I AM TIRED OF SUPPORTING ALEX OTTI: WHEN THE ARGUMENTS BECOME TOO MANY TO DISMISS
By AProf Chukwuemeka Ifegwu Eke
I am tired of supporting Alex Otti.
The arguments have become too many. They come almost daily and, increasingly, with the confidence of people who believe that repetition has become evidence. Where are the industries? Where are the mega projects? What has happened to the huge allocations? Why all these roads? Why the emphasis on reconstruction? Why not simply build factories and create jobs immediately?
These are legitimate questions. A government must be questioned, its expenditure scrutinised and its priorities debated. No governor should be insulated from public accountability.
But there is another question that deserves equal attention: how does one rebuild an economy whose basic development ecosystem has deteriorated over decades?
That, for me, is the more serious conversation.
Economic development does not begin with the ribbon-cutting ceremony of a giant factory. A factory is usually the visible end of a long chain of less glamorous investments. Before serious private capital arrives, there must be roads that reduce logistics costs, reliable electricity, functioning cities, transport systems, security, healthcare, education, water, digital connectivity, predictable institutions and confidence that investments can survive beyond one political administration.
In development economics, infrastructure is not merely an item of expenditure. It is productive capital. Roads reduce the cost of moving people and goods. Electricity raises productivity. Efficient transport expands labour and consumer markets. Education builds human capital. Healthcare protects that capital. Digital infrastructure reduces information and transaction costs. Institutions lower uncertainty.
Put differently, mega projects rarely create the ecosystem. More often, the ecosystem attracts the mega projects.
This distinction matters greatly in assessing Abia.
Governor Alex Otti’s administration says it completed 414 road projects covering about 864 kilometres in its first three years, with another 82 road projects then under construction. That figure is the government’s account, reported by Premium Times, and should naturally remain open to independent verification of individual projects and expenditure. 0
Yet even without accepting every political claim surrounding those numbers, the underlying policy question remains: why would a government place such weight on roads?
Because Aba cannot fully function as a manufacturing and commercial centre if logistics remain expensive. Arochukwu, Ohafia, Isuikwuato, Umuahia and the surrounding communities cannot participate optimally in a larger economic network when physical connectivity is weak. Infrastructure determines the effective size of a market.
Consider the reconstructed 30-kilometre Abam–Ndiokereke–Arochukwu corridor and Omenuko Bridge. The bridge had reportedly deteriorated after decades of use, while the government presented the reconstruction as an attempt to reconnect communities and stimulate local economic activity. 1
The same logic can be applied to transportation infrastructure. In May 2026, the state commissioned the Umuahia Central Bus Terminal, designed for more than 340 buses at a time. The government linked the project to a broader transport programme involving terminals, bus shelters, traffic management and electric buses. 2
One may debate whether every component represents the optimal use of scarce public resources. That is precisely what democratic economic debate should involve. But a transport terminal should not be assessed merely as a beautiful building. Its economic test is whether it reduces congestion, improves mobility, lowers transaction costs, increases commercial activity around the transport network and contributes to better urban organisation.
Power presents the same issue.
In March 2026, a 5 MVA power substation, upgraded from 2.5 MVA, was inaugurated at Abia State University, alongside other university infrastructure. The stated objective was to improve electricity supply to the institution and surrounding communities. 3
Again, the important question is bigger than the commissioning ceremony. Universities themselves are part of economic infrastructure. Powering them, improving their physical environment and connecting them to the wider economy can contribute to the production of skills, research and innovation.
And this brings me to the problem with what I call the mega-project fallacy.
There is a temptation to judge development only by spectacular projects: an enormous industrial complex, a refinery, an airport, a technology city or some gigantic structure carrying a multibillion-naira price tag.
Such projects can be transformative.
But they can also become expensive monuments when the surrounding ecosystem is weak.
A serious investor does not ask only whether land has been allocated. The investor asks: What is the road access? Where is the power? What is the security situation? How quickly can goods reach markets? Is there skilled labour? Are there functioning hospitals and schools for workers and their families? Can contracts be enforced? Can the business obtain permits without endless uncertainty? Is there broadband? Can executives and technical personnel move efficiently?
These seemingly ordinary questions determine whether capital arrives, remains or leaves.
That is why rebuilding a state that has experienced prolonged infrastructure deterioration is fundamentally different from governing a state whose foundations are already functional.
The first stage is rehabilitation.
The second is connectivity.
The third is productive infrastructure.
