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Governor Hope Uzodinma, what more evidence do you require before acting? The road in Ubowalla, Emekuku, Owerri North, as seen in the viral video now circulating widely, is not a road. It is a swamp, an insult carved into the red soil of Imo State, and a mirror of government betrayal. Children wade barefoot through stagnant water to reach school. Farmers, who should be moving yams, cassava, and palm oil to Owerri’s markets, are marooned in their villages. Expectant mothers cannot reach hospitals. Vehicles die in mid-passage, their wheels swallowed whole by mud. This is not infrastructure; it is a death trap. It is also the perfect metaphor for your governance.
The rot did not appear overnight. It is not ignorance—it is willful neglect. In 2022, your own government listed the Ubowalla–Abor Uzo–Agba road in its procurement plan, with an estimated value of ₦300 million. Two years later, there are no bulldozers, no engineers, no contractors—only erosion and despair. A budget line item that exists only on paper is nothing more than official fraud dressed as governance.
And yet, even when your own House of Assembly cried out in 2024—pleading that the Emekuku–Emii–Ulakwo road had become “impassable”—the legislature was ignored. Today, the proof is undeniable: the video from Ubowalla shows that both the executive and legislative arms of Imo State are complicit. The House member, and the Councilor representing this constituency, silent as their people drown in mud, are nothing but stooges. They do not deserve mention here, except as accessories to betrayal.
The same applies to the Chairman of Owerri North LGA, a man whose duty it is to fight for the basic dignity of his people. Instead, he has presided like a caretaker of suffering, trading loyalty to the governor for silence, trading the cries of his citizens for political patronage. Leadership demands voice, not servility. Yet what we have are local custodians of neglect.
The figures are damning. A World Bank assessment of rural roads in Imo noted that communities cut off by poor access experience drastic reductions in agricultural produce, as crops rot before they reach markets. A regional study showed that farmers in South-East Nigeria spend up to 80% more on transport costs when trapped by bad roads. Translate that into Ubowalla’s reality: tens of millions of naira vanish each year in wasted harvests, inflated transport fares, and foregone trade. The losses are not abstract—they are food missing from tables, school fees unpaid, hospital bills abandoned.
Read also: Gov Uzodinma’s State Address Exposes Leadership Weakness – PDP
But the costs are more than economic. A child missing school because rain has turned the road into a river loses not just a day, but a future. A pregnant woman stranded because no ambulance can pass does not lose minutes, but life itself. Motorcycles—the desperate last option—become death traps on slippery mud. Research confirms that more than 70% of rural roads in Imo State are in poor condition, correlating directly with poverty and food insecurity. Ubowalla is not an exception. It is a case study of systematic abandonment.
Governor Uzodinma, your government has mastered the art of glossy propaganda: billboards, slogans, photo-ops. But development is not measured in posters. It is measured in culverts, in drainage, in asphalt. It is measured in whether a farmer can deliver his cassava without ruin, whether a child can reach school without risking her life. By that measure, you and your government appointees have failed catastrophically.
The world is watching. The viral images of Ubowalla have exposed Imo State to shame. Will you continue to pave political estates in Owerri while leaving villages in the mud? Or will you finally honor the allocations already proclaimed and restore dignity to your people?
History is not forgiving. The road to Ubowalla may be broken, but the memory of betrayal is intact. And when the people speak at the ballot box, their judgment will be harsher than the mud you left them in.
