Ukwa People Marginalized, Even In Access To Justice!
By Sir Don Ubani; KSC, JP
Thursday (Orie) 27-03-2025.
The long term economic prosperity and significance of Abia State, nay South-East, could depend, to a very large extent, on the geographical entity known as Ukwa.
In the economy of Abia State and, of course, South-East geo-political zone, Ukwa occupies a premium position for two reasons. The first is that, for now, Ukwa-West is the only Oil and Gas-Producing area of Abia State. It is because of the Oil and Gas in Ukwa-West that Abia State is categorised as an Oil and Gas Producing State and, therefore, earns 13% Oil Deprivation Funds from Nigeria’s Federal Accounts & Allocation Commission, FAAC, on monthly basis. Yet, there is no way in which this huge revenue has reflected in Ukwa-West, except now that the State Government succeeded in strangulating hundreds of land owners and forcefully depriving them of over Two Thousand Hectares of their ancestral farm lands, and, in order to have easy access to such exceptionally unprecedentedly confiscated huge quantity of land, has flagged off construction of Obehie-Umudobia-Owaza Road. Basically, the road, if tarred, would be to create access to individuals, who are strangers to Asa land but who have, using the instrumentality of Government, coerced Asa People to mournfully give up their land and, of course, the future of their generations yet unborn, to access the land they have deceitfully sequestered and acquired.
A false narrative about the South-East being landlocked has been spreading for quite a long time. The truth, however, is that the South-East has a proximal sea link to the Atlantic Ocean, that is less than forty-five nautical miles. The Confluence riverine Town of Obuaku-Ndoki in Ukwa-East Local Government Area, where Aba River which turns blue at Azumini-Ndoki joins the Imo River that flows from Umuaku-Isuochi in Umunneochi Local Government Area of Abia-North, is a place readily waiting to be taken developmental advantage of for the construction of a Seaport. No matter how long it may be delayed, a Seaport will one day crop up from Obuaku-Ndoki.
Meanwhile, the Gas being used by Geometric Power Plant, also known as Aba Power Limited, supposedly to generate electricity that supplies light to nine Local Government Areas of Aba-North, Aba-South, Isialangwa-North, Isialangwa-South, Obingwa, Osisioma, Ugwunagbo, Ukwa-East and Ukwa-West is extracted only from Owaza in Ukwa-West Local Government Area. Yet the State Government has no iota of consideration for the People of Ukwa.
To add salt to injury, the People of Ukwa-East and Ukwa-West have been deliberately constrained to confront difficult and expensive hurdles in their natural quest for justice. There is only one High Court of Justice for the two Local Government Areas of Ukwa-East and Ukwa-West, situated at Obehie-Asa.
The implications are many. Firstly, a litigant from Akirika Obu in the extreme of Ukwa-East, for instance, has to travel about forty kilometres before he could access the Court distantly located for him at Obehie-Asa. Secondly, with the bumpy roads in Ukwa, the hazards could translate to any untoward development.
This accounts for the reason why many people opt for justice in Juju Shrines around their vicinity.
Again, when the cost of getting Justice is avoidably complicated to be beyond the reach of the poor, the probability of resorting to Jungle Justice, J J, could become very high.
Apart from the above hiccups, that Ukwa-East and Ukwa-West Local Government Council Areas are compacted in only one High Court amounts to undue pressure and stress on the Judge presiding over Ukwa-East and Ukwa-West High Court, which ironically sits at Aba.
No matter his professional training and dexterity, a Judge remains a human-being and should not be unduly overused and overstretched. Besides, with the congestion of case files on the Judge’s Table, many cases may not be heard as accelerated as even the Judge himself will naturally wish.
The Government of Abia State is, therefore, called upon to consider the very miserable plight of the People of Ukwa-East and Ukwa-West and establish a High Court of Justice in Ukwa-East, in order to decongest cases from Ukwa-East and Ukwa-West Local Government Areas now piled up on a single Judge’s Table. Time disposition is also important in Administration of Justice.
In rounding off this piece, it is pertinent to remind the Government of Abia State that one of the glaring cases of injustice the State Government has vowed to continue meting to the very law-abiding People of Ukwa-West, that is Asa People, has been the State Government’s subtle inclination not to appoint an Asa Lawyer as a Judge of the High Court, despite having very many Asa Lawyers being eminently qualified to be High Court Judges, just as the State Government bluntly and arrogantly refused to appoint any Asa Son in the class of Directors in the Civil Service of the State a Permanent-Secretary.
It is high time that Abia State Government should have a rethink and appoint an Asa indigenous Lawyer as a Judge. It will heal many wounds and calm many frayed nerves.
Sir Don Ubani, Okwubunka of Asa and Oke Amadi Gburugburu, is a former Commissioner for Information and Strategy in Abia State and writes from his native Asa land beautifully situated between Aba in Abia State and Port-Harcourt in Rivers State.