The fourth is private investment.
The fifth is industrial clustering.
And only then does the spectacular economic skyline that everybody wants begin to emerge sustainably.
This does not mean that government should postpone job creation until every road has been reconstructed. Development stages overlap. Infrastructure, enterprise development, agriculture, skills, technology and industrial policy must move simultaneously.
Neither does infrastructure spending excuse poor value for money. Every contract deserves scrutiny. Every kilometre of road should be measured against cost and quality. Every large expenditure should be subjected to procurement rules, legislative oversight, audit and public examination.
Indeed, Abia’s 2026 appropriation was slightly above ₦1.016 trillion, making scrutiny of priorities, implementation and outcomes especially important. 4
So the question should never be simply, How much money has entered Abia?
A more economically useful set of questions is:
What proportion has gone into recurrent expenditure?
What proportion has created assets?
What is the quality of those assets?
How widely are they distributed?
What are their expected economic returns?
How much private investment are they capable of crowding in?
How many years will the infrastructure remain productive?
And, ultimately, is the state’s productive capacity expanding?
Those questions are harder than shouting a monthly allocation figure on social media.
They are also more meaningful.
There is another danger in our public debate: we often demand the final floor of a building before permitting anybody to construct the foundation.
An industrial economy is an ecosystem.
Take Aba.
Its extraordinary entrepreneurial energy did not begin yesterday. For decades, manufacturers, artisans and traders have produced shoes, garments, leather products, metal works and countless consumer goods under difficult infrastructure conditions.
Imagine the productivity effect if the cost of transportation falls.
Imagine more stable electricity.
Imagine improved drainage and flood control.
Imagine cleaner commercial districts.
Imagine better broadband.
Imagine formal industrial layouts linked efficiently to ports and regional markets.
At that point, government would not have to manufacture every product itself. Its responsibility would increasingly shift towards enabling entrepreneurs who already know how to manufacture.
That is the distinction between government as producer and government as platform builder.
The most successful development strategy may not necessarily be the government constructing hundreds of factories. Government can instead build the physical, institutional and human-capital platform upon which thousands of businesses expand.
This is also why the debate about “industries established by government” requires nuance.
Jobs can emerge from government-owned industries, but they can also emerge when private firms expand because infrastructure makes investment commercially rational. The appropriate measure is therefore not merely the number of factories bearing government plaques. It is growth in productive investment, enterprise survival, employment, incomes, internally generated revenue and economic diversification.
Abia’s official development framework itself now speaks in longer horizons. The state government presents its revised development plan as covering 2024–2050, with infrastructure, education and healthcare among its stated priorities. 5
Whether that long-term vision succeeds will not be determined by speeches.
It will be determined by outcomes.
Are businesses becoming more productive?
Is investment increasing?
Are young people finding sustainable employment?
Are educational and health outcomes improving?
Are rural communities becoming connected to markets?
Is Aba becoming cheaper and easier to do business in?
Is Umuahia developing the characteristics expected of a modern state capital?
Are infrastructure projects durable?
Is public debt sustainable?
And can the development trajectory survive whoever becomes governor after Alex Otti?
Those are the tests that matter.
This is why I said at the beginning that I am tired of supporting Alex Otti.
I am tired of the word supporting because it reduces an important economic discussion to political camps.
Development deserves something better than cheerleading on one side and reflexive condemnation on the other.
If a road is economically justified, let us demonstrate why.
If a project is wasteful, let us establish that with evidence.
If government expenditure is excessive, let the accounts reveal it.
If public investment is creating productive infrastructure, measure the returns.
And if somebody insists that a state recovering from prolonged deterioration should immediately leap into mega industrial projects without first addressing its enabling infrastructure, let that proposition also be subjected to economic reasoning.
I therefore withdraw from the business of merely “supporting” Alex Otti.
I would rather interrogate the model.
The relevant question is no longer whether one likes Alex Otti.
It is whether rebuilding roads, transport systems, power infrastructure, schools, healthcare facilities, digital networks and institutions can create the economic ecosystem upon which larger private and public investments can subsequently stand.
That proposition is testable.
Time will test it.
Investment will test it.
Employment figures will test it.
Productivity will test it.
Abians themselves will test it.
And ultimately, history will test it.
For now, perhaps the most important lesson is simple:
You cannot sustainably place a mega project on a broken ecosystem.
First repair the foundation.
Then build the economy that the foundation was meant to carry.
That is the argument worth having.
