Ogbede: When Preparation for Public Service Meets Opportunity

By Chinedu Opara

The newly appointed Executive Director in charge of Agriculture, Rural Development and NaturalResources at the South East Development Commission (SEDC), Dr. Clifford Ogbede, is a man with passion for  public service. All his adult life, he has always shown that inclination to serve the public good. It is a great trait that he inherited from his late father, Chief Augustine Ogbede, and it has remained with him till date. 

The late father served humanity in many capacities in his lifetime. He was a teacher for thirty-five good years. While in service, he also served his colleagues through their union the Nigeria Union of Teachers, NUT as Zonal Secretary, and Chairman of Ngor Okpala Branch when Ngor Okpala was created. With regard to classroom teaching, he  taught with so much passion, dedication, and commitment. That stood him out and made him very popular in communities in the then  old Owerri Province. Upon retirement, he continued serving.  He served his immediate  Obiangwu as president general and Ngor Okpala LGA as a Customary Court Judge.He also tried to leverage politics to serve his Onyeaghalanwanneya Clan as a Councillor.

Indeed , he had an illustrious and distinquished service career. This is why  his name  remains a household name in Onyeaghalanwanneya Clan and Ngor Okpala, years after his passing unto eternity. As  someone who grew up under such a father, it definitely would have been a big shock if  the younger Ogbede did not walk in the footsteps of his father. But, he very well did, and this could be attested to, by the fact that like his dad, he also talks and demonstrates in action, that service is the most important duty of man on earth.

It's been over twenty years now since  he started demonstrating  this virtue in words and deeds. At the time he began doing that , he hadn't even the minutest access to the public sector. He was neither occupying any elected nor  appointed office; he was neither a government contractor nor a government employee. He was just a private sector person who  worked for every kobo he earned.

What this means, in other words, is that there was a limit to what he could do with his personal resources. 

Therefore,if he is someone  whose spirit of giving and serving wasn't ordained above, he may have simply minded himself, his family, relations, and business. But, because of his public spirited nature,  he has remained a man of the people. He has never held back from using the little he had in the service of God and the society.

Ever since he started several years back, he has continued to go about touching lives up till today. Expectedly, one of the consequences of this job was that he got closer to the people, especially those at the grassroots.  Naturally, this made him to gain a lot of experience, the most prominent of which was the realization that, try as much as he could, his private resources won't be enough to do all he wants for the people.

That was how the idea of seeking public office to help deepen and sustain his humanitarian gestures crept into his mind years back. However, at the beginning, he ignored it completely, but when those he touched one way or the other began nudging him to give running for elective office a thought, he started reconsidering his earlier stand.

The end result of that rethinking was the throwing of his hat into the ring in 2007 to contest for Ngor Okpala/ Aboh Mbaise Federal Constituency Seat in the House of Representatives. As it is open secret here that, you don't win election by popular will, Dr Ogbede, despite being the clear favourite of his people, lost that election at the party primary stage.He never allowed that man-made setback to weigh him down, as he again contested for the seat in two subsequent  electioneering periods. Just as happened in his first effort, the system also torpedoed his other two efforts to serve his people.

More than anything else, his responses on the three occasions he was frustrated out, spoke eloquently to the fact that he came to serve and not to feather his personal nest. Each time he was rigged out after spending so much, he quietly packed his bag and returned to his business.  He never resorted to  desperate acts like playing do or die politics, which is exemplified by endless court cases.  Or, the licking of the boot of those who were  (s)elected, for the purpose of getting contracts, or any other type of patronage.

He always went back to his business. For him, those experiences were not the end of his life and the world. He was always of conviction  that his time had not come, that when it comes, no power on earth can thwart it. As he  predicted many years ago, his own time has finally come. God has remembered him using Rt Hon Benjamin Kalu, Deputy Speaker House of Representatives. Therefore, as Dr. Ogbede gets set to assume  office as Executive Director, Agriculture, Rural Development and Natural Resources, in the South East Development Commission, there is every reason to believe that he will serve well. Having prepared for this for a long time, now that his preparation has met opportunity, we are confident he will live up to the expectations of the people.