OBEHIE, Ukwa West — On a sunlit Friday, August 29, the courtyard of Obehie Central School became a stage for a political turning point in Ukwa West. Sixty-six political heavyweights from across parties — accompanied by hundreds of supporters — formally left their old banners and walked into the Labour Party fold, pledging to work for Governor Alex C. Otti. The welcome was warm, the crowds buoyant, and the message clear: Ukwa wants results, and it sees them in Otti.
Among those who switched allegiance were familiar names in local and state politics: APGA’s 2023 Ukwa House of Representatives candidate Hon. Adinigwe Ugochukwu Nwoke; former Deputy Speaker Rt. Hon. Ngozi Ulunwa; former Secretary to the State Government Chief Ralph Egbu; Hon. Uche Nwaele; Ugoeze Young Ogbonna; and Dr. Lucky Ejiogu. Their defection — formalized with the handing over of Labour Party flags — was more than symbolism. It was a public endorsement of a record of projects that, supporters said, are already giving life to communities that had long been neglected.
“I truly, truly welcome our new members and their followers,” Governor Otti told the gathering. “If there are a few more people who are still doubting, please let them know that they need to board the train before it leaves the station.” The line captured the evening’s mood: a sense that momentum is building and that Ukwa is ready to join the broader project of rebuilding Abia.
For Otti, the politics is inseparable from purpose. He framed his administration’s work as a campaign to “restore the dignity of the Abia person,” pointing to visible investments as evidence. “When you see us building roads, when you see us building schools and renovating them, primary health care centres, general hospitals, specialist hospitals, medical city, it is all geared towards the restoration of the dignity of the man or woman that comes from Abia,” he said.
Local leaders catalogued those achievements in personal terms. Pastor Dike Briggs Nwankwo, Mayor of Ukwa West, thanked the governor for the Asa Industrial and Investment Project (AIIP), the Civic Centre completed and commissioned for Asa people, the 13 primary health care centres renovated across the LGA, and the completed and ongoing road works that are already easing travel and commerce. As the people’s mayor — affectionately described during the ceremony as an “Oliver Twist” asking for more — Pastor Nwankwo asked for a mini stadium. Otti immediately responded: the government will build the requested mini stadium, and he directed the mayor to resurvey the site and fence it.
Peaceful progress — and partnerships with the private sector — were on display as well. The governor urged the host community of Inner Galaxy company to allow the firm to establish a skills acquisition centre at Obehie, stressing that disagreements over its precise location were unnecessary and that community cooperation would bring jobs and training.
Voices from the administration reinforced the political significance of the day. Commissioner for Environment Hon. Philemon Asonye Ogbonna praised Otti’s performance and predicted sustained support from Ukwa West through 2027. Venerable Joshua Onyeike, General Manager of ASOPADEC, called the gathering “timely,” recalling two decades of decay under previous administrations and celebrating the visible return of life to the area: “For over 24 years, the other parties held sway, we saw total decay and now you can see that life is coming back to this part of the State.”
The acting State Party Chairman, Sir Nwaeze Oti, framed the defections as the political consequence of boots-on-the-ground governance. He credited the governor’s practice of visiting every nook and cranny during the campaign for helping identify the state’s problems — problems the administration is now tackling.
In a key moment, the new entrants moved a motion to adopt Governor Otti as the consensus candidate of Asa land for the 2027 gubernatorial election — a motion embraced by the crowd with a thunderous “YES.” Several of the defectors acknowledged that Dr. Otti did not carry Ukwa West in 2023, but insisted that with their alignment, he is now the area’s unanimous choice moving forward.
Dignitaries at the event underscored its weight: former Deputy Governor Sir Ude Oko Chukwu, SSG Professor Kenneth Kalu, Commissioner for Information Prince Okey Kanu, special advisers and assistants to the governor, and mayors from neighbouring LGAs all joined the crowd, adding institutional heft to the ceremony.
What was striking about the scene at Obehie was not just the number of banners that changed hands, but the story those banners now tell — one of projects completed, services restored, and a local electorate persuaded not merely by promises but by tangible improvements. For many in Ukwa West, the Labour Party’s growth here is less about partisan fashion and more about practical hope: roads that reconnect markets, renovated clinics that restore confidence in local care, a civic centre that rekindles community life, and the promise of a stadium and skills centre that signal investment in youth.
As the ceremony closed and flags were distributed to new members, Ukwa’s endorsement of Governor Alex Otti read less like the end of a campaign and more like the beginning of a partnership: a commitment by local leaders to rally behind a government that, they say, is delivering renewal — and a pledge by that government to keep rebuilding Abia, one community at a time.