An oil magnate, Chief Barth Nwibe, has declared his intention to run for Anambra state governorship election in 2025 on the platform of Labour Party.
Nwibe made the declaration when he addressed political stakeholders in Anambra Central Senatorial District in Awka Etiti, Idemili South Local Government Area (LGA) on Sunday.
The Igboukwu-born politician and businessman said his desire was to address the leadership failure in the state.
Nwibe said the state needed a humble leader who listens to his people and not an all-knowing individual who would not pay attention to the feelings of the masses.
“I want to tell you that I am running for Anambra governorship and I want your support, there is a need for us to reorganise our society.
“We need security here, our youths can not live and work here because there are no jobs.
“If my brother, the governor is doing well, I will not have aspired, we expected so much but unfortunately we are seeing so little.
“That is why I am offering myself for a term of four years,” he said.
Nwibe said the statecraft had collapsed due to insecurity, high youth unemployment, collapse of businesses and absence of vision for strategic development.
He said Anambra had a rich deposit of natural gas which could be harnessed for industrialisation purposes but regretted that the current administration was not doing anything to activate it.
“We should no longer have a system where the governor determines who should be the traditional ruler, president general, kindred heads and market associations, all these things have been politicised.
“We have significant business presence in Abuja, Lagos and PortHarcourt while our state is deserted, I will create employment. We cannot continue to have our children run away from here and expect the state to develop.
“You can build roads and make all the promises but if there is no security, it makes no sense, the problem we face can not be solved by grammar.
“In the South Senatorial District, we have massive insecurity, everywhere there is occupied, we can no longer visit home like we used to,” he said.
In his remark, Chief Gaius Ezeh, the Coordinator of ‘Barth Nwibe for Governor Movement’, said Nwibe was a successful businessman and proven philanthropist who was best fit for the task of rebuilding Anambra.
According to Ezeh, “Nwibe is a disciplined man, he has grown businesses, he sponsored thousands of youths at various levels of education through his Ugo Igbo Foundation
“He is in the class of leaders we need to redeem ourselves from our current economic situation in Nigeria. With him, Anambra can still return our days of glory like the days of Peter Obi.
“Anambra is a state known for entrepreneurship, we need a man who understands us, Barth fits into this, he is the best man for the job, let us support him for the sake of our children and the future of Anambra.”
