We have had cause to continually raise alarms on developing political situations in Akwa Ibom state. We are convinced that Akwa Ibom State is as ours, as she is, to those lording over it today, such as Governor Godswill Akpabio and his brothers. We have acted in good faith drawing the attention of our people to the dangerous antics of the governor and his people to subjugate the state and ensure that Oron people do not have their due in the state. In the main, government has not answered some of the nagging questions we raised in our past alerts. They however made a tepid attempt at responding to our last outing. So far, the so called response to our last alert to the people of Akwa Ibom state on the plan of our governor to impose his current SSG, Mr. Udom Emmanuel, on the state has continued to elicit laughter and pity on the hatchet media managers of the government in Uyo. Their crying ineptitude and that of their hired signatories is palpable. Well our people are already used to paid-for signatures to these money-making publications, to be ashamed by their latest antics. In the response signed by two borrowed hands, they claimed that Oron has no beach. We do not actually blame them for not knowing. After all, what will they be looking for in Oron? When they go to other places to commission projects, or inspect ongoing projects, do they factor Oron into it; when there is nothing going on in the five LGAs of Oro nation? So we dont hold it against them that they do not know where our people call Oron beach. We are also not too surprised that the government can still continue to lie about the so called Ibaka project. I challenge these signature-for-hire boys to show Nigerians where this Ibaka project is located. They should allow Oro people to mourn their misfortune in the hands of Akpabio in silence by not provoking us with the list of appointments from Oro nation viz a viz other ethnic nationalities in Akwa Ibom state. They should not allow us to remind them that the governors Essien Udim LGA alone has more quality appointments and projects than all the LGAs in Oro nation put together. (We shall come to this shortly) We know it was a deliberate ploy to ensure that we dont have the economic power to contest the governorship that should be ours for the asking. It is even more pathetic that our genuine outcry could be so easily collapsed into the Akpabio governments latest craze, Umanaphobia. The Oron 2015 project has nothing to do with Obong Umana Okon Umana. Is it not absurd for them to think that our people, who have in their own way prepared for the 2015 election, together with all other aspirants from all over the state, would fold their hands and applaud Akpabio as he plans to impose Emmanuel Udom, a man nobody knows in the state, just because he must enthrone a stooge to continue his enslavement of our people with his brothers? The battle for the governorship of our state come 2015 is beyond Umana Okon Umana and Akpabio. It is a project for all Akwa Ibom people. To therefore think we have no rights, and by implication that the only other person that has the right to challenge the cunnings of Akpabio and his family is Umana Okon Umana, is to say the least bizarre and incongruous. It is even more ridiculous to think that other aspirants would remain docile while they are openly robbed, as Akpabio is currently attempting. These hired boys should not downgrade our legitimate agitation with their fear of Umana. He is just one out of many who are being manipulated out of a contest they have invested so much energy and time. A recent development took place recently in Uyo, when Governor Akpabio in his latest campaign outing took advantage of the visit of the Presiding Bishop of Living Faith Church, Bishop David Oyedepo, to the embarrassment of the man of God and the congregation, to preach the politics of his plan to install his stooge, clothed in his deceptive agitation for zoning. The murmuring that followed his campaign is indicative of the amount of trust he enjoys among our people. Remember that this was the same man who had sworn that he was not a product of zoning, and so does not see anything in zoning. For such a man, with an unequaled pedigree in double speak, his latest utterances should be weighed against his plan to impose his chosen stooge on the state. Akpabios attempt to exclude some people, even among the local governments of Eket Senatorial District should be a cause for concern for our people in Oro and other parts of the state. The governor cannot be preaching zoning in churches, while he had narrowed his choice to Udom Emmanuel. If Former Governor Attah had gone the same way by narrowing the choice to Ukanafun Local government area, we are sure there would have been no Akpabio today. He is a beneficiary of openness, which, we have to repeat, enabled the likes of Larry Esin, an Oro man, contest and come a close third in the 2006 primary, the same with Nsima Ekere, who made a major showing in the contest. Today, Akpabio is strategically restricting other contestants in a manner that shows clear bias. It is on record that Obong Victor Attah, the governor who was on the seat when Akpabio contested, never went to any church to shove it down the throat of Akwa Ibom people the person he was supporting; contrary to the current practice by Gov. Akpabio, who is going from church to church in a bold bid to hoodwink