Dr Peter Mbah

The Enugu State Stakeholders Forum (ESSF) has ascribed the failure of the state government’s cancellation of the Monday sit-at-home order to the lack of legitimacy by the new Peter Mbah government that came into being last May 29.

In a statement in Enugu today signed by the ESSF’s leader, Professor Joseph Aneke, and the secretary, Dr Ifeanyi Agbo, the stakeholders said that what would have been a good government initiative failed spectacularly because Mbah did not think through it before announcing it.

“Mbah has been desperate to do something popular to get accepted by the Enugu because he and his Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) government did not win the March 18 gubernatorial and State House of Assembly elections”, declared the stakeholders.

“He merely hit upon the idea of ending the illegal sit-at-home declared by nonstate actors; it is a brainwave rather than a sound government policy”.

The ESSF observed that if the government had thought through it, the administration would have first called a meeting of stakeholders to discuss the government’s new step to end insecurity and provide honest suggestions on the way forward which all groups would accept to implement from an agreed day.

The ESSG regretted that with “the government order failing as most Enugu people last Monday observed sit-at-home as usual, out of fear of vicious attacks by nonstate actors, the state government took a panic measure by calling for a meeting of all kinds of stakeholders yesterday (Saturday) at the Old Governor’s Lodge in GRA, Enugu.

“The meeting should have been called before announcing the cancellation as no right-thinking person puts the cart before the horse.

“The central issue in ending the destructive sit-at-home order is deploying security forces everywhere, from markets to government offices to motor parks to major and minor roads, and all other public places.

“The people will defy IPOB and its agents once there is a fair assurance of security”.

The group also faulted the government for implementing the cancellation before the appointment of key government officials.

“It is top government officials like the Commissioner for Security and the Special Adviser on Security who will drive the implementation of this security step and take responsibility for it, not just the Secretary to the State Government, Professor Chidiebere Onyia, a fellow Nkanu person who is about the only person appointed by Mbah since assumption of office”.

The ESSF criticised the meeting at the Old Governor’s Lodge “for having only one item on the agenda: endorsement of the anti-sit-at-home order, which looks pretty sycophantic.

“It should have discussed in a serious manner modalities for the success of the government’s cancellation of the order by the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) that has been taking a tremendous poll on the entire people of the Southeast.

“The government’s resounding failure or inability to think correctly before taking action is what normally obtains when the people did not choose a government, and so does all manner of things to gain acceptance.

“Security is not provided through populism and all such acts of playing to the gallery”.