Facts have emerged on how Governor Willie Obiano cost his state, Anambra, a whopping N90 investment, which was eventually moved to a more receptive part of the country.
Details of the monumental loss were contained in a statement issued on Thursday in Onitsha by 20 human rights group under the banner of the South-East Based Coalition of Human Rights & Good Governance Organizations (SBCHRO’s).
The coalition lamented the resultant loss of over 600 direct jobs and over 2000 indirect jobs by Ndigbo following the relocation of the Hero brewery to Ogun State.
SBCHRO’s in the statement cited the investment that was taken away from the South-East as part of the cost of failed political leadership in Igbo land.
The statement reads in part: “Particularly saddening and shocking was the recent diversion or relocation, construction, expansion and commissioning (28th August 2018) of a gargantuan N90 billion ($300M) Budweiser/Hero Beer Breweries in Shagamu, Ogun State, Yoruba Land or Southwest Nigeria.
The Brewery; brewers of Hero and Budweiser Beers as well as Grand and Beta Malt, among over half a dozen other alcoholic and soft drinks, was originally attracted to Nigeria in the 90s by former Governor Peter Obi of Anambra State in his private capacity as an international investor-businessman.
The Company, originally “SABMiller Breweries” from South Africa, was recently purchased and taken over by AB InBev (Anheuser-Busch InBev SA/NV), a multinational drinks and brewery holdings company, based in Leuven, Belgium with global net value of $115 billion.
“Obi followed it up when he became Anambra State Governor and succeeded in getting the Company to invest and situate its giant Plant in the Harbour Industrial Layout part of Onitsha and Ogbaru; where it procured and paid for a parcel of land belonging to the General Cotton Mills (GCM) and injected not less than N30billion or $100m (calculation based on official exchange rate) into the Onitsha Plant. The Plant at its commissioning instantly created 200 direct and over 2000 indirect jobs, mostly involving sons and daughters of Igbo Nation. Anambra State Government till date maintains 5% stake in the Company.
“The Company, since its inception in the State in 2010, has continued to pay hundreds of millions of naira as tax into the coffers of the Government of Anambra State; making it the highest taxpayer in the State with tens of millions of naira monthly. The Hero Beer Company has also doled out hundreds of millions of naira worth of cash, materials or kind in fulfilment of its corporate social responsibility obligations to Government and People of Anambra State in particular and the entire Igbo Nation in general. It has further served as a formidable source of investment, employment and poverty reduction mechanisms in the State in particular and Igbo Land in general. The Company and the Nigerian Brewery facility in Udi, near Enugu State Capital City, are the two most surviving and largest industries in Igbo Land today . . .
“SBCHROs also has it on good authority that the Budweiser and Hero Breweries Company approached the present Governor of Anambra State twice for allocation and acquisition of a larger parcel of land to expand their facilities, but got cold response, forcing them to abandon their third scheduled meeting in frustration, leading to relocation to Shagamu in Ogun State, Southwest Nigeria.
“At the commissioning of the N90 billion project on 28th August 2018 with full support and presence of the Governor of Ogun State and members of his cabinet, instant employment of 600 direct or skilled laborers and no fewer than 2,000 unskilled or indirect labourers was announced. The employment rate is also expected to hit thousands and tens of thousands for the skilled and the unskilled involving sons and daughters of the Yoruba Nation in coming years; in addition to projected monthly tax payment of hundreds of millions of naira into the coffers of the Government of Ogun State.
“Social and economic consequences of loss of the gargantuan N90 billion Brewery investments to Yoruba Nation; on Igbo Nation and her People are innumerable.”
On the feelings of the people of the South-East over the development, the group said: “It is therefore heart-breaking and condemnable for the affairs of the Igbo Nation to be left in the hands of ‘apostles of stomach infrastructure and casino bar disco dancers’ parading themselves as ‘elected’ and ‘appointed’ public office holders in Igbo Land. It does not border them at all that perpetrators of physical violence, structural violence and cultural violence against the Igbo Nation and her People have sworn never to allow the Race to reap from fruit of their hard labour.”