The New Nigerian Peoples Party (NNPP) candidate for Abia State governorship election, Dr. Ukpai Iro Ukpai has promised to employ technology to provide solutions to the state’s complex problem.

In an interview with VINCENT KALU, the oil and gas expert, stressed that he will grow the state that it would no more depend on statutory allocations to survive.      

Are you in the race because Abia North Zone is claiming that it is her turn to produce the governor based on Abia Charter of Equity?

While I am a supporter of maintaining the peace and the rotation the Abia Charter of Equity gives to our polity, and while I am in full agreement that it is the turn of Abia North to produce the next governor after Dr Ikpeazu from Abia South, I am in the race to provide solutions to Abia’s complex problems. I am in the race to return Abia State to God and to provide, using good, Godly governance, uncommon care for Abia people who have been wasted over the years.

Why did you defect to the NNPP from the APC?

Yes, I was an active member of the APC from 2015 and started expressing my aspiration from late 2019 under APC. The excessive factionalization in the Abia State APC, which refused to go away, made APC an unhealthy platform to pursue my governorship ambition. Thank God, I moved to the New Nigeria People’s Party (NNPP), which gives me a clean platform to present myself as the breath of fresh air to Ndi Abia in the race to govern Abia State.

Given the fact that the NNPP is relatively unknown in the state, what are your chances?

Let’s be frank, NNPP is at present one of the four national political parties in Nigeria with membership and structures cutting across all the zones and states in Nigeria. Abia State is a beneficiary of what’s happening at the national level. NNPP is known in Abia State. Truth is that some of the parties better known in Abia State are known and remembered for their notoriety, for the bad governance of the state and misuse and abuse of the people’s mandates. NNPP is now recognised as one of the first 4/5 in the state but not for notoriety, but for having promise in stock for Abian people, for presenting Godly, God-fearing, capable, greed -dead, tested, forward-looking candidates across board.

What are you coming to do differently if elected Abia governor?

Like I have said earlier, if elected Abia State governor from May 29, 2023, we will return Abia State to God indeed. We will use governance to take very uncommon care of Abia people, to show them the kind of love governors so far have not shown to the state and its people. With me in the saddle, tech will take over in Abia State from 2023 leading to growing Abia revenue fast, reducing Abia’s debt stock, producing what Abians need and what the world needs, reducing corruption to near zero. Importantly, we will use our years at the helm to lay a solid developmental foundation for the state so we are not imperiled come 2050. Part of our focus is to dutifully train our youthful population, leveraging on digital technology to massively create jobs, provide security in education, food/agriculture, health, and lives and property. We will so engage Abia youths in wealth creation that we will take them out of the streets, and by so doing, deal a blow on insecurity once and for all. We will use governance to announce back to the world that Abia State is come; that Abia State has arisen!

With other candidates like Prof Uche Ikonne, Prof. Greg Ibe and Alex Otti in the race, what are your chances?

Those are eminent Abians you mentioned there, no doubt. Yeah, I may be a nobody compared to them, yet you have Ukpai Iro Ukpai PhD, CQRM, LLM, B.Eng, Former Managing Director, Smart Drilling Services Ltd, serial entrepreneur, one of the best known oil and gas experts in Nigeria, currently chairman/CEO Hocihatt Limited, as governorship candidate of NNPP. My credential is not really the most important. What’s most important is the state of my heart. I love Abians so dearly and want to provide them servant leadership. They call me Ebube Abia (The glory of Abia).

You have an enviable credential. Knowing the nature of Nigeria’s politics; don’t you think you will be tainted?

Like I said earlier, I have been in active politics since 2015. I play politics following my principles in life. Nigeria’s politics is part of the world we find ourselves in; it is not worse than other activities we engage in around the world. So far, in my engagements, I have not been soiled; I will not be tainted. I have been well prepared by my creator for this time. The times we all face in Nigeria provide good test for our characters and or faiths.

What have you identified as the major problems of the state and how would you go about tackling them?

They key problems of Abia State (we cannot exhaust them here) include insecurity, unemployment and underemployment (few jobs), dilapidated infrastructure, dwindling revenue, increasing debt stock, failure by government to harness our productive force and resources, corruption, idolatry, etc.

In answering you about what I will do differently, I answered how I will tackle the problems. Let me reiterate. Following my manifesto, using digital economy and digital society (DEDS), which is the hub, we will massively create jobs (MCJ) for Abians, grow our revenue so that we are not dependent on federal allocation from Abuja, create wealth as investors come in and tax revenue grows, block leakages to Abia’s revenue, reduce governance excesses, reduce debt stock, produce for Abians and the world by taking advantage of our human capital and ingenuity of our people, frugally use our revenue to provide wholesome security (PWS) in the sectors like education, food/agriculture, health, lives and property.

Of course, infrastructure will be designed and built with the focus on these sectors. Make no mistake; we will utilize Public Private Partnerships (PPP) in most of what my government will do. By my insisting that all of us in government live showing good example, we will tolerate no corrupt practices. Under my government, Abia State must truly be lived in, experienced, and felt as God’s own State, where Jehovah God is honoured and reverenced. Cry aloud unto Abia State that her warfare is accomplished. The glory of the Lord over Abia State comes soon.

Source: Sun news Online