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By Chukwudi Nweje
The President General, Uvuru Communities Development Union, Chimaroke Benedict Nnaji in this interview, speaks on various issues including his vision to bring development to his communities.
You recently became President General, Uvuru Communities Development Union, what is the union about?
Uvuru is known as Uvuru Ikedonobi, it is made up of 10 villages. In recent times, it has been turned into five autonomous communities, each with its own Eze and each of the autonomous communities has a president general. However, Uvuru Communities Development Union is a unifying body of all these autonomous communities, that is what I am President General of. The body is to ensure development and peaceful coexistence of all these autonomous communities and to drive Uvuru into prosperity, peace and unity. I was elected into office on January 2, 2022 for a three-year tenure.
What is the focus of the body?
We have taken time to look at the challenges bedevilling our people, we have looked at our strength and weaknesses and assessed what we must do to uplift our community and make it what it should be in Igboland. We decided to embark on self-help, we are looking at what we can do to make life better for our people. We have established a security outfit, we did this for two reasons, to solve the problem of insecurity and to create employment; the officials are on monthly salary and the community both those at home and those in diaspora contribute to their maintenance.
At this electioneering period, we are also sensitising our people because you cannot talk about development without politics. Some people think that politics is about making money but we are sensitising them that politics is about the people, it is about service.
What exactly do you do as president general?
I am like the coordinator, the pilot. My role together with my executives is to lead this community and take them to a level that is greater than what we met. We want to recreate Uvuru, there are many areas we want to make better. We may not necessarily finish everything, but we want to lay a solid foundation for the next executive to build upon. These areas including education, markets, security as well as the political situation in the community. We want to change the orientation and views of the people about politics.
Talking about what you are doing for the community, a political and economic summit is coming up on Saturday April 16, what is it about?
We set up a group called the Political and Economic Summit Group to deal with some of these problems I’ve highlighted. The group is made of intellectuals, seasoned professionals, people involved in Nigerian politics and distinguished Uvuru sons and daughters. The essence of the summit is to create awareness among our people, especially as we are now in a season of politics; we want to sensitise our people on how to interrogate politicians and vote the persons that will deliver.
What do you think is the reason for the nonchalance among the Igbo, especially youths?
The Igbo have suffered brain drain, most of our best are in diaspora, thus politics is mostly left to those at home who may lack capacity. Other times few people come from the city and exploit those at home. The implication has been that most of our ward leaders, Councillors, and chairmen are not the right people to represent us. Part of what the summit will address is to sensitise our people on participation in politics. No matter who you are or where you are, the local politics will affect you because selection of who the political leaders will be starts from the ward and if you don’t have the right people there, you will not get it right.
You mentioned engagement of local security earlier, how much training do they have to ensure professionalism and prevent abuse?
They were trained by the Nigerian Police and Civil Defence Corps. The training and retraining will be continuous because society evolves. They however collaborate and support the Nigerian Police, they are not a replacement. What they do is to provide intelligence to the police. They provide security at social events but they are not allowed to be at political rallies because we don’t want them to be contaminated by politics.
What message do you have for Uvuru sons and daughters outside the homeland to become part and parcel of what you are doing?
I want to tell them not to despair, they have been contributing and I will urge them to continue and remain motivated. We are talking about our next generation, any investment we make to the future is an investment for life and it is very rewarding. The essence of our life is to serve humanity and God and if you serve humanity you have served God. I want to encourage them to see community service as the essence of life and the community will be better for it.
What legacy do you want to leave for Uvuru at the end of your tenure?
I want to be remembered for laying a solid foundation for the community. Three years is not much but it is reasonable; so I want to create a roadmap and give my people the direction to achieve it. The best thing we can do is to build human capital and create vision. If we create a vision, with or without me as president general, it will be followed.
