Rivers: Monarch Tasks Security Agencies, Community Leaders On Fight Against Cultism

The traditional ruler of Upata Kingdom in Rivers State, Eze Felix Otuwarikpo, has appealed to security agencies, politicians, and community leaders to find a way of addressing cultism and other social vices that have affected the state’s reputation.

Otuwarikpo made the appeal while speaking at the 2024 conference and gold paper lecture of the state chapter of the Nigerian Institute of Public Relations (NIPR) in Port Harcourt.

 The traditional ruler, who regretted that most companies that were operating in the state had relocated to Lagos because of the negative news, said NIPR and, indeed, the general public owed it a duty to build the reputation of the state.

 He said: “We have to think again about the need to rebuild the reputation of this state and the nation. If Rivers State has any reputation, it affects Nigeria as a country. You can’t get it right at the national level if something is wrong in a state here or any state at all.”

 Delivering a lecture on the theme: “Rebuilding National Reputation through Business Integrity and Public Trust”, the state commissioner for Information and Communications, Warisenibo Joe Johnson, said building a national reputation requires total commitment to value-reorientation, just as the government and business.

 Johnson said: “Building national reputation requires total commitment to value-reorientation, just as the government so also is business. If there is no integrity, there can never be a reputation.

 “Leaders in all strata of society must openly possess essential qualities of integrity, reputation and trustworthiness in all activities, but with people of impeccable character, posited that building true reputation requires consistency, public trust and credibility.”

 In his address, Pastor Paulinus Nsirim, the member representing Rivers State at the NIPR Governing Council, stated that the onus is on all Nigerians to create a future we all want to see.

 Nsirim said, “And creating that future will mean that every Nigerian, no matter where you find yourself, has to play a critical role in building Nigeria’s reputation, and some of the ways to do this is to engage in constructive criticism.”

He informed that the NIPR recently launched a National Reputation Management Group to galvanise and mobilise stakeholder groups for the citizenry to understand that Nigeria is blessed and the only thing we need to do to begin to reap the rich resources that nature has blessed the country with, is to build a reputation that will stand the test of time.