My dear brother and Governor,
As we consider the solemnity of the Holy Week and its profound meaning for our faith and eternal journey, I come to you today with an abundance of goodwill.
I pray that you will, as always, draw upon the abundance of your love for the state and its people to listen, apply the wisdom of the biblical King Solomon, and demonstrate the resolve of King David in addressing the issues raised here concerning your administration.
I have continued to monitor developments in the state with the keen instinct of an investigative journalist, and I dare say that investigative journalism is neither an instrument for careless fault-finding nor one based solely on criticism. Rather, it seeks to expose what is wrong while also pointing out and celebrating what is done right. It is a battle for the soul of truth.
Before I continue, I want to apologise to my friends and family who might not feel comfortable with the way I am engaging with you. I have the utmost respect for them and greatly appreciate their concern for me. However, I respectfully disagree that engaging you publicly amounts to “heating” the state or insulting you.
I believe that politics should never be used to separate friends, brothers, and sisters, nor to destroy the bonds that hold us together as a people. Those who tell the truth in love cannot, by any fair judgment, be seen as enemies. The real danger comes from people who sing “Hosanna in the highest” when everything is going smoothly, and then scream “Crucify him” when the tide shifts and the odds are unfavourable.
I sincerely thank you for appointing my classmate from the Department of Communication Arts (now the Faculty of Communication and Media Studies) at the University of Uyo, Mrs. Elsie Peters, as the Head of Service of Akwa Ibom State. She is a proud member of the 1998 Class, one of the best and finest sets from the faculty. I also wish her the very best as she takes on the demanding responsibility of overseeing the welfare and development of the state’s workforce and all that comes with it.
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Your Excellency, this brings me to one of the most important subjects that calls for your immediate attention: your public communications strategy. Sir, some of what you say during official engagements has occasionally offended people and put you and your communications team in uncomfortable and often avoidable positions, especially when they are forced to deal with the predictable backlash that follows.
As a result, you must approach your communication with greater caution and deliberateness. Your speeches and public interactions should be carefully framed to ensure message clarity, minimise unintended reactions, and prevent misinterpretation by your target audience. Clear, consistent, and deliberate communication will not only strengthen public confidence but will also increase your administration’s credibility. Look into it.
A few weeks ago, you advised your aides who are considering elective positions to think carefully before taking that step. You also reminded them that you are bound by the agreement you made before your defection and that you do not intend to breach it.
I am not sure whether that agreement includes returning all current office holders in 2027. If true, then it was wrong and deserves a second look. Allowing everyone who defected with you to automatically get tickets could disrupt zoning arrangements in some areas, alienate those you met at your new party, reward poor performance, and, more importantly, go against the tenets of democracy.
If hard work deserves reward, then poor performance should have consequences. Leadership must reflect fairness and accountability. I had expected that you might face this dilemma, which is why I wrote to you before your defection. Interested politicians should aspire to contest based on what they have done, not simply allocate tickets based on agreements that were not made with our people. Doing that would be forcing your personal agreement on 8 million people in Akwa Ibom.
I learned, Sir, that most of the local government projects you embarked upon have been successfully delivered. Thank you for spreading development, keeping hope alive, and creating a sense of belonging among our people.
I am also proud of your intervention in the health sector and of your leadership in the Ministry of Health. I have read genuine stories of people whose lives were saved because the state’s ambulance service got them the badly needed help at critical moments. Many have reported that public hospitals and clinics are doing well, and the level of negligence experienced in the past has reduced. The health insurance scheme is taking shape just like the international hospital projects.
These are very positive developments that would ultimately make our healthcare system top-notch. However, I must remind you that many of the model primary health centres you built are not equipped to serve our people. Please look into it. Ibom Specialist Hospital is still struggling, but you can reequip, renovate, and convert it into Akwa Ibom State University Teaching Hospital (AKUTH).
During my recent visit, I noticed that potholes have disappeared from most parts of the state capital. The Ibom Tropicana Hotel remediation project, as recently shared by Itoro Eti, is also gaining momentum. I cannot speak to how the tourism projects in Lagos and Abuja are faring, but sincerely thank you for the steps you have taken to pay pensioners, build homes for vulnerable people and transform the Brooks Street erosion site into a multibillion-naira recreation centre. Equally deserving of commendation are the construction of the Judiciary Village, the Aviation Village, and the ongoing efforts to transform Victor Attah International Airport into a truly international hub—alongside many other life-impacting projects across the state.
I commend you, Sir, for your commitment to fiscal responsibility, particularly in repaying existing debts rather than adding to the state’s debt burden.
But Your Excellency, the state’s infrastructure projects appear to be progressing so slowly that they have yet to deliver on the promises made during your campaigns. You acknowledge that the state is getting increased federal allocations, and with the Single Treasury Account system in place, internally generated revenue has also improved.
