More than six months after assuming office as Speaker of Imo State House of Assembly, Dr. Iheanacho Ihim, former educationist turned politician is said to have not been able pay his political appointees and other domestic staff.
He has been alleged to be hiding under the pretext that the Governor had consistently rejected his proposal to hire more than one hundred appointees, some of whom he inherited from his predecessor and others spread across the polling booths in Okigwe LGA.
Curious observers of this development and scenario have however faulted such deceitful claims on the basis that the Speaker Chief Ihim has continued to draw from a monthly budget of about N15Million allegedly approved for the administration of his office and cost of entertainment.
Earlier he had shortlisted more than 100 names for appointments as Political Assistants (SAs), including representatives of a handful of the numerous media houses. The padded salary or wage bill for these prospective appointees was reported to have scared the Executive Governor, Owelle Rochas Okorocha who allegedly promptly cancelled it in line with his decision to trim down the Imo work force.
This notwithstanding the fact that his personal aides now resort to hiring Press Secretaries and cooks from even outside Imo State. Since then Acho Ihim is said to have reneged on his earlier resolve to accommodate some of these hangers-on by paying them from his office overhead and entertainment cost.
Except for his Chief of Staff, chief Security Officer and the likes of Chief Mike Ibekwe of Okwelle Holdings fame and Don Onwukaike, a former PDP stalwart who left Lagos to join forces with Acho Ihim in supporting the candidacy of Chief Ben Uwajumogu for the Okigwe Senate seat, Speaker Acho Ihim is virtually feeding fat on N15Million allegedly approved and released to him as office budget monthly all alone since he is not known to have entertained any visitors in his office recently including those who brought the corpse of late Speaker G.N.A. Atulomali for a valedictory session which incident he even bungled by not pacifying striking workers of the Assembly when they locked the casket-carrying Abulance, out of the entrance gate of the Assembly Complex.
Meanwhile, some of the appointees who had resumed normal duties in the office following a directive to make available their bank account numbers for the payment of the monthly salaries, early in June 2015, have remained undaunted and could be seen daily loitering the premises of the House of Assembly hoping that Acho Ihim would soon address their plight.
They have even vowed never to accept the speculated rejection or cancellation of their appointments by Governor Owelle Rochas Okorocha, who they claim to have worked for arguing that their case cannot be an exception. Speaking to Community Watchdog Newspapers at the premises of Imo House of Assembly, they recall readily that apart from maintaining a retinue of aides, some of who earned over N1.5Million monthly, the former Speaker, Benjamin Uwajumogu sustained a horde of social media practitioners each of who were paid a minimum of N50,000 per month, to promote his candidature as soon as Citizen Samuelson Iwuoha took him to the cleaners for his alleged mismanagement of public funds and other alleged corrupt practices bordering on indiscriminate award of road and city gate contracts and inflation of allowances paid to ordinary media operators.
According to one of the affected aides, “Up till now Ihim has not personally called any or all of us to address the issue of non-payment of monthly allowances or even consider us to benefit from his alleged N15Million monthly office budget since we fall directly under it”.
Another agitated appointee who appeared famished and emaciated wonders why Acho Ihim would accept the alleged rejection of his appointees by Governor Owelle Rochas Okorocha. The victims of this disagreement between Governor Okorocha and Speaker Acho Himi Counsel, the legislature to immediately set the machinery in motion for the conduct of council election so that they can contest as Chairmen and councilors. They stated that the Governor cannot claim that he is waiting for the law courts whereas he has never observed any rule of law since he assumed office.
Sources close to the Speaker, claim that Chief Acho Ihim has not received even one naira from Governor Okorocha for the past six months he has been in office. It is surprising therefore how he sustains those he took to Turkey and Common Wealth Speakers Conference or the cost of moving the Assembly to South Africa recently. Political pundits while commenting on the impasse and imbroglio blamed Dr Acho Ihim for reducing himself to an errand boy when he accepted appointment as Chairman of task force on motor-parks, instead of opting for financial autonomy.
They queried the rationale in the flimsy excuse raised by Okorocha for not conducting council elections on the grounds that the case is before a court. They accuse Okorocha of deceit bearing in mind that while he waits for the law court, he has vehemently refused to obey court orders to re-instate elected council Chairmen and councilors, to recall beneficiaries of Ohakim’s 10,000 jobs offers which his Chief of Staff and in-law, Uche Nwosu was one of them and has never observed due process and bureaucracy in the conduct of government business as a governor.
Curled: Community Watchdog Newspaper