our people. It is a matter of utter disrespect for Akwa Ibom people for Akpabio to arrogate to himself the only wisdom of who should be governor. As a people, we have proved it to past leadership that we are capable of taking the chance provided by democracy to pick whoever we want, and we are sure Akwa Ibom people would look beyond Akpabios smoke screen and go for whoever they want from any part of the state, provided Akpabio and his stooge are defeated. The way this governor is going, Nigerians are still asking what other office he is eying that we are not aware of. It could not just be the Senatorial seat that is driving him frenzy spending so much to purchase awards, with some so absurdly worded that one wonders how easily Aniekan Umanah, his Information commissioner and purchaser-in-chief of awards could con Akpabio. With 18 months to go in his administration, Nigerians are still wondering why he is spending so much money advertising his so called achievements in office. Or has he another national executive office that he is eying that makes him undertake diplomatic visits and return visits without recourse to the Federal Ministry of Foreign Affairs? We in Oron Solidarity Movement are concerned about the real transformation that has taken place in Akwa Ibom. We are concerned that the people have been so manipulated that they no longer ask question on how our state is governed. We should be asking this governor to start giving us account of how he has spent the over N1.95 trillion that has come to the state. He should lay side by side his so called uncommon transformation projects with the states revenue inflow profile. This should not end with monthly allocations, but must include other sources such as Excess Crude revenue, Paris Club reconciled account, revenue from recovered oil wells, refunds from wrongly calibrated federation account revenue etc. It is when all these come into play before Nigerians can be better educated on the noisy broadcast of uncommon transformation. Let us see whether what we have is commensurate with what we have earned. We have seen states like Edo, Lagos, Enugu, Jigawa, Bauchi, that receive less than twenty percent of Akwa Ibom accruals, record great achievements, without the noisy fanfare that is only meant to ensure that questions are not asked about transparency. Talking about transparency brings us to another nagging question we asked in our last message to our people that the Akpabio administration and their spin doctors have not answered. What is the amount of governance going on in this state? When we raised the alarm that Gov. Akpabio does not hold Executive Council meetings, as only two Exco meetings held last year and two also held by August this year, the governor came back and hurriedly convened one, where only one memo, out of hundreds waiting for his attention, was treated. He made a show of conveying a retreat for the state Exco in Lagos. Three months down, no retreat has taken place and no Exco has held. We ask again, how does this governor get approvals for the millions of dollars contracts he awards to front companies of himself and brothers? Who forges the approvals that give him legitimacy to award such contracts? It is time the state House of Assembly calls this governor to account on the way and manner he is unilaterally governing the state, despite the constitutional requirement that Executive Council meeting should be regularly held. All Nigerians know he has boasted that he is the only governor that performs and had accordingly invited other state governors and even the federal government to come and learn how to govern from him. Is he now saying as usual that other governments that hold weekly Executive Council meetings should come to Akwa Ibom and learn how to rule without state Exco and due process? Gov. Akpabio should sit down and govern the state. By the way, where are his own key projects; where are the so called mega projects of his? What he has so far done is the completion of Obong Victor Attahs projects, like the airport, Ibom Power Plant, the Ibom Le Meridian. With less than18 months to go in this administration, he should tell us what happened to the Hospital project in Itam started in 2007 and the drainpipe Tropicana, started in 2008 that has gulped Billions of our money and yet is still neither here nor there. He should sit down and take a deep thought at the hunger that is prevalent in a state that has come to be known as Nigerias donatus state, where easy money could be picked at will; where all manner of conferences are lobbied to be brought to and fully paid for by government. Elsewhere, the people of the state benefit from tourism, here, we spend to bring people to show off. At the Winners Chapel Ikot Ebido, the governor was said, as has become his custom, to have said that for equity and justice, he was handing over to an Eket Senatorial District person. This new apostle of justice and equity has inflicted the deepest injustice and inequity on the state than any other governor has ever done. He has so institutionalized injustice that we need to again showcase his track-record of injustice, nepotism, parochialism and inequity. The hungry signatories to the response to our last statement on the state of our state, alluded to the number of projects, Gov Akpabio had executed in Oron, even though they cannot substantiate any of their claims. In Oro