By Uzor Maxim Uzoatu
The people have spoken! The incumbent Governor of Anambra State, Prof Chukwuma Charles Soludo, CFR, of the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA) party has been re-elected via a landslide victory. Soludo defeated his 15 other challengers in all the 21 Local Government Areas (LGAs) of Anambra State, thus achieving the ultimate feat tagged 21/21!
The Returning Officer of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Prof Edoma Omoregie, the Vice-Chancellor of the University of Benin and Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN), announced the final results in the wee hours of Sunday, November 9 at the collation centre in Awka.
Governor Soludo polled 422,664 votes thus leaving the second-placed candidate, Evangelist Nicholas Ukachukwu of the the All Progressives Congress (APC) trailing with only 99,445 votes to his name and party. The candidate of the Labour Party (LP), Chief George Moghalu, came third with 10,576 votes, while the candidate of the African Democratic Congress (ADC), John Chuma-Nwosu, took the fourth position with 8,208 votes.
According to Prof Omoregie, a total of 2,788,864 voters registered for the election but only 598,229 of the registered voters were accredited during the Saturday, November 8, poll. In the end, a total of 584,054 valid votes were recorded in the poll while 11,244 votes were voided out of the 595,298 total votes cast.
After winning in all the 21 Local Government Areas of the State, Soludo lost in only 6 wards out of the 362 wards. Soludo garnered 72.4 percent of the valid votes while Ukachukwu and Moghalu took 17 percent and 1.8 percent respectively.
With his mandate renewed, Governor Soludo was gracious in victory. He called on all his opponents to join him in unity to develop Anambra State. For Soludo, there is no other way than the “Anambra Way”, and there is no other spirit than the “Anambra Spirit”. It’s the Anambra style to fight spiritedly only to later bond together in partnership, sharing drinks like brothers and sisters.
It is worthy of note that Soludo took an unassailable lead from the very beginning of the election. It was as though his re-election was carved in stone. Soludo towered in fine fettle over all other contenders as the consensus candidate of Ndi-Anambra. Solidly backed by Anambra State’s one and only political party APGA, there was no stopping the People’s Governor hailed as Oluatuegwu, that is in popular parlance “Man wey no dey fear work”, a titan who achieved unbeatable feats in infrastructure and human capital development in his first tenure without borrowing one kobo!
As they say, one good term deserves another. Anambra State has never had it so good, even as Soludo insists that he is still on the starting-block of buying the beans to make the akara!
This grand re-election is the due reward for the leader who broke the jinx of the homeland not having a befitting home for the government by constructing the commodious Government House and Lodge poetically christened Light House. The builder of the Light House remains as the resident landlord!
The Dubai-Taiwan-Silicon-Valley road-map remains on course with this resounding divine mandate as Governor Soludo powers on to make Anambra State a destination point instead of a departure lounge.
*Uzọatu, a poet writes from Awka.*
