How Edeoga’s NBA gaffes left Enugu Lawyers dumbfounded, by Donatus Ezejah (Esq.)

It was not until Thursday, the 6th of December, 2022 that the noble body of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA), Enugu branch witnessed the highest folly of an individual supposedly aspiring to be the number one citizen of a state.

In the developed countries of the world, such acts as exhibited by Chijioke Edoga in the presence of learned gentlemen and ladies should have earned him political ostracization for life. An act many people later described as the vengeance of Karma.

Being a guest speaker at an occasion which was organized by the lawyers’ association in Enugu, the sacked governorship candidate of the Labour Party had totally ignored the subject matter he was meant to speak on his and veered off course. To the utter bewilderment of the audience, he started calling out his fellow party rival Chief Evarest Nnaji (Odengene) who instituted a legal case that resulted in the nullification of his governorship ticket by the Federal High Court sitting in Abuja, saying he (Edeoga) had appealed the judgment.

Stuttering incoherently on the stage with much vexation, Edeoga abused his fellow party man, alleging that he used his enormous wealth to subvert justice which ordinarily would have gone in his favor. Edeoga recklessly lampooned the judiciary, accusing them of being a tool in the hands of greedy politicians like Odengene who want to ascend to power by all means.

As lawyers booed the frustrated former Labour Party guber candidate for desecrating the sanctity of the judiciary with his ear-tingling allegations, the organizers of the occasion who had already been irked by his unguarded utterances approached him and instructed that he should stick to the main issues of discourse, but those whom the gods want to kill they first make mad. Edeoga ignored them and continued doing what only he knows how to do, which is to attack everyone perceived to be standing on his way to his political dreamland. His defiance forced one of the fiery lawyers into taking the microphone off his hands, leaving him no further option than make his way to his seat shamefaced.
Edeoga’s inability to control his emotions left his supporters in in the audience unsettled and embarrassed as it became obvious that he didn’t come fully prepared to aspire for the governorship position of Enugu State.

As though the first blunder was not enough, Edeoga had further astonished the audience when he confessed he had no manifesto to present, even though that was the very reason he was given the floor in the first place.

His inability to present his manifesto to the public all this while has corroborated the views of some analysts that Edeoga was forced to join the Labour Party guber race by his in-law, Chief Nnia Nwodo.

Ndi Enugu are expectant of the manifestos of every candidate in Enugu. Edeoga, the political gambler who comes from Labour Party saying he has none is a big blow below the belt for Enugu Labour Party as it has shown that their political ideology is entirely different from what Peter Obi whom they claim they are imitating represents.

The general public is still asking the big questions; if a farmer has no farming tools, with what is he going to work with? If Edeoga has no manifesto, what shall then serve as a guideline towards implementation of projects should he win? What is Edeoga’s governance agenda for Ndi Enugu?