Akwa Ibom: Governorship should go to Oron –Etiebet

Former Minister of Petroleum Resources and life Board of Trustees (BOT) member of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Chief Don Etiebet has said the only way peace would return to Akwa Ibom is f

or an Oron person to succeed Governor Godswill Akpabio in 2015.


Chief Etiebet said this  while  speaking on last Saturday’s PDP ward  delegates’ congress in Uyo. He said the zoning of the gubernatorial ticket to Eket Senatorial District would have been a perfect arrangement if the governor had not adopted the immediate past secretary to the state government, Mr. Udom Emmanuel, an Ibibio man, as his successor.
He said it was when Akpabio adopted Udom that he decided to part ways with the governor since such a move did not guarantee justice and fair play, which was enshrined in the state zoning arrangement.
“If we are to talk about justice, we should be talking about Oron; let Akpabio take it to Oron and I will support him 100 per cent as we started in 1999. My disagreement with him is with taking the gubernatorial ticket to core Ibibio in Eket senatorial district in the name of zoning and also trying to take Abak gubernatorial slot for himself.
“You can’t be preaching justice and fairness on one hand and practicing injustice on the other hand. In 2007, I resisted Governor Victor Attah producing a successor in the person of his son-in law even though Udoma Ekarika is from my local government and his democracy dividends would have affected my community positively.
“Udom Emmanuel is my in-law because he married from Oruk Anam, my local government. But equity and justice would not allow me to support him.
“That is why I say if the thing doesn’t go to Oron, then let there be a level playing field for everybody. Nobody should be cheated. Let everybody who bought the form be allowed to contest without any one aspirant getting undue government support,” Etiebet explained.
He carpeted the Saturday ward delegates’ congress as sham, saying the leader of the PDP team that came to conduct the congress, Senator  Abdulazeez Ibrahim, had openly admitted in the PDP state secretariat that their duty was not to conduct but monitor the exercise.
“I have never seen such a biased electoral team since 1978. They were not ready to listen to anybody at all. They only came to monitor, meaning that the congress had since been conducted maybe, in Government House as they later drove to the centres to read names of delegates without any election taking place.”
Etibet said he had the national leadership of the party had been duly informed with the hope that they would order a fresh ward delegate congress to be conducted in the state .  “But if this type of anomaly continues, it is left for the people to decide what to do,” he warned.