Hon Elvert Ayambem is a lawmaker representing Ikom 2 state constituency in the Cross River State House of Assembly. He is one of the assembly men jostling to occupy seat of the Speaker in the yet to be inaugurated 10th Assembly. In this interview, he claims to have the capacity and conversant with the intrigues involved to pilot affairs of the Assembly. NSAN NDOMA-NEJI brings excerpts of that interaction:
How prepared are you to become the Speaker of the Cross River State House of Assembly?
I am very prepared legislatively, spiritually and otherwise. Why did I said I am prepared? This is because I am conversant with the rules that govern the House. The rules state that a ranking member shall be the Speaker and ranking is deviod of tenureship.
The biggest controversy that have thrived in Cross River is the difference between ranking and tenureship. Ranking is simply when you are a returning officer or a returning House member, you are automatically a ranking member. But if you have started eight years, twelve, sixteen and beyond, it’s inconsequential when it comes to ranking.
It didn’t say the man with the highest years in the Assembly, it said ranking and ranking begins when you are doing your second term as far as you are a returning House officer you are a ranking member. So that alone is what has really plunged me neck deep into this battle of speakership. Besides, it is zoned to the central and in all of this, zoning must be observed, because it is the reason for our peaceful co-existence, especially given the fact that Boki and Ikom share the same federal constituency.
Ab nitio when the Ikom man takes, the Boki man takes and when the Boki man takes the Ikom man takes. During the era of Senator Victor Ndoma-Egba, for 12 years, the Senate was in Ikom, and the House of Representatives did not leave Boki. If you even think of His Excellency, Ben Ayade government, the SSG position has never drifted to any where else, but Boki; so I begin to think why it should be different now and of course you know how bad that part of Ikom has been in the past seven years. In my candid opinion, I think the equitable thing to do, having taken the House of Representatives to Boki, the Speakership should domicile in Ikom.
Apart from the zoning issue, do you have the capacity to pilot the affairs of the House, knowing how turbulent and hot the Speakership seat can be?
When you say capacity, I get a little worried and confused. What do you really mean by capacity? Are you aware that the speaker speaks the least and does not interject, especially when very necessary issues are raised and being discussed on the floor of the House by members? And if you are starting the matter of the day, if there is any correspondence to members, we deliberate and take a common position and that is why we get into an executive session before coming to the floor of the chambers to deliberate properly on the issue.
At the executive session, members are given the opportunity to listen to dessenting voices before bringing the issues to the floor of the House to brainstorm on the issue. It’s the reason why all must be in tandem with reality on ground. But if there are grandstandings, you take it to the floor knowing that you have the required percentage of members that is to go through such a document.
You are definitely not a first timer in Cross River State House of Assembly. Can you tell me one bill you succeeded in sponsoring and it received the governor’s assent?
The most famous bill in that House of Assembly that made the governor not really want to sign it, although he later gave his assent was sponsored by me.
The anti-grazing bill is sponsored by Hon. Elbert Eyambe. So, when people are talking about bills, I don’t just go to sponsor bills that the governor will not assent to. If you say you have sponsored three hundred or four hundred bills, how many has the governor assented to it.
How many of your bills has the governor assented to?
I did a very controversy bill, the anti-grazing bill and expeditiously the governor assented to it, because the bill was useful to my people and for the fact that the people of my community were going through so much pain caused by herdsmen, whose cattles were destroying their farms. Of course, like a servant who was out serve his people, I came up with that bill.
Can you just shed more light on what you did to salvage the situation when your community farmlands came under serious threat by cattle rearers?
I visited the Force Headquarters to let them know that our farmlands were being surrounded by herdsmen, who had their backings from the soldiers.
I did everything I needed to do, made sure that the herders left the land, and on that same day of reckoning, I told them I am going to do a bill to support my position on the eviction of those herdsmen. I went all out, did my research and compare notes with others from other states, where the bill was passed and forwarded it to the governor; he vetted it, and thereafter, I took the bill to the floor of the House, presented the bill myself and subsequently, the bill got it’s assent.
Even when the governor initially did not want to sign it, I mounted pressure and he succumbed and did the needful.
I told the governor this is what is tenable for you, and when all these things were itemized to the governor, he saw reason to assent to that bill and he did.
So for anyone to just wake up and begin to tell us that he has a number of bills, it’s ridiculous! When someone tells us that he or she has a number of bills, let’s try to ask him the number of these bills that received assent of the state government.
Somebody just tell you that ‘I have 20 bills,’ good you have sponsored 20 bills, how many have become law?
What is your relationship with the incoming administration?
Of course, is there any body in Cross River State who does not have a relationship with Prince Otu, he has been a very responsible person and I’ve spent a reasonable time of my life in Calabar, particularly in Calabar South. Right from my diploma days, I’ve been in Calabar South, I’ve been with him for a while and when I identified with my people I had to go back to Ikom.
So I have a relationship with the incoming administration, though not all that robust like some other people have.
When I finally becomes the Speaker, it will not be borne out of nepotism, but to stabilize the polity and because the Prince Otu mantra is centