By James Eze
If you are from Anambra State, there’s probably no better time to be proud of your roots than now. Well…don’t get me wrong. There has never been a lack of reason to be proud of Anambra State, but this time, with Professor Chukwuma Soludo presiding over a historic committee that has been charged with the task of envisioning a great future for the state; there is yet one more reason to be proud of Anambra State. Now, you understand where I am coming from.
Truth be told; whatever impulse that nudged Governor Willie Obiano to set up a 50-Year Development Plan Committee and appoint Chukwuma Soludo to head it couldn’t have been anything but divine. With this development, it may be safe to say that after a few years of getting its political leadership right, Anambra is finally be ready to step into its manifest destiny.
Again, don’t get me wrong. Anambra is great already. Innoson. Chicason. Coscharis and the whole of Nnewi dream-makers are enough to make any state great. But with a clearly defined roadmap and clearer timelines to guide her steps into tomorrow, Anambra State may eventually be standing up to be counted as a model state in Nigeria in major indices of development and not just as a state that has produced the highest number of billionaires. And just in case we wish to face it, we must admit that Anambra needs a development plan. It needs an iron clad fence around its myriad of dreams sprouting in all corners of the state. No great society waits for change to happen to it. No. They usually get up to determine how it happens, where it happens and when it happens. A realistic development model that takes cognizance of the flora and fauna, the human capital, the distribution of natural resources as well as the colour of the dreams of ordinary people is an absolute imperative. And who is better qualified to lead this effort than Chukwuma Soludo?
Indeed, 60-year old Soludo is almost God-sent to lead Anambra’s 50-year Development Plan Committee. I doubt that there is anyone more capable of providing the ingenuity that Anambra desperately needs to teach Nigeria how to design a realistic and timeless development plan. Chukwuma Soludo is one African who will not blink in an eyeballing contest with any other human being from any part of the world in his field of knowledge. His visionary leadership of Nigeria’s banking sector has been a favourite of financial historians for years and will continue to be for years to come. Yet, it might help to recall that when he announced the banking reform that changed Nigeria, many people did not believe him in much the same way that some people have thumbed their noses at him on Anambra’s 50-year development plan. But anybody who doubts Soludo’s capacity to deliver a farsighted and sustainable development plan for Anambra does so in pardonable ignorance. As a renowned professor of economics and member of the International Advisory Group of the British Department for International Development, Soludo’s genius has been acknowledged worldwide. He is vastly experienced from his years of working as a consultant to The World Bank, the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa, the United Nations Development Programme and also years of teaching in many prestigious universities around the world including Cambridge, Oxford, University of Warwick, Swarthmore College and the University of Nigeria among many others. Who else has this profile on the scene, please?
Indeed, since he blazed into national consciousness in 2003, Chukwuma Soludo’s star has continued to shine like the Orion; not the vaguest hint of obscurity. In fact, just the other day, he was named among the 8-member Economic Advisory Council that works directly with the Nigerian President on the economy.
Now, if someone like Soludo does not inspire confidence as the leader of any development planning committee, it would be difficult to find anyone else who will. And that is why all eyes are on Chukwuma Soludo. Everyone knows that this is one assignment that Soludo must deliver hundred percent. Prof Soludo knows too. And if morning shows the day, the rigour that he pressed into the first meeting of the committee, moments after it was inaugurated at the Governor’s Lodge in Amawbia shows that Prof Chukwuma Charles Soludo is in absolute self-possession and has indeed welcomed his new challenge with both arms.
And now, all eyes are on him.