Imo: The passé technique of Maximus Uba’s ranting against Gov. Ohakim

By Okechukwu Nwadike

Criticism of governments, their policies and programmes by any individual is one among the many benefits human beings in all civilized democracies enjoy out of the freedom of expression.

Objective and constructive criticism of such governments and or characters in governments creates an avenue for changing or correcting certain identifiable ills of such systems and their operators. It should not be slanderous, damaging and or personalized to any particular member of that government, and above all, such criticism should be able to proffer suggestive approaches, or changes to pending matters raised in the censure.

Any condemnation of character of government, or person/s in governance without suggestive correctional measures to question issues in the criticism, is like asking your guest to go to sleep without showing him where to lay his tired body; it’s all senselessness and in futility.

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For some time now, I have dedicated myself in understudying the writings of one Maximus Uba from Mbaise in Imo state. This is of cause the same state that I come from.

I have sort of tried to build a literal classification of his dangerous style of venomous attacks on selected government executives, but each time I tried this, all that stare at me is an outdated ranting technique filled with hatred, sadism, aggression, destabilization intent and animalistic behaviour of a frustrated and disappointed all-round loser.

I have discovered a reckless character assassin that, in his myopic conviction that the pen is mightier than the sword uses his writings to heat up the tranquil Imo polity.

I equally uncovered an egocentric individual on a vendetta mission, whose murderous ambition can never quench unless he evens the score, if ever there was any.  

Just like many who have read the many disparaging writings of Maximus Uba on Imo state authorities had declared, his writings are “ manifestations of angst, thick and unrestrained” attacks on the governor of Imo state, Chief Ikedi Ohakim, who is less than 2 years in office.

My curiosity on the ferocity of his punches on the governor left me wondering if the amiable governor had had some secret involvements with Maximus’s wife or that he made a pass at any of his private estate that would warrant such unbridled denigration.

My desire to know better this Mbaise-born confusionist led to my background check on his person which revealed to me where he was coming from and where he is going.

Maximus Uba is a failed political prostitute; a jobber who suddenly turned to media terrorism as a way of getting cheap popularity and attention from respective governments in Imo state. He claimed to be a journalist, but has not been seen in the staff list of any organized media organization.

I was told that he once served as an unofficial media (attack-dog) aide to Senator Arthur Nzeribe in the heyday of the infamous Association for Better Nigeria (ABN). The association it could be recalled championed the dangerous cause that led to the annulment of the June 12, 1993 presidential election adjudged as the freest and fairest in the nation’s political history. Beside the association which Maximus projected ferociously became a foremost advocate of  Abacha-for-live-President.

Maximus Uba “was in the media vanguard of the Abacha junta and he churned out false, puerile pieces on the media to back up the former maximum ruler’s ignominy. They conned huge amounts of money out of Abacha; organized a stupendous five million man-march, produced Abacha rice, Abacha TV and Abacha badges and he swore he would commit suicide should Abacha refused to be President of Nigeria.

But Nzeribe severed his relationship with Uba when he discovered that Maximus was more dangerous than a monster bred beyond control. While in the pay roll of the maverick senator, Uba showed a terrible smack of his media naivety than laundering the image of the embattled senator, thereby building him more enemies than friends.

Popularly known for going only where money rains, Maximus later found his way into the political garrison of Andy Uba and became the media adviser to the former domestic adviser to former President Olusegun Obasanjo. Today, the Anambra politician is gropingly immersed in image fortification in his state.

Former Gov. Achike Udenwa was smartly conscious of the devil in Maximus that he resorted to the use of the proverbial long spoon while eating with him. But be that as it may, the diarrhea running pen of Maximus continued to screech over the former governor whenever his bank accounts ran blank.

So when the 2007 general elections came, Uba’s Judasaic judgment once again led him to Senator Ifeanyi Ararume where then the cash was uncontrollably flowing and he became the propaganda machine of the Mbano-born senator.

To Maximus, Chief Ikedi Ohakim was a rabble-rouser working for a political appointment from Ararume during his campaigning days. But he forgot that real Kings are made by God, not man as Ohakim through divine call won the governorship of Imo state.   

Envy, they say provides the mud with which desperation throws at success because broken hopes and shattered dreams can frustrate a limp-hearted man. So he looks for a loop hole with which to attack a successful man. You can tell a failure by the way he criticizes success.

It was one of the ancient Greek philosophers in history that declared “in few men only is it part of nature to respect a friend’s prosperity without begrudging him” even as nature presents death many times to the fool caught in the cobwebs of a drowning game.

The scent of the he-goat is right from its marrows otherwise the rain would have sluiced it. The instability in ideology and lack of political topography of the self-seeking Maximus brought him back to Gov. Ikedi Ohakim to beg for the position of a press secretary to the governor.

But it is only a fool that would employ his enemy as his Personal Assistant just as no sane person expects to withdraw his money from a particular bank having deposited the same cash with another. His loyalty was in serious doubt therefore he was denied the position.

Shamelessly, Maximus again commenced lobbying for appointment as a member of Transition Committee in the state and when this did not also materialize, he approached the governor to sponsor his overseas scholarship.

In some parts of Igbo land, it has become an acceptable norm to package travelling documents for unmanageable, recalcitrant and wayward children in families. The families send them to Europe, or Asia where whether they come back refined and successful, or dead, are all gains to the families.

While Maximus Uba’s application for foreign scholarship was still undergoing verification and possible consideration, the scalawag in his impatience went back to his former pay master, Ararume and commenced once again his pen war.

The truth is that the wind has blown and we have come to see the fowl’s rectum. Imo people have grown beyond Maximus Uba’s out-of-date screaming technique and are beginning to ask some pertinent questions.

Why is Maximus only after Imo governors? Why does he not balance his writings by touching even a single good project undertaken by these leaders in the state? How come he was always in the payroll of most unpopular wealthy citizens in Nigeria? And finally, could he have been this antagonistic had his lobbying for the position of Chief Press Secretary to Gov. Ohakim sailed through?

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His recent allegation on some dailies last week of “rumours spreading in Owerri that Governor Ohakim has assured his aides and followers that there is no cause for alarm over the pending case at the appeal court and that a budget of N6 billion for the appeal court judges and N1.5billion for the 1 st class Oba from South West has been agreed” exhibits an reprehensible sign of idiosyncrasy.

He made an ignominious presentation of his case in his unwarranted hound for his victim in the person of Governor Ohakim while forgetting that rumours have no place in the world of objective journalism.   

The writing profession is a prestigious one which has gone through a lot of digital reformation in the 21 st century. It is no longer a job for beer-guzzling and hemp-smoking generation only. It has transcended the analogue era of short-hand applications and so are the practitioners.

Maximus Uba in his Mbaise enclave needs some tutorials to be up-dated with the trends in the profession with relations to democratic setting, or quit the scene and retire happily with any village title of his choice. This game is like a race and a good racer relinquishes the baton to the next when tired.

On a collective level, we at the Imo Peoples Movement (IPM) would no longer hesitate to take on Uba’s uncoordinated utterances against successive governments in Imo state and especially against our esteemed and respected governor Ikedi Ohakim. He should be left alone.

Inasmuch as we do not intend to obstruct constructive criticisms from reasonable Imo sons and daughters against the governor, our opinion remains that such should proffer solutions and way forward to issues pertaining the state’ development.

We are not unaware that “the man who makes no mistakes… is the one who never tries anything. He is the brake on the wheel of progress. And yet it cannot be truly said he makes no mistakes, because the biggest mistake is the very fact that he tries nothing, does nothing but criticize those who do things”.

To this we say to Maximus: Enough is enough!

Okechukwu G. Nwadike is a media practitioner and Coordinator, Imo peoples Movement (IPM), Abuja and the Northern states.

Greg Okey Nwadike

Discovery News Nigeria

Garki, Abuja

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