Two ethnic nationalities in Eket and Ibeno local government areas of Akwa Ibom State are in a war of words over the allegation of abysmal performance levelled against former governor Udom Gabriel Emmanuel, by the paramount ruler of Ibeno, Prof. Effiong Archianga at the weekend.
The royal father had described as, abysmal, the eight years scorecard of the immediate past regime, noting that it was far below average.
HRM Archianga, in an interactive session with newsmen in his palace in Ibeno, dwelled on both state and national issues. He decried the administration of that era as anti-people, alleging “the administration sowed seeds of discord, created divisiveness and strife, and also promoted ethnicity, with a low development index in development programmes.”
He recalled the former administration’s failed attempt to remap and alter the boundaries in the oil-bearing communities of Mbo, Eastern Obolo, and Ibeno Council areas, where villages were wrongly ceded into another. He added that “such selfish interest led to communal crisis, violence, and bloodshed,” describing the unilateral decision as unpopular.
The royal father also pointed at the “Absolute Monarch Law,” which placed the Ibibio Monarch, the Paramount Ruler of Nsit Ubium and Oku Ibom Ibibio, as the live Supreme Monarch in the state, against the hitherto rotational arrangement.
This thereby fuels ethnic animosity, disunity, and violence between the three major tribes of Ibibio, Annang, Oron, and Obolos, where the title usually rotates.
However, their Eket neighbours condemned the paramount ruler’s critical disposition of the administration, describing it as lies borne out of hatred and sentiments.
They argued that the former governor’s achievements were widespread across the 31 LGAs including Ibeno, with road infrastructure and political appointments to Udom Emmanuel’s credit.
However, the Ekid People’s Union (EPU) president general, Dr. Samuel Udonsak, accused the revered monarch of not making his assessment with a good conscience.
Dr. Udonsak described the paramount ruler’s remarks as inflammatory, and had the potential of stoking the embers of violence and asked for a recant.
But an Ibeno apex socio-cultural organization, the Ulok Ulok Progressives Assembly (UUPA), expressed dismay at the attack on their Paramount Ruler by their Eket neighbours, wondering how his views on national and state issues expressed within the constitutionally guaranteed right in Nigeria should concern them.
The secretary of Ibeno Clan Council (ICC), Chief Udofia Okon Udofia, who spoke on behalf of the group, wondered when and how the Eket people suddenly became the megaphone and the mouthpiece of former Governor Udom Emmanuel.
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