An Oblong Media Global Intelligence Observation.

For decades we have heard discussions about opening the South-East commercially to the sea, Oguta, Osemoto, Ihiala and various proposed port and maritime corridors have entered and disappeared from our political vocabulary.

We have talked about exploiting the enormous commercial potential of the Niger waterways.

We have talked about modern railways linking our industrial and commercial centres.

We have talked about turning Aba, Nnewi, Onitsha, Enugu and Owerri into an integrated manufacturing and logistics belt.

But where is the grand South East infrastructure strategy?

That, for me, is the bigger political question.

As another election approaches, too much of the conversation among our political leaders is still about candidates, parties, alignments, endorsements and who controls what political structure.

Meanwhile, other regions are discussing infrastructure on an entirely different scale.

Look at what is happening nationally.

The Lagos Calabar Coastal Highway is under construction, with work having progressed beyond Lagos into other sections. The Federal Government also lists the Sokoto Badagry Superhighway among its major highway projects.

Lagos already has the Lekki Deep Sea Port.

The South West sits at the centre of Nigeria’s most developed port and logistics ecosystem and is connected to the Lagos Ibadan standard-gauge railway.

Whether one supports the government or opposes it politically is beside the point.

Infrastructure creates economic geography.

A deep seaport does not ask which party you belong to before creating a logistics ecosystem.

A railway does not ask your ethnicity before reducing the cost of moving freight.

A highway does not ask whether you voted APC, PDP, Labour, ADC or NDC before opening communities to commerce.

Gas infrastructure does not ask for your political affiliation before attracting industries.

This is why South East political leadership needs to think beyond the next election.

To be fair, significant federal projects are underway in the South East.

The Federal Government lists the Enugu Onitsha Expressway, Enugu Port Harcourt Expressway, Enugu Abakaliki road and Second Niger Bridge access roads among major interventions. The Works Ministry incredibly puts parts of the Enugu Onitsha programme at ₦202 billion and ₦150 billion respectively, while the Anambra side Second Niger Bridge access road is listed at about ₦175 billion.

Fifteen kilometres of reconstructed Enugu Onitsha Expressway were opened in April 2026.

Those interventions should be acknowledged.

But maintaining and reconstructing existing highways cannot be the ceiling of our regional ambition.

Where is the South East’s transformational project?

Where is the modern freight railway connecting Aba–Owerri–Onitsha–Nnewi–Enugu and the surrounding industrial clusters?

Where is the viable maritime strategy giving South East manufacturers efficient access to international shipping?

Where is the properly developed inland waterway and river port system?

Where is the integrated gas based industrial corridor?

Where are the massive industrial parks connected simultaneously to electricity, gas, rail and highways?

Where is the collective five governor infrastructure masterplan?

And where is the unified South East economic lobby in Abuja relentlessly pursuing these things irrespective of party?

That is where our governors should demonstrate regional statesmanship.

Imagine Abia, Anambra, Ebonyi, Enugu and Imo jointly producing a 20-year South East Economic Infrastructure Masterplan.

Map every industrial cluster.

Map every gas pipeline.

Map every federal highway.

Map every proposed railway.

Map the Niger waterways.

Map potential inland ports and commercially feasible maritime connections.

Identify the missing links.

Cost them.

Prioritise them.

Commission proper feasibility studies.

Create bankable public private partnerships.

Then collectively take the programme to Abuja, development banks, pension funds and international infrastructure investors.

That would be regional politics with economic purpose.

The Second Niger Bridge itself demonstrates what persistence and institutional financing can eventually accomplish. It spent decades in Nigeria’s political conversation before finally being commissioned in May 2023.

So why shouldn’t the South East already be designing the infrastructure that will define its next fifty years?

This should transcend President Tinubu.

It should transcend Peter Obi.

It should transcend governors.

It should transcend APC, Labour, PDP, ADC or NDC.

Governments come and go.

Infrastructure remains.

Our politics cannot permanently revolve around who becomes governor, senator, minister or president while the structural economic questions remain unanswered.

The South East is one of Africa’s extraordinary concentrations of indigenous entrepreneurship.

Aba manufactures.

Nnewi manufactures.

Onitsha trades.

Enugu provides services and an emerging technology ecosystem.

Owerri possesses enormous educational and human capital potential.

Across the region there is commerce, manufacturing talent and private capital.

But entrepreneurship without modern logistics carries an enormous penalty.

Every bad road adds cost.

Every hour without electricity adds cost.

Every container transported unnecessarily long distances adds cost.

Every missing railway adds cost.

Every logistics bottleneck makes locally manufactured goods less competitive.

And ultimately the consumer pays.

So as we enter another political season, perhaps the question for South East governors, legislators and political leaders should be bigger than:

Who are we supporting in 2027?

Let us also ask:

What exactly are we collectively negotiating for the South East?

What railway?

What port strategy?

What gas infrastructure?

What power infrastructure?

What industrial corridors?

What highways?

What measurable federal commitments?

What completion dates?

And what will the five governors themselves jointly finance rather than waiting indefinitely for Abuja?

The South East does not need another decade of conferences about development.

It needs a regional economic programme with projects, costs, financing structures and deadlines.

Let us compete with other regions not merely for political appointments but for infrastructure, investment, manufacturing capacity, logistics efficiency and economic output.

That is a competition worth having.

Our governors may belong to different political parties.

Our people may support different presidential candidates.

But Aba, Nnewi, Onitsha, Enugu, Owerri and Abakaliki will still be here after the election.

The South East will still need electricity.

It will still need railways.

It will still need efficient access to ports.

It will still need gas.

It will still need modern highways.

It will still need jobs.

And it will still need economic integration.

That should be the conversation.

NDIGBO, NDOONU.

Let us begin thinking beyond the next election and start building for the next generation.

By Duruebube Chimazuru “Oblong” Nnadi-Oforgu

For

OBLONG MEDIA GLOBAL INTELLIGENCE

Politics determines who occupies office.
Infrastructure helps determine where prosperity goes.

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