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For many politicians, birthdays mean cakes, canopies, and chieftaincy titles. But for Senator Osita Izunaso, it means going to where hope is scarce -the prisons, the hospital, and the homes of persons with disabilities.
It was not different on Friday, October 24, 2026, at his Ohakpu country home in Oru East Local Government Area of Imo State. While friends gathered to mark his 60th birthday, the senator representing Imo West at the National Assembly was counting his gifts to the needy, instead of the birthday gifts he would receive from the rich.
“I will secure the release of 12 prisoners from Imo Correctional Centre tomorrow and offer free medical treatment to 700 inmates,” he announced.
It was not an empty promise. By Saturday, the Turkish medical team from Nizamiye Hospital, Abuja, in partnership with his Kpakpando Foundation, was inside the Correctional Centre, treating over 700 inmates with different ailments, from hypertension and diabetes to eye defects and skin diseases.
Kpakpando, meaning “Leading Star” – is not a campaign tool. Izunaso founded it in 2006 on what he calls a personal covenant with God: to help persons with disabilities actualise their destinies.
Eighteen years on, the numbers tell the story: Over 500 inmates and awaiting-trial persons have regained freedom through fines paid and legal assistance facilitated by the Foundation. The 12 released this October added to over 40 released in similar birthday outreaches in 2024 and 2025.
More than 10,000 people with disabilities and indigent families across Orlu Zone have received empowerment, sewing machines, grinding machines, wheelchairs, tricycles, start-up grants, and scholarships. Chairman of the occasion, HRH Eze Dr. Cletus Ilomuanya, noted that many beneficiaries have become employers of labour.
Over 5,000 patients have benefited from annual free medical outreaches, eye surgeries, and distribution of drugs and glasses. At this year’s event, the Foundation announced scholarships to 10 students of Claretian University, Nekede, which is partnering with Kpakpando. This followed the 2025 birthday when dozens of Imo West students were placed on scholarship at Imo State University.
“My birthday is an annual event of giving,” Izunaso said. “I find more joy celebrating with the less privileged than with the high and mighty.”
It is this philanthropy that has cemented his politics. Imo West, a zone of 12 LGAs often described as politically volatile, has returned Izunaso to the Senate three times, 2007, 2023. Political observers say the senator’s second-to-none empowerment programme has made him one of the most accepted grassroots politicians in Imo. While others share rice at Christmas, Kpakpando shares livelihoods all year round.
The Vice Chancellor of Claretian University, Rev. Fr. Wence Madu, who blessed the scholarship beneficiaries, described Izunaso’s model as “philanthropy with a human face.”
As the 2027 calculations begin, a new whisper is gaining ground in Owerri. If Governor Hope Uzodimma, who is eyeing the Imo West Senatorial seat after his tenure, clinches the ticket, the governorship may swing to Orlu Zone again, and Izunaso, with his statewide goodwill, his experience as former House of Representatives member, former Senator, former National Organising Secretary of the APC, and his unblemished humanitarian record, may be favoured to succeed him.
Whether that comes to pass or not, one thing is certain: in politics often described as self-serving, Senator Osita Izunaso has chosen a different altar: the prison yard, the disabled colony, the hospital ward. And every year, on his birthday, he returns to restore hope to the hopeless.