nation, we have resigned ourselves to fate in terms of marginalization. But Nigerians need to hear that more than N200b has been spent on infrastructure and projects in Ukana, the governors home village alone. There, every road is tarred, even the ones leading to the village stream. Of course, this is not injustice and it is not inequitable when the whole of Oro nation of five LGAs cannot boast of any completed road. When one community has more than N200b sunk into it, while other towns and communities in Uruan, Ikono, Ini, Ikot Abasi, Ukanafun, Eastern Obolo, the whole of Oron land, Oruk Anam, where one of the states elder statesman, Atuekong Don Etiebet hails from, go without any projects, or have nothing to do with the so-called road revolution in the state, then something is seriously wrong with our sense of right, equity and justice. We warn Akwa Ibom people, especially our Oro brothers of the antics of this governor in his new love for equity and justice for Eket Senatorial District. This new love is suspicious and merely meant to railroad us into falling into another enslavement plot. Does Akpabio love Eket this much when he had as a policy deliberately ensured the underdevelopment of the area in all his years in government? How come his administration is the only one in the entire Niger Delta region without a local equivalent of NDDC in the state to cater for the immediate needs of oil producing communities? Even Imo state with marginal oil base has Imo state Oil Producing Areas Commission, and so have other states in the region to make more meaningful the 13 per cent derivative for the benefit of the core areas of oil production, which Oro land is a principal area in our own state. Eket people are not deceived. The latest protests in Eket is just a demonstration of the peoples anger against Akpabio, who insensitively told them that the oil spill compensation money, meant to cushion the hardship of the people arising from oil spill would be used to construct roads. Oh yea! Maybe all the wonder roads in his own area were constructed with oil spill money from there. His new love for Eket is suspect and we must be wary of this cunning lover, who is only trying to lure us into a trap to further enslave us with his stooge. Let us pause for a second and look at the appointment record of this our new Mr Equity and see how he has been equitable. A sample of our new apostle of equitys equitable distribution of jobs in the state was eloquently captured in the The Nation newspaper advertorial by an Abak group on September 27, 2013. In that advertorial, out of the 1400 secondary school teachers recruited from the 31 LGAs of the state this year, Essien Udim LGA (the governors LGA) 155 teachers were recruited. Compare this to a paltry 62 teachers that were hired from the five LGAs of Oro Nation. From the 12 LGAs of Eket senatorial district, 216 teachers were recruited while from only two LGAs of Essien Udim and Ikot Ekpene 252 teachers were recruited. If this is not nepotism and injustice, what then is it? This is Equity, the Godswill Akpabio way. Akwa Ibom people beware when this man preaches equity! It will also shock the sensibility of well meaning Akwa Ibom people that the governors home local government has more Permanent Secretaries in the state civil service than the entire five local government areas of Oro nation. Note that while most LGAs have one each with Ibesikpo Asutan and Nsit Ibom LGA having none, Governor Akpabios LGA has seven, (including the state Accountant General and Auditor General). While the Governors Essien Udim LGA alone has seven permanent secretaries, including the Accountant General and Auditor General, Uyo Senatorial District made up of 9 LGAs, has 9 permanent Secretaries, and Eket Senatorial District with 12 LGAs, has 11 permanent Secretaries. That is equity and justice at play! In a strange and uncommon arrangement, the Accountant General of the state and the officer who should audit the states account, the Auditor General come from the governors LGA. With this bizarre arrangement, we ask, what is the governor afraid of? What is he trying to cover up? Is he saying no other person from any of the LGAs of the state can be appointed to take up one of these key appointments? We will shock you more! Take a close look at the following appointments into statutory commissions, which are tenured, at the federal and state levels: Federal Civil Service Commission -Mr Simon Etim, from Essien Udim; Federal Character Commission -Mr. Matthew Ukpong, from Essien Udim; Revenue Mobilisation and Fiscal Commission, Senator Ibok Essien, from Ikot Ekpene (Governors Fed Constituency); State Civil Service Commission Commissioner1, Essien Ubeng from Essien Udim and governors brother-in-law; State Local Government Service Commission, Commissioner1, Mr. Mike Sebastine, Emem Akpabios brother-in-law; Monday Akpan from Essien Udim, State Auditor General; Chairman Assembly Service Commission, Mr. Cornel Udo from Essien Udim; Our daughter Mrs. Grace Anwana was unceremoniously and prematurely removed as Head of State Civil Service to pave the way for Mrs. Cecilia Udoessien, when she still had two years to stay in service, she later died in very sad circumstances; State Accountant General, Mr. Udo Isobara, Essien Udim, (due for retirement since Dec. 2012); Ibanga Akpabio, governors brother, PDP State Secretary and defacto Helmsman at