By Eze Nwamadi, Ogbonna Asadu and Ezema Igwenunu

When on 13th October, 2022, Peter Mbah, the Enugu State governorship candidate of the PDP, unveiled his manifesto at Peter Mbah Law Auditorium of Godfrey Okoye University,  it was expected that the opposition parties in the state and their candidates would come up with their own manifestos to counteract and match the much acclaimed excellent delivery Peter had wrought, speaking extempore for over two hours, articulating issues of the Enugu economy and governance. Peter had dissected the Enugu economy from the inner to the outer layers, providing clear roadmaps to exponential growth. The PDP candidate touted to be a visionary go-getter with antecedents of innovative capacity provided the blueprint to the transformation of the present GDP of the state from $4.4 billion  to $30 billion and prospected zero percent poverty headcount index within the stated period of 8 years. Mbah came out with the process by which he would make Enugu State the first choice of investment by de-risking businesses via enhanced ease of doing business. Mbah's unveiled manifesto was quite comprehensibly intelligible, and made provisions for disruptive innovation in all sectors of the Enugu economy.

 The manifesto was unexampled. From the presentation, Peter demonstrated his preparedness for issue-based campaign as obtains in developed climes. The audience was exhilarated at the bright prospect Mbah's manifesto did offer them, and so looked forward to what the opposition would come up with.

Weeks passed; months rolled by, yet nothing came from the opposition. Frank Nweke and his APGA managed to hobble an uninspiring piece in the name of manifesto. It came nothing short of what had been the style of the opposition in Enugu State: leaving the nipples to suckle the boil. It was an insipid bunkum filled with vile tantrums and nothing else. If the Enugu electorate is disappointed with the lackluster piece Nweke called manifesto, what would anyone say of Chijioke Edeoga and his Enugu Labour Party? What would they say of the Ugo Agballa-led APC and its governorship candidate, Uche Nnaji? Neither Edeoga nor Nnaji presented any manifesto to the people. All they do is make spirited attempts to besmear the person of Peter Mbah with all manner of falsehood and mischieviously contrived fictions that never took place anywhere. The people of Enugu State have begun to wonder what fate holds for a candidate electioneering without a manifesto. It apparently appears all target is to shoot down the soaring image of Peter Ndubuisi Mbah and his popularity among the people of the state who have bought into his social contract with them. While the opposition swarm in the cesspool of false propaganda and mudslinging, Peter took to the explanation of his manifesto at the grassroots via town hall meetings at the 68 development centres in the state, something he rounded off on 3rd February, 2023. At the town hall meetings, Peter felt the pulse of the people and articulated programmes in line with his manifesto that would specifically address the raised concerns.

While that was ongoing, Chijioke Edeoga, the embattled purported candidate of Labour Party, left all that plagued him and came up with phantom allegation that the FBI was looking for Peter Mbah. Peter travelled to USA where he met with Nigerians in the Diaspora and spent up to three weeks there and there was no FBI anywhere to arrest Peter for whatever imaginative crime Edeoga had attributed to him. When Edeoga saw that Peter returned unscathed, he now resorted to the EFCC, claiming that the EFCC would arrest Peter for whatever crime Peter had committed in his imagination. Till date, Edeoga's mental EFCC is no where to be found let alone arrest Peter.

When on Saturday, 22nd October, 2022 President Buhari commissioned the offshore storage facility of Pinnacle Oil and Gas Limited, the biggest player in the downstream oil and gas business in Nigeria of which Peter Mbah is the CEO, Edeoga and others lost appetite and emaciated to skeletons and peed in their pants at the meteoric rise of Mbah and the impactful storage facility which is the largest in Africa, something that has turned around the downstream oil and gas sector in Nigeria. Seeing that Peter was impervious to their besmear campaigns, they came up with 'Ego Ndi Enugu' video clip, claiming that Pinnacle was established with money taken from the coffers of the state. That headless crab of a claim died a natural death on arrival because the source of funding for Pinnacle is in the public domain, and the banks from which Peter had taken the seed capital is also well-known. It then became clear, the opposition was desperate to condemn an innocent young man who made it quite early in life by dint of hardwork, uncommon intelligence and precociousness, creative bravura and elan. At this, point it had become clear the opposition was driven by jealousy.

Recall that Chijioke Edeoga had sponsored to a day all manner of calumnious claims against Peter Mbah during the build up to the gubernatorial primaries. All such besmear campaigns failed woefully, and Chijioke was beaten silly. Smarting and sulking like a baby in malice, Chijioke and his minions have stopped at nothing to bring down Peter Mbah. Chijioke had like a confused fellow he is pledged support to Peter after the primaries. He licked his vomit and kissed dust off Peter's shoes when he collapsed his support groups for Peter and asked all his supporters to work with Peter. He however like a traitor later absconded to Labour Party in pursuit of vain ambition. At Labour Party, Edeoga could not come up with any issue of governance. Peter Ndubuisi Mbah is Chijioke's own manifesto. Chijioke and his camp filled with despicable derelicts and individuals driven by rebellion and vindictiveness have continued till date to malign Peter Mbah for no just cause. Such politics of bitterness is reprehensible and primitive. How would it be said that in the 21st Century, Enugu State would yield its sceptre to such crude savagery Edeoga embodies? How shall the story be told that someone without an inkling of what governance and economy's entail would become the governor of Enugu State.God forbid and we forbid!  To put it in Ogbonna Asadu's Nsukka dialectical terms, 'governor gab'te imi utaba.

