THE 15 DANGERS OF AN EMERGENCY PHILANTHROPIST IN POWER: THE CHIMA AMADI ILLUSION

by Kenneth Arua Ukpai

 

Imo State is once again at a crossroads. In this season of political scheming and tactical deception, one name keeps surfacing, not for visionary ideas, not for track record, not for community service, but for brazen manipulation of the poor: Chima Matthew Amadi, a man whose sudden interest in philanthropy exposes not compassion but calculation.

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Until he declared his ambition for governorship, almost nobody in Imo State had heard of him. Not for building roads, electrifying his community, offering scholarships, creating businesses, or even donating boreholes. For over two decades as a self-professed billionaire, Chima Amadi had no legacy. He lived only a life of luxury.

 

Today, he parades himself through markets like a savior, tossing naira notes at struggling women in a desperate bid for loyalty. But Imo must beware. An emergency philanthropist is the most dangerous kind of politician. Here are 15 reasons:

1. They Do Not Believe in Sustainability: Emergency philanthropists treat poverty as a campaign tool, not a social evil to eradicate. They give fish to bait votes, but never teach fishing.

2. Their Charity Is a Bribe, Not a Blessing: These sudden acts of giving are not from a heart of service; they are transactional. Vote for me, because I have given you money. That is not love. That is political ransom.

3. They Use the People’s Pain as a Publicity Strategy: Going from market to market with cameras and cash is not compassion. It’s exploitation of misery for social media optics.

 

4. They Lack Vision and Long-Term Plans: If Chima Amadi had a plan for development, we’d have seen its fruits in his own village. Ngor Okpala would not still suffer from bad roads, poor water access, and blackout.

5. They Rewrite Their Past to Invent a Future: Amadi has claimed that he built his wealth through Julian Matt Agricultural Resources Ltd, yet records show the company was only registered in 2024. What then funded his luxury lifestyle in Paris, New York, and London in 2009?

6. They Fear Questions and Hide from Accountability: When pressed on real issues, namely: budget policy, infrastructure, or security, they vanish. They thrive only in spaces where applause drowns out questions.

 

7. They Are Masters of Disguise: Philanthropy becomes their camouflage, hiding a lifetime of absence, silence, and selfishness. But the people must look deeper than the envelope.

8. They Reduce Governance to Cash Distribution: A state is not governed with handouts. Leadership demands planning, policy, and political will, not market day theatrics.

9. They Breed a Culture of Dependency: Instead of empowering citizens, they reduce them to beggars, creating a population easier to manipulate and harder to mobilize.

 

10. They Do Not Build Institutions, Only Influence: You will never hear an emergency philanthropist speak of building schools, health centers, or local industries, only of how much they gave and who bowed. Chima Amadi even vowed to shut down private schools built by hardworking Imolites if by mistake he is elected governor.

11. They View the Poor as Props: Market women are not campaign extras. Youths are not backdrop dancers. But to people like Amadi, they are just a means to an end.

12. They Avoid Serious Conversations: Ask Chima Amadi about Imo’s debt profile or fiscal management, and he changes the topic to how much he gave at a village meeting. At a recent town-hall, Amadi did not even know the IGR profile of Imo State! That is not governance. That is misdirection.

 

13. They Are Spiritually Dangerous: Men who worship money often see people as commodities. They can sell, trade, or discard anyone who doesn’t serve their ambition.

14. They Rewrite Generosity into Power: True givers do not remind the people of what they gave. Emergency philanthropists never forget what they gave; and they never let you forget either.

15. They Will Abandon the People After Victory: If he can ignore his own village for over 20 years, imagine what he will do to the rest of Imo once he has what he wants.

 

And just to seal the farce, there was the now-infamous incident where Chima Amadi pretended to venture into a bush to “begin” a building project for a widow. What was the first instruction from his campaign Director General? “Start recording! Snap! Video us!”

 

That one moment stripped bare the entire façade. It showed that the whole philanthropy drama was not from the heart, but a carefully choreographed scene, an organized optical deceit, designed to harvest sympathy and votes from an unsuspecting populace.

 

Imo people must now look beyond handouts and hashtags. Leadership is not about who gives the most rice or who throws the biggest party. It is about integrity, vision, and the capacity to build lasting legacies. Chima Amadi had two decades to prove he loved Imo, but he chose Dubai and deception.

 

Let us not mortgage our future to a man who just discovered the poor last year. Let us not hand our destinies to a shadowy figure who seeks power through drama, not principle.

Because once an emergency philanthropist enters office, what he gave with one hand, he will take tenfold with the other.