Much is expected from those who have received much. While it is important to continue investing in legacy projects, you must give equal, if not more, attention to investing in the people. They are the state’s most valuable resource.
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Sir, the state of many public primary and secondary schools in Akwa Ibom is very disturbing. What is more upsetting is that schools in Uyo, the capital, are now nearly as decrepit as those in rural areas. For a state as rich as ours, this is unacceptable.
I wonder why the Commissioner of Education is bent on punishing school administrators and teachers who allow journalists to report these problems, rather than taking steps to fix the schools.
I learned that some secondary schools in Uyo metropolis now have more vice principals than classroom teachers. In some cases, as many as 20 vice principals are posted to a school, many of them wives of politicians and top civil servants. Meanwhile, classrooms no longer have enough teachers to teach the students.
Take Government Primary School, Afaha Offot, for example, which is located near the Idongesit Nkanga Secretariat and where the Ministry of Education and other government offices are. The school is in a terrible state. There are no ceilings, no doors, no windows. Offot Central Primary School near the Federal Secretariat and St. Francis Primary School on Abak Road, close to Pepsi Junction, are not better. Community Comprehensive Secondary School, Four Towns, also came into the spotlight recently, with images of students writing exams on bare floors in dilapidated classrooms.
Ideally, a secondary school in the metropolis should have between 90 and 100 teachers because of the large number of students. But what we see instead is a system in which vice principals lobby to be posted to city schools, causing a shortage of teaching staff. As senior officers, most of them are given administrative duties, and only a few teach occasionally. This situation is not good for the education system and is unfair to the students. You must take urgent action to correct this imbalance and restore proper teaching and learning in our schools.
We must acknowledge the Environmental Protection and Sanitation Agency and the Ministry of Transportation for their efforts to keep our state clean and our roads safe. Today, Akwa Ibom is one of Nigeria’s cleanest states, with our roads ranking among the best in the country. However, it is important to pay contractors promptly and set up effective monitoring mechanisms that ensure quality work and timely delivery.
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Making agriculture one of the central pillars of your development agenda is a commendable and strategic decision. However, it is deeply worrisome that farmers in the state have been at the mercy of rampaging herders. These herders not only feed their cattle on cultivated crops but, when challenged, often resort to violence against the very farmers whose livelihoods they destroy.
Just three months ago, I learnt of an incident along the Airport Road, where a young herder breached barbed wires and led his cattle onto a commercial farm and destroyed the irrigation system, ate up crops, and broke water pipes. When confronted, he drew a cutlass, uttered incantations, and charged at the farm owner. It took the intervention of staff and neighbours to repel him. Two days after the initial incursion, the cows returned to cause more damage and spread fungi on crops they could not consume, compounding the farmer’s losses.
While the herder who destroyed the crops was eventually apprehended, thanks to CP Baba Azare, the situation took an even more troubling turn. The young Fulani man reportedly stabbed a police officer while attempting to escape from the Police Headquarters in Ikot Akpan Abia.
Even now that the matter is before the court, the attacks have not ceased. Apparently angry that one of them had been prosecuted, another group of herders went to the same farm with their cattle and, in a single night, completely wiped out what was left of the farm. This is not only happening to the farmer along the Airport Road. It is happening all over the state.
If a herder can violently attack a police officer within the confines of the Police Headquarters, one is forced to ask: what hope do helpless farmers in our rural communities have? Investigations indicate that some of these cattle are owned by influential Akwa Ibom indigenes, including politicians, ranging from council chairmen to commissioners, senators, and members of the House of Representatives.
Your Excellency, it took an executive order to stop the menace of Ekpo masquerades, and Ekpo is a part of our culture. Why are you allowing “okoyo to come from the bush and break the horns of the domestic goats?”
Please enforce the anti-open grazing law and take other proactive measures to prevent herders from damaging farms in the state. This is not only a security issue; it is also crucial to food availability, affordability, and price stability, all of which are major components of your ARISE Agenda.
While security has improved significantly, thanks to the efforts of our security agencies and vigilant citizens, the state of power supply remains a serious concern. It calls for urgent action and the full implementation of the plans made during the Electricity Summit organised by your government. Akwa Ibom cannot make real progress with the current power situation. You are leading a state still eclipsed by darkness. Do something urgently.
As I end this reflection, I wish to remind you that true leadership is measured not by power, but by sacrifice; not by position, but by service; and not by praise, but by impact. It is time to go beyond talking and focus on a legacy that will last, not as monuments of pride, but as long-term improvements in the lives of our people.
I urge you, therefore, to summon the courage to correct what is wrong, the wisdom to sustain what is working, and the compassion to remember that governance is ultimately about people, not policies. May this Holy Week inspire you to lead with greater levels of purpose, justice, and courage.
God bless Akwa Ibom State.
