The Many Sins of Benjamin Kalu
Every so often, Nigerian politics throws up a figure who forces even his fiercest critics to search for new insults, because the old ones — the tired charges of absenteeism, of constituency neglect, of performing power rather than exercising it — simply refuse to stick. Benjamin Okezie Kalu, the Deputy Speaker of the House of Representatives and member representing Bende Federal Constituency since 2019, is one such figure. Nearly eight years into his tenure, the "opposition" — real and imagined, political and personal — has assembled a charge sheet against him. This piece indulges that charge sheet in full, examines each "sin," and lets the reader decide whether Bende, Abia State, and the South East have been wronged or served by a man whose crimes, on inspection, look suspiciously like competence.
Kalu's rise has not been quiet. From his beginnings as the youngest Local Government Chairman of Bende LGA at 31, through advisory roles under Governor Orji Uzor Kalu and Governor Theodore Orji, to his election to the House of Representatives in 2019 and his ascension to the Deputy Speakership in 2023, his career reads like a steady accumulation of responsibility rather than a lucky break. In May 2026, Bende's APC ward delegates returned him as their candidate for the 2027 elections unopposed — a fact that, whatever one makes of internal party politics, is difficult to square with a representative genuinely despised by the people he serves. It is against this backdrop that his "sins" deserve a full airing.
The charge sheet begins with the fact that he is guilty of sterling performance. Kalu's presence in the House has been, by most honest accounts, hard to ignore. Between sponsoring and shepherding legislation and delivering constituency projects, he has built a record that some would call ordinary competence and others would call proof that Nigeria is not short of capable public servants — only short of enough of them in the right seats.
He is guilty of accessibility. In a political culture where junior aides of junior aides can develop the airs of demigods, a man who has held the second-highest office in the federal legislature and still answers to his constituents is, by the standards of that culture, committing an offense. Whether this stems from personal temperament or conviction, it is a charge that flatters more than it damns.
He is guilty of giving politics an intellectual bent. His approach to governance and development leans on rigorous academic reasoning rather than sentiment or slogan — an unusual habit in a system that often rewards charisma and populism over analysis, and one that his detractors seem unable to forgive.
He is guilty of "one belleism." Borrowing a phrase coined half-jokingly by a university contemporary, Lucky Akpeji, during their student politics days at the University of Benin, the charge amounts to this: that the constituency projects, jobs, and empowerment programmes Kalu has attracted to Bende are designed, unapologetically, to serve Bende's people first. If wanting one's constituency fed before others is a crime, it is one most representatives would happily plead guilty to, if only they had the means.
He is guilty of wanting the South East developed. Kalu was central to the sponsorship and eventual passage and assent of the South East Development Commission (SEDC) Bill, a long-sought vehicle for channeling federal resources into a region that has often felt shortchanged by the national project. He has also pushed the "Peace in the South East" initiative, an attempt to address the security anxieties that have shadowed the region in recent years. Wanting peace and infrastructure for one's people is, evidently, indictable.
He is guilty of refusing ethnic politics. Rather than retreating into narrow sectionalism, Kalu has positioned himself as an advocate for returning Ndi Igbo to the political center of Nigeria, arguing for inclusion within the national mainstream rather than permanent opposition to it. Tied to this is his continued backing of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu's re-election prospects and his investment in building the APC into a genuinely strong party structure in Abia State. Depending on where one sits politically, this is either statesmanship or heresy — but it is, undeniably, a position taken and defended openly rather than one hedged for convenience.
Strip away the irony, and the pattern in these "sins" is obvious: none of them describe failure. They describe a legislator who shows up, who can be reached, who thinks before he legislates, who prioritizes his constituents, who has delivered a landmark regional bill, and who has chosen a clear political lane rather than triangulating endlessly. If opponents want him out of the seat, it is worth asking whether the objection is really about performance at all, or about the more mundane calculus of who controls patronage, structure, and succession in Bende and Abia politics.
Those opposed to his re-election have latched onto the allegation of a zoning arrangement being broken. But the arithmetic works against them: since independence, Kalu's Ikwuishi division of Bende has produced the constituency's representative for only eleven years, while the Umunna zone has held the seat for twenty-four, including Nnenna Ukeje's three terms. The dance around "zoning" is not the problem — the problem is that the tune it's dancing to is badly out of key.
The "sins" catalogued here are, on any fair reading, virtues wearing a disguise — a rhetorical device, not a real indictment. Benjamin Kalu's near eight years representing Bende have been marked by visible legislative output, a landmark regional development bill, an accessible style of leadership, and an unambiguous political identity. Whether one agrees with his party loyalties or his positioning within the APC's national project, the record suggests a man being measured not by what he has failed to do, but by how uncomfortable his doing it makes those who would rather he hadn't. If these are Kalu's sins, Bende — and the South East more broadly — might do well to pray for more sinners of his kind.
