- By Ngozi Onwukwe
Have you ever searched Aba the commercial city of Abia State on Google?
Have you also wondered why other cities in Nigeria tagged Aba as one of the dirties city in Nigeria?
Search the name ‘Aba’ on Google or any other search engine it will give you the answer to the above questions.
I have spent much of my time in search of what our city looks like on Google, since it’s the most used search engine on earth.
But then I realized why Aba is tagged as the dirties city in Nigeria…. Do you know why?
Because residents and visitors made it to look so. The truth is Aba was neglected for 8yrs from the previous government of Chief T.A Orji, the former Abia State Governor, now senator representing Abia Central in the National Assembly.
The city was left to collapse and die off, no government presence in the city, the roads were damaged and no one is there to control the residents.
Robbery became the order of the day, multiple taxation was on the increase, thugs and touts took over the beautiful Enyimba city… The city was indeed neglected.
To make the matters worse, residents used every corner as refuse bin, dumping refuse in every corner of the city…. When it rains? All hell will let loose.
No good road, the drainage system were all blocked with refuse… The city known as a commercial city, became an abandoned empire waiting to die off.
But then the city thrived.
Aba On Google Image.
When all this was going on in Aba, the residents were busy uploading pictures of the bad side of the city, mostly when it rains, residents and visitors will take to the internet mostly bloggers and start writing the bad images of Aba… Most people think they’re doing it to expose the bad governance going on in Abia, but they thought wrong.
They’re only demarketing Aba… Making it look so bad, even an investor or those wishing to invest in Aba will put back their investment.
Really? Who wants to invest in a city look so dirty and abandoned? Aba became a point to bloggers …. Who always pray for the rain to fall to enable them get content and photos to publish.
It became so obvious that Aba is too dirty and abandoned. But we the residents are the culprits and also the victims.
We took to social media and forums, upload the bad image of Aba, but we forgot that we are also the victims of what we are doing.
If Investors don’t come in and invest, how would we have companies that will employ our people and provide other jobs for the people?
Why Are We The Victims?
Take for instance, you’re a shop owner or you own a company and looking for an investor or buyers, what are the things you do first? In my guess, while using the internet to hunt for customers, you only upload your product and services, mostly at times, take a snapshot of your company environment or shop, then upload it on the social media or blog… Why do you do that?
Marketing!
Yes, we call it marketing, you’re wooing investor or buyers to come in and buy your products and services.
But what if someone else de-market your company or products by uploading the bad side of your company environment or your products and tagged it as bad make it look like those areas are only what you have to offer.
Do you know you’re losing?
That same situation boils down to Aba, the visitors and residents demarket the city. Like I said earlier, Aba was left to die… But she thrived.
The city is gradually regaining its lost glory, the same way we uploaded the bad images which was indexed by Google, let us use the same way and upload the good side of Aba… Let Google do the justice.
Aba is our home and it’s high time to tell the world that we are not living in a swamp… We can assist the government by stop dumping refuse in every corner of Aba… The refuse bucket is there, let’s make use of it.
Truly Aba is dirty, but not all parts and let us join hands and tell Google to do justice by uploading some good side of Aba.
Remember, whatever photo you upload on the internet is automatically Indexed by Google… and it will be served to investors while searching for Aba.
In the other hand, the government owes us much by making us feel the dividend of democracy, also by ensuring that when it rains we won’t be scared of the roads because of flood and lack of proper drainage system.
In conclusion, ABACITYBLOG is the voice of Aba, and we live to make sure Aba regained her lost image on Google, to achieve that, you’re going to help us.
Take pictures of the good places you have ever visited in Aba and send it to our whatsapp line; (+234)7038111972
Or join us on Facebook, twitter and Instagram.
sometimes, the images posted are old images in order to paint the city bad. There are many beautiful sites in Aba.