SUBEB; Aniedi Akpabio, governors brother, MD AKIIPOC, as well as a member of the board of Ibom Power Limited; Chairman of Christian Pilgrims Board, Rev. Fr. Prof Nyoyoko is from Essien Udim; Hon Nse Ntuen has been the Chairman of ALGON in the state since our Tin-god came into office. It will be noted that during Attahs administration, the office was rotated among the Senatorial Districts that was why late Pastor Oyong Asuquo was there for Eket, Hon Uwem Ita Etuk was there for Uyo. Today for equity sake it must remain in Essien Udim forever. It is a shame that in a state with 31 LGAs, only one LGA has 8 chairmen and members of statutory tenured commissions, while more than 20 LGAs have no member in any of such full-time commissions. In preaching equity for Eket, we note that Akpabio and his family are currently rewriting the recent history of political development in Ikot Ekpene Senatorial District. The latest deceit is that they are telling people that ISD is made up of Old Abak Division and old Ikot Ekpene Division. It is on that contrived convenience that they seek to deny Abak Federal Constituency of what should be theirs, going by the argument of zoning. The truth Akpabio and his boys are not telling Nigerians is that the current Nigerian political configuration does not know divisions, what we know now in Senatorial Districts, which are made up of Federal Constituencies. And Ikot Ekpene Senatorial District has four; Abak/Etim Ekpo/Ika; Ukanafun/Oruk Anam; Ikot Ekpene/Obot Akara/Essien Udim; Ikono/Ini federal constituencies. Of these, only Abak has not produced and so it is their turn and their right. This will clearly show the discerning people of our state that these men are deceptive liars, who are merely mouthing the mantra of zoning, equity and justice to serve their narrow self interest. Where it is convenient, they shout zoning, where it is not, they device a no zoning subterfuge. We restate our resolve to resist Akpabios plan to impose a candidate on Akwa Ibom state under any guise. We are asking for a free and fair treatment to all aspirants to the governorship of our state in 2015. Let Akpabio, who was actively campaigning, even when he was still in Attahs government, allow people with interest, no matter their Senatorial District of origin, to campaign. Akwa Ibom people are intelligent enough to know who they want. They do not need an all knowing Godswill Akpabio to dictate to them who should be their governor. Our people have already seen through their plan to stage-manage a so called town hall meeting, which they cannot say has any place in our Electoral Act or our Constitution. So we align with the position of Akwa Ibom Elders rejecting the Akpabios contrivance called town hall meeting. Town Hall meetings cannot tell Akwa Ibom people why despite N1.95 Trillion or an equivalent of $12.2billion received in 6 years, there is still so much hunger in our state; it cannot explain why our state with a princely earning of $12.2billion is broke with over N200billion unpaid vouchers and N70billion in Bank loans, when he has less than 18 months to go. Town Hall meetings will not explain to Akwa Ibom people why the Specialist Hospital stated in 2007 is still at its present level, why the drain-pipe called Ibom Tropicana, started in 2008, despite multi-billion naira already committed into it is still at its present level, why despite such revenue, the state is still wallowing in unbelievable poverty. Governor Attah never went to churches, and market places, campaigning the way this governor is doing. Akwa Ibom people cannot be hoodwinked into believing that Gov. Akpabio, who has spoken to a cross section of the people in private and currently in public, to support a particular candidate, is open and unbiased. We cannot be fooled. He cannot ask us to keep quiet, while at the same time encouraging others to play Udom Emmanuel. Governor Akpabio should tell us why he is so desperate. Why is he the one spending state money organizing and holding all manner of meetings and buying all manner of signatures pledging loyalty to him at this time? Is he contesting the 2015 governorship election? Why is he spending N500 Million to organize youths in each Senatorial District to pass vote of confidence on him? He has indicated his interest to contest for the Ikot Ekpene Senatorial District seat in the Senate. Why cant he concentrate on his Senatorial District? We are repeating it, let Akpabio hands off the campaigns, let the aspirants speak for themselves. Akwa Ibom people must be at alert to ensure that their constitutional right to chose whoever they wish to be their governor is not abridged by any person. They must insist on having an open and transparent electoral contest to elect a governor that would be truly acceptable to the generality of the people. As for those us in Oro land, we align with the statement of one of our sons that we shall produce an Oro governor from a transparent and open process, where governor of Oro extraction shall compete with others and emerge as a result of his broad based acceptance across the ethnic and Senatorial District spectrum of the state. We shall not yield to Governor Akpabios ploy to foist Udom Emmanuel on us in the guise of zoning the ticket to Eket. Victor Unuyu & Bassey Uwe Chairman & Secretary.
Posted on: Mon, 18 Nov 2013 04:20:45 +0000
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