It is no longer hidden that what many are marketing as a rebirth is, in fact, a recycled plot. The so-called Ukomu Igala Organisation is like a masquerade whose raffia is already falling apart, yet still insists on dancing in the market square. Their hurried proclamations, their selective appointments, and their media rushes — all point to one truth: the agenda is crooked before it even leaves the ground.
Let’s not forget that the Ukomu Igala Organisation had been in existence for over 12 years back. Igala Nation came to the position we found ourselves today about 10 years ago. Could it be possible for the Ukomu Igala Organisation not to know what to do in addressing the accumulated problems of the zone?
That should be a topic for another day.
As Elder Ichado Noah laid bare, the very architecture of this latest scheme betrays its hollowness. General James Ataguba Rtd, Commodore Godwin Obaje Rtd, Prof Lucy Ogbadu, Barrister Jibrin Okutepa — all plucked from Idah LGA where Attah Igala himself resides. The tripod of national leader, deputy, and secretary have all been trapped in one corner of the land, while other constituencies remain like abandoned stepchildren. In a nation of many rivers, they have chosen to drink from only one well. Is this not a clear handwriting of hidden agenda? Is this not the politics of eating with short spoons while others are starved at the gates?
We may, at this point, begin to see and address the organisation as Ukomu Idah Organisation .
Nobody is against the existence of the Ukomu Idah organisation as it is now because the sky is so wide that it can accommodate as many other organisations as possible.
The question now is why rushing into doing what you know too well would bring disgrace on people involved and at the same time expanding the existing problems for the zone???.
What is even more tragic is that the supposed architects of reform — men like Okutepa and Dr. Michael Idachaba, who stays in USA — were once inside the house of the Igala Elites project. That noble body was painstakingly consulting over 250 professors, generals, SANs, and professionals from across the diaspora. The aim was clear: to birth a roundtable of Igala Nation Elites, fashioned after the Afenifere of the Yoruba, the Ohanaeze of the Igbo, the Ijaw National Congress, and the Tiv Council — a credible platform to front Igala causes at the Local Government Area, State, and federal levels. That patient sowing was to mature into a harvest of leadership. But before the yam could sprout, impatient hands uprooted it and rushed to the radio, calling a shadow inauguration.
The truth is bitter: what happened was not leadership. It was burglary. They burgled the dreams of an elite consensus, hijacked the framework, and dressed it in emergency garments. Worse still, they invited politicians — the very same breed that fertilised Igala’s present calamity — to grease the unripe engine with donations for Inikpi radio. If that is not a hidden agenda, then it is a locust pretending to be a butterfly.
Yet, prescriptions remain. Igala nation must insist on equity — leadership must not be monopolised by one LGA. Power and responsibility should be distributed across all federal constituencies of Kogi East, lest unity becomes lip service. Secondly, the elites must refuse the poison of haste. Rome was not built on the back of emergency meetings in parlours. A credible Igala front requires deliberate consultations, documented blueprints, and broad participation. Thirdly, politicians must be fenced out at the foundation stage; let the house be constructed by elders, professionals, and patriots before inviting political tenants who may pay rent today and burn the house tomorrow.
In the end, the question remains: is this gathering of Ukomu Igala Organisation truly the assembly of Igala’s sons and daughters, or merely the convocation of praying mantis waiting to devour their own kind? A people at a crossroads can not afford theatre. They need direction. They need discipline. They need leaders whose legitimacy does not begin and end in Idah parlours but flows like River Niger — reaching every shore of Igala/Bassa land.
Anything less is not leadership; it is locust work disguised as nation-building.
– Inah Boniface Ocholi writes from Ayah – Igalamela/Odolu LGA, Kogi state.
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