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| Gov. Udom Emmanuel |
A shadowy group known as the PDP Defenders, which is strongly suspected to be one of the cult groups terrorising parts of Akwa Ibom State, has just stepped beyond its traditional role to issue a press statement today defending the poor and abysmal performance of Governor Udom Emmanuel. Coming on the heels of the traumatic defeat of Mr. Emmanuel in Ekiti where he was the Chairman of the PDP Campaign Council and and key financier of the Ayo Fayose’s third term, and the embarrassing remarks made by HE Engr Chris Ekpenyong and Senator Godswill Akpabio against the governor at the PDP rally last week, we can understand that the Governor really needs some psychological support, even from a faceless group like PDP Defenders.
The first paragraph of the unsigned statement bemoaned that Mr Nsima Ekere, the Managing Director & Chief Executive of the NDDC, was not kind enough to acknowledge the achievements of the governor at the APC rally in Ikot Ekpene over the weekend. Rather, the statement added, Mr Ekere ‘stooped so low to speak negatively about the international market, flyover, Uyo-Ikot Ekpene Road, Four Points by Sheraton Hotel’.
We were however shocked to read through the whole statement and found no single line in which the PDP Defenders mentioned the so-called achievements of Udom Emmanuel. If a well-funded group like the Defenders, which has unlimited access to the inner recesses of this administration, cannot list a single, verifiable achievement of its benefactor governor in a widely circulated press release, it is unimaginable that anybody could do that, least of all a man who has nothing to do with the government.
Truth is Udom Emmanuel has been adjudged by even his most generous admirers to be an unmitigated disaster and a colossal failure. His list of achievements is a mix of fiction and daydream. If you doubt, please go around the state and ask to buy Peacock Paint. Like the rice and tomatoes this government talk about, they are only available at the State Exco Chambers.
Senator Godswill Akpabio, who brought Udom from political obscurity and made him Governor has repeatedly complained that the governor has performed well below expectations. Engr Chris Ekpenyong, a former Deputy Governor, openly accused the governor of incompetence and nepotism at the PDP rally in Ikot Ekpene. It was out of sheer exasperation and frustration with Udom Emmanuel’s ineptitude that Senator Akpabio let out the ‘All is not well’ scream last December to the utter embarrassment and humiliation of PDP stakeholders in the state.
Apart from lack of capacity, our governor is seen as a betrayer, especially by the people of Akwa Ibom North West Senatorial District, who supported their son Senator Akpabio to make Udom governor. The people of Ikot Ekpene Senatorial District just cannot understand why Udom Emmanuel would be so callous to abandon the Uyo-Ikot Ekpene Road which was almost completed by Akpabio before he left office. Why has this administration decided not to put the Sheraton Hotel, started and completed by the Akpabio administration to use? Does Udom Emmanuel not care about the direct and indirect employment this project would have created, and the multiplier effects the economy of that community would have benefitted from? Why is our governor paying back the people with so much meanness? If the governor is treating Ikot Ekpene Senatorial District so badly, why is his own Eket Senatorial District not faring any better? The remodelling project of Eket metropolis has been abandoned and the town now looks far more squalid than before.
Mr. Ekere was only re-echoing the words of the good people of Ikot Ekpene Senatorial District who have spoken out loudly against the nepotism of the current administration and are bound to be unimpressed by vote-catching gimmicks like hurried contracts that we now see across the state.
PDP Defenders say that Udom Emmanuel should be left alone. Do they understand that Akwa Ibom State is not Udom’s private estate, and that the people over whom he actively campaigned to lead, are duty bound to ask him to account for his stewardship? Obong Nsima Ekere is bona fide citizen and former Deputy Governor of our State. He has every right; indeed, it is his civic duty, to ask Udom Emmanuel about his stewardship, and to raise an alarm over his performance as governor.
The Udom government has gained notoriety for being tall on talk and short on performance. It is critically deficient in trust.
PDP Defenders and other paid agents should focus on the key issue, Udom has failed and is no longer deserving of the trust of Akwa Ibom people. Nsima Ekere only said it as it is. PERIOD.
ONE FRONTIERS
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