Remembering Ambrose Alli

Friends and associates of Professor Ambrose Alli, former governor of defunct Bendel State honoured him at a public lecture, 20 years after his death

By Victor Osehobo

Twenty years after he died on his 60th birthday, friends and admirers of the late first executive governor of defunct Bendel State, Professor Ambrose Folorunsho Alli gathered, penultimate week to celebrate a man whom many referred to as a visionary leader who came ahead of his time. The event was marked with a public lecture delivered by the Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, Mrs. Farida Waziri. It was a day the former governor was literally brought back to life by glowing tributes paid to his legendary leadership by friends and associates.
Senator Frank Okpozo, who served as deputy speaker of the defunct Bendel State Assembly during Alli's tenure described the former governor as a rare gem, a politician who “tactically used his educational influence and tireless industry to win his (political) opponents.” According to Okpozo, Alli promoted the policy of free education and operated well-equipped public schools even in the remotest parts of the state. He said the former governor established the then Bendel State University at Ekpoma to cater for the teeming population of students of the state who were denied admissions into federal universities due to the quota system. This was followed with the establishments of two polytechnics and colleges of education in the two senatorial districts of the state. Okpozo who spoke glowingly of Alli's feats in the health, employment, road construction and infrastructural development said the fledging democratic era in the country was suddenly truncated by the seizure of political power by a military junta led by General Mohammadu Buhari. Alli became a victim for his inability to explain how the sum of N983, 000 was spent on a road contract. Alli's daughter, Mrs. Rosemary Zuberu blamed her father's death on the dehumanising treatment he received at the hands of the military.
Mrs. Farida Waziri said in her lecture that Nigeria's problem was failure on the part of leadership and corruption which she said, eroded public confidence, undermined public service delivery and entrenched round pegs in square holes in leadership positions. The anti-graft boss noted that 70 percent of the country's over 150 million people are jobless because of bad leadership. She said that for the nation to move forward, it must develop the non-oil sector, noting that this can only be done by a leadership that is proactive and innovative in the provision of viable alternatives that could see to the effective accommodation of the huge youth population. Waziri said corruption during Professor's Alli's times was primitive compared to what is the case presently when many public office holders line up foreign bank accounts with billions of naira meant for the provision of essential services. The problem, according to her, of bringing the culprits to book was compounded by prolonged court cases and administrative and bureaucratic procedures involved in the apprehension of corrupt elements and retrieval of looted funds.
Pastor Ayo Oritsejafor, national president of the Pentecostal Fellowship of Nigeria, PFN, blamed the failure of the anti-corruption crusade on the method adopted by government to prosecute the war. He called on EFCC to publish the names of people believed to have looted public funds, adding that for Nigeria to be delivered from bad leadership and corruption, there is need for people to realise that money can get a good doctor but cannot buy health.
Former governor of Lagos State, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu said that people who put themselves forward for public service must be ready to serve the people conscientiously. For Nigeria to get out of the fog of bad governance, he said electoral integrity must be advocated and entrenched at all levels of electoral process, including political parties.
Joseph Anetor, one of the organisers of the event told Newsworld that Alli embodies most of the values such as transparency and accountability which are required of Nigerian leaders at this critical time of the nation's history.
Alli, a professor of morbid anatomy was governor of the defunct Bendel State between 1979 and 1983. He was sentenced to 100 years in prison by the special military tribunal set up by the Buhari-Idiagbon government for misappropriating a N983, 000 road project during his tenure. He was saved from the hangman's noose by the Esama of Benin, Chief Gabriel Igbinedion who paid the sum into the federal coffers to secure the professor's release from prison.