Obiano: Blending style, trends and hardwork

FROM flamboyance to elegance, poise to panache, even eclectics – just name it. Gov. Willie Obiano’s dress sense does not only exude characteristic élan and aplomb despite work pressure, but also brings him on as a connoisseur who invests more than mere appearance in existence.

  That’s why even if spotting tone-on-tone military fatigues or longline work wears, or decked in eponymous ethnic attires – bedizened with traditional chieftaincy red caps hoisting chic, white eagle feathers on both sides – or trendy suits accoutered with avant-garde bow-ties and bowler hats, not gainsaying trendy denim jeans and golf T-shirts or fitted, haute couture button-down, collar shirts, the governor not only comes up a high stepper, but indeed a preppy dandy with nose for sartorial symmetry. 

  What of royal, leatherskin native fans with which the governor acknowledges uproarious cheers from admiring, teeming ndi Anambra on his arrival to events? Or collection of monotone necklaces or red beads lining his chest, not to talk of hot number aviator sun glasses, or epic weather-friendly foot wears in tune with ecosystem, all these speak to essence honed in grand style.

  There are three sub-themes connecting to a trilogy which no fashionista may miss in any informed analysis of Brand Obiano. The first label waving sveltely from the plot like zesty petals of a hibiscus flower snuggling in mid-day colour coordination is that the governor’s label, in charting good looks as an effective tool of public engagement or interpersonal messaging, has shown that one does not need to break the bank in order to look good. 

The governor also proves that working hard blends well with looking good, and this has since sparked off new work orientation in Anambra State in which men suddenly become sticklers for suitable wardrobes and even the right haircuts. This matters so much because public imaging deteriorated to a sorry pass where competing with mendicants in off-the-rack wears showed who was ‘working’ or not just in recent past. The governor did not just wake up one morning and started simulating this motif. Rather, it is a genetic offshoot of a consistent, conscious imaging stretching back to the governor’s dewy days or tender age. 

  Yet, and even on a weightier scale, the governor does not sign off on looking good as a matter of body function alone. For sure, he shares no kinship ties with the proverbial Pharisees that wash only the cup’s exterior and give no hoot if maggots fester inside. Rather, the governor has shown that good looks connect humans with their environment in aesthetic unity or environmental harmony. That’s why he continues to sign up to ecological interventions.

Operation light-up-Anambra is one machinery the governor put in motion to bring the state up to speed with modern environmental beauty, not only in daytime but also at nightfall. Construction of three iconic flyovers in Awka metropolis and annual decoration of roundabouts, parks and public spaces during Christmas equally speak to the governor’s taste. Anyone still in doubt will be convinced by what the once noisome Upper Iweka and Zik’s Roundabout in Onitsha have become under Gov. Obiano’s stewardship.