Chijioke Edeoga: the Shameful Acts of a Purported Governorship Candidate

By Eze Nwamadi, Ezema Igwenunu and Ogbonna Asadu

Chijioke Edeoga is a disgrace to decent and mature politics. From his actions so far, it will not be wrong to conclude that Edeoga is cake unturned, a rolling stone that gathers no moss. He is childish, inept and corrupt. Edeoga has shown to be childish on all fours. He has gone on to display vicarious shame in every bit of his appearances in public.

It was at the town hall meeting organized by the Enugu State Chamber of Commerce, Industry Mining and Agriculture ( ENCCIMA) where he was booed for lack of proper articulation of economic questions posed to him. Edeoga was fidgety as his tongue malingered to a staccato of stuttering incoherence. It was a show of shame as he was heckled and booed out of the scene.

Recently, he goofed again while addressing the bar during the Law Week in Enugu. Edeoga sounded quite hollow and off point. He developed stage fright and gibbered away uncontrollably. He kept on saying, ” So Odengene went to court” and repeated himself several times. When asked to present his manifesto, Edeoga said he had no manifesto; yet this is someone who wants to be the governor of Enugu State. (Tufiakwa! Governor gab’te imi utaba). Yet Edeoga would not relinquish the microphone to the master of ceremonies who himself was vicariously ashamed of such crass display of indecorum and absolute want of courtesy and etiquette. Edeoga behaved like an insensibly primitive Australopithecus Africanus the species of which must have hived off from some cave in Mgbiji Eha-Amufu. The bar was miffed and disappointed at Edeoga’s malfeasance and had to collect the microphone from him. That very outing has generated a lot of narratives woven around him and his ill-advised governorship ambition.

The straw that broke the carmel’s back was Edeoga’s eratic fawning kind of name-dropping as witnessed on the occasion of Nnia Nwodo’s 70th birthday anniversary. Edeoga was caught on camera fawning around Peter Obi, struggling to take pictures with him. Obi had ignored him and began to move away from him diplomatically, while Edeoga threw himself at Obi, shouting, “candidates! Candidates!” Peter Obi knows that Labour Party in Enugu State has no governorship candidate and so could not have identified Edeoga as the candidate of Labour Party in the state. The court judgement that nullified Edeoga’s candidacy still subsists; yet Edeoga has continued to parade himself as the governorship candidate of Labour Party thereby committing contempt of court. Edeoga’s unrestrained usurpation of the vacant seat led to the hoisting of the billboards of Odengene in the streets of Enugu metropolis which now fly the sky and fan Edeoga and his minions cold.

The fact is that Peter Obi doesn’t want to be associated with the charlatan called Chijioke Edeoga and the travesty of primaries that temporarily made him the candidate of Labour Party which was dismissed as a charade and annulled by the court. Obi knows that Edeoga is an evil attachment should he identify with him and so avoids him as one would a leper, knowing full well that Edeoga is a stigma capable of ruining his presidential ambition. On many occasions Obi came into Enugu, he had carefully avoided Edeoga; yet the desperado would foolishly throw himself at Obi in his desperate search for validation by name-dropping. It is shameful.

It is obvious from Edeoga’s many indecorous, childish and inept performances that governorship is far from him as the sky is far from the earth. Even Nnia Nwodo, his godfather, was reportedly said to be currently ill at ease with Edeoga’s many shameful acts and had had to upbraid him, regretting muscling him through the Labour Party governorship bid. The fact is that Edeoga does not have the mental strength and character to even represent Eha-Amufu Ward 3 in the legislature of Isi-Uzo Local Government let alone contest the chairmanship of Isi-Uzo. And here we are with such a deterioration being foisted on Enugu Labour Party in the name of governorship aspiration. Interestingly, Obi has distanced himself from the charlatan lest he would sully his immaculate presidential robe.