial zones that have never produced governors in the country.

?We believe that the opportunity to govern the state is something that really should go round. Everybody should have an opportunity. There?s only a few states-about three states-that have not had contingency arrangements to ensure that there is inclusiveness in terms of the personality who governs the state,? Iheanacho said.

Throwing more light on The Imo Harmony Project, he said: ?If you look at that name, it?s a very unique name: The Imo Harmony Project. It is a project that has in its membership people from different political parties. We make no difference within. We do not discriminate against anyone. So you could be APC, you could be PDP, you could be any of these new political parties, as long as you do not come in there on a party political basis and start clapping for one person to go forward.?

Iheanacho, who contested the governorship in 2015, dismissed speculations in some quarters that IHP might be the covert structure of some smart politicians intending to use it to ride to power. His words: ?If anybody within IHP has an ambition and we have actually seen ourselves, people who have ambitions to become governor from IHP.

?We will tell them when the time comes you have to break out and go and set up a structure and then bring the resources, do your campaign. If you are accepted, you?ve won.?

He disclosed that the group has also met with incumbent Imo State Governor, Senator Uzodimma, to brief him on the objectives and activities of IHP, adding that the governor was very receptive to the project.

Iheanacho stressed that his involvement in the activities of IHP and promotion of the Imo Charter of Equity are not motivated by any personal political ambition.

?I don?t think that I have done anything to give people that impression that I am here to contest. I haven?t said that I?m going to do that, so if I haven?t said it, you must give me the benefit of the doubt to say, if he doesn?t, if he hasn?t said it, then maybe he doesn?t want to do it.

?In times past, when people ask me this question, I would answer in a categorical manner; when I recently thought about it, and I said when you look at the head of state now, that?s the president, he is about the same age as me, if he went around just before he became president, saying to the people, ?I don?t want to be president. I am too old. I?m going to be infirm, then he will not have needed it. We are not God. I am not God,? he said.

The erstwhile minister praised Governor Uzodimma for his stewardship, assuring that a successor from Owerri zone would take Imo State to the next level.

Hear him: ?So, the future of Imo politics is to ensure seamless development. I spoke about the quality of the infrastructure that the governor has committed himself to. And I said, flowing from that, we are hoping that he will move forward and develop a proper economy.

?What I meant by developing a proper economy? If you know what has happened since 1999 to all the governments in all the states, if you win the election to become the governor, you have become rich beyond your wildest dreams, because the money that is given to the state from the centre absolutely belongs to you. Officially that is not the case.

?But in reality, governors do whatever they like. And we haven?t seen anybody who has been interdicted or prosecuted for spending money the way that they like. So, what I said was that it would be nice for the governor to move from a situation where he is building all those infrastructures from monies that are given from the centre, to one where we actually develop an economy.?

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