A frontline Female Chairmanship Candidate in the forthcoming council election for Nkanu West Local Government Area of Enugu State, Princess Uchenna Ugwu, has promised to transform the area within two years, saying that even development would be her top priority.

Princess Ugwu who is contesting the seat on the platform of All Progressives Congress (APC) for the November 4 council election, disclosed this on Tuesday at a forum organised for contestants from different political parties across the 14 wards and representatives of the 41 autonomous communities that make up Nkanu west council held at Umuokorouba, Ozalla hall.

Top on her agenda is participatory governance Town Hall meetings. Construction of Atavu Bridge, water, Culvert, Security, Road, Education and Healthcare would be her administration’s priorities across the local government Area.

“Nkanu west under me will be transformed. I will be accountable to the people because no stakeholder will say I put her there lets share the money. I believed the peoples’ votes will count. Nobody will rig the election. I have something to offer the people. I will operate an open door policy. There will be an election and results will count,” she declared.

The programme organised and sponsored by Voice To People (V2P), for all the political party’s chairmanship and councillorship candidates in the council area to enable them showcase their manifestoes to the people before the election.

Of all the political parties invited, only the APC candidates and a councillorship candidate under the platform of National Unity Party (NUP) Mr. Nnamoko Osita attended the Nkanu west Citizens’ form 2017 and 2018 agenda setting.

Speaking at the occasion, Mrs. Onyeka Okey Udegbulam, Executive Director of Hope Givers Initiative, an NGO that works with Voice to the People project, said they organised the interactive forum at Nkanu west so that the people would hold their state actors in governance accountable.

“We have come to the point in this country where this culture of silence is removed

from the polity. It is as if our people do not have voice. It is just for somebody to help them and amplify their voice.

“What we have come to do today is to get the candidates from different political parties to interact with stakeholders from the 41 communities in Nkanu West to interact with their people so as to know their people and their people to know them and they will tell their people what to do for them.

“That is why we are here so that if there are questions, the people will ask them, so that the voice of the people will be heard.

“Again there are key developmental needs, Enugu talked about VEC and from what we know, the VEC document is meant to be used by the Local Governments, the state and their representatives to address their needs.

“So it is important that the candidates know this and put their signature to these needs, committing that if nothing else they will hold town hall meetings. Politics in Nigeria has come to the level where the people dictate the tune. We are saying shun money politics and let us do politics of issues not the other way. We are asking for participatory governance, where the people set the agenda.

“On why only one party participated, she stated, ‘as an organisation, we did our mobilisation for the political parties and they confirmed attendance. We got confirmation from APGA, APC, PDP and NUP. PDP did not confirm but we followed up on them.

“We spoke to Henry Okenwa on the importance of interacting with his community members. We spoke with his campaign director, we tried the party Chairman and VEC director to come and interact with their constituents, unfortunately, and they are not here. So we don’t have a choice than to go on. PDP is the ruling party in the state today, tomorrow they may not be.

“If they are thinking of signing into OGP, this is where it starts. OGP is about government and citizen’s partnership and so if you cannot speak to the people you want to govern, is it the entire state that you will speak to? So we are appealing to the PDP to allow participatory governance and this is what is acceptable all over the world. That is the fun of democracy.”

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