Imo State Governor, Rt. Hon. Emeka Ihedioha, has described his predecessor, Rochas Okorocha as a man without character.
The Governor said this while lamenting Okorocha’s decision to discontinue the Ahiajoku Festival and Lecture series.
Ihedioha stated that Okorocha never valued the Igbo culture.
He said this during the 40th anniversary of the Ahiajoku Lecture held on Saturday, November 30, 2019 at the Ahiajoku Convention Centre, Owerri.
“Today, Imo State is on the march again. Never again a man without character will rule Imo State,” Ihedioha said.
The Governor noted that ever since the institution of the Ahiajoku lecture series by the late first civilian governor of old Imo State, Chief Sam Onunaka Mbakwe, the lecture series has remained an intellectual and cultural harvest of Igbo people.
He added, “It is important in this short narrative to note that during what is clearly now properly categorized as the locust years (2011 – 2018) when a man who rode on the popularity of an essentially Igbo party to beguile Imo people, but who turned out to despise everything the Igbo hold dear, a man who limped into Douglas House Owerri on a lie of the garb, never held the lecture; instead, the name of Ahiajoku Centre was changed to Imo State Investment Centre and anything that could amount to an intellectual journey of discovery for the Igbo was shunned by this man for eight years.
“Even all the cultural artifacts at the Mbari centre were equally destroyed and termed as idols.”