Ugo Agballa is quite another. Agballa suddenly left the nursing of the invalid Enugu APC in his hands and went to Urban Radio to castigate Peter Mbah for no reason. Agballa has a candidate to market but left all that burden for vendetta, having been asked to resign in the government of Chimaroke Nnamani where he played most foul for it as the Commissioner for Works. Agballa was on a cause for pound of flesh, forgetting as would an ingrate that he is that it was Peter Mbah who in 2022 bankrolled his failed governorship bid under APGA. Ugo Agballa had never won any election all his life. He is a political rolling stone that gathers no moss, a fugitive of sort. He rolls from PDP to APGA and from APGA to APC, a party he has divided and scattered. All the major stakeholders of the APC in Enugu State such as Ken Nnamani, Ayogu Eze, Sullivan Chime, Jeffrey Onyeama, Gbazuagu Nweke Gbazuagu, Eugene Odo, to metion no more, are not with him and his neophytic candidate who is bereft of any idea what governance entails. It is Ugo Agballa and Uche Nnaji who left issues of governance to file a frivolous suit meant to waste the time of the court, claiming that Peter Mbah entered a plea of guilt and plea bargain, a claim that is as foolish in conception as it is daft in delivery. At no time did Peter either enter a plea of guilt or plea bargain. Peter meritoriously served in the Chimaroke administration as Chief of Staff and later as Commissioner for Finance. It was natural that he was asked to give account of his stewardship since the administration was under probe. When nothing was found against him, he was discharged and acquitted. It is curious and mischievious of Agballa and his cohorts to have come up with the fiction of plea bargain and all that childish ruse.

Seeing that all their smear campaigns have run off like water over a duck's back, the said opposition adamant as ever went gaga with yet another ridiculous fiction of NYSC certificate forgery leveled against Peter Mbah. It appears the opposition is shameless about the desperate and childish manner it pursues smear campaigns against Peter. They raise improbable issue and one begins to wonder whether they still have brains in their craniums. How could anyone claim Peter forged NYSC certificate when evidence of his participation in the programme is quite very clear? Could Peter have participated in the programme only to fail to collect his discharge certificate? If Peter did not want to participate in the one-year national youths service programme, he could have asked for exemption. Why should he forge NYSC certificate? It is crazy to contemplate such idiocy as is being hawked by a sponsored faceless group who left Enugu for Abuja to present such surreal tale full of lies, signifying nothing. Even the letter they purport to have come from the NYSC is couched in such street humdrum unbefitting of such a reputable government agency as the National Youths Service Corps ( NYSC), even if there was no educated person in the organization. All those behind this stupid allegation will be fished out and punished. Nigerians can confirm from the NYSC that Peter Mbah participated in the national youths service and was duly certified. The records are there with the NYSC. Chief Nana Ogbodo, the Director of Communications and Chief Spokesperson of  the PDP Enugu State Campaign Organisation, in a press conference yesterday, 6th February cleared the air and displayed pictorial evidence of Peter's participation in the NYSC programme before the press.

Lest we forget, recall that it was the same opposition that misled one Chidi Idoko to file yet again a frivolous suit against the PDP, asking that all the candidates of the PDP be disqualified because the party allegedly did not submit the register containing names of its members to INEC at the time stipulated by the electoral act. The said Idoko is not a member of the PDP, so one wonders how, assuming without conceding the party did not submit the register as required, that concerns someone who is not even a member of the party. No aspirant complained. Not even INEC did complain. So, what business of Idoko's was that. Idoko, a meddlesome interloper, was sent by the opposition to play the devil against the PDP, another exercise in futility. All these were meant to frustrate the candidacy of Peter Mbah. Meanwhile, he who goes to equity must do so with clean hands. If Idoko must file a pre-election matter, it has got to be done within 14 days after the primaries. How would an Idoko seek strange equity on technical grounds and wrap it around technical default? The court in due course will strike out that frivolity.

There is no manner of inquisition the vile opposition in Enugu State has no visited on Peter Ndubuisi Mbah. All manner of contrivances, falsehood, make believe narratives and fictions, mudslinging propaganda  evil machinations and hate have been unleashed, yet Peter comes away with it all. The Almighty God who called Peter into leadership as He did Samuel has protected the young man from the fangs of the demons that people Enugu State opposition politics. He whom God calls, He pre-destinates.They are on hatchet job to quench the destiny of Enugu State for whom the Lord has raised a man, a Joshua to take the people to the promised land, a land flowing with milk and honey, a proposed large economy size of $30 billion with zero percent poverty headcount index. The good news is found in Psalms 23:5, "The Lord prepares a table before me in the presence of my enemies." All those throwing spanners on the wheels shall attend Peter's swearing in as the governor of Enugu State on May 29th 2023. Then it shall be said that the mouth that spoke evil has begun to speak good; when Haman shall hang in his own gallows; when the children of disobedience shall kiss the ground before Peter Ndubuisi Mbah's feet; when they with their mouth shall confess their atrocities to their shame.