Emmanuel Ugwu in Umuahia
The Inter-Party Advisory Council (IPAC) has frowned at the development pace in Abia State, saying Abia needs a 25-year plan in order to attain sustainable development.
Chairman of IPAC, Ceejay Igara made the suggestion while briefing journalists after the inaugural meeting of the newly elected executives of the group.
He insisted that the old way of doing things had not helped the state move forward since it was created in 1991 hence the necessity to adopt a new method of doing things for good governance.
He thus said IPAC had concluded arrangement to articulate a 25-year plan , which would be presented to the state government for possible adoption and implementation.
The IPAC chairman also said that a new master plan would be developed for the major cities of Umuahia, Aba and Ohafia, an emerging urban area.
“We want to join hands with all stakeholders, including the state government to develop a new master plan for Aba, Umuahia and Ohafia,” he said.
He added that the new leadership of IPAC was committed to work for the overall good of Abia.
Igara, who is also the state chairman of Labour Party, said that IPAC was desirous of seeing Abia emerge into a new dawn, saying the IPAC would come up new ways of advising the government and the governed to engender collective developmental agenda.
He said Abia “has reached a stage where political differences should not be allowed to stand in the way of progress hence IPAC would open a very robust channel of communication with all political office holders irrespective of party affiliations to put Abia first in all their decisions and actions.”
He lamented the level of voter apathy experienced in Abia during the 2019 general election, saying there was need for concern as less than 500,000 votes were cast in a state that registered over two million voters.
As a result, the chairman said that IPAC would embark on a campaign “to recover the lost votes by mobilising all stakeholders, including town unions, churches, market unions, traditional institutions, among others to end apathy during elections.”
He attributed the widespread voter apathy in Abia to the electorate’s distrust of the system, adding that the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) muddled up a lot of things thereby eroding the people’s confidence in the electoral process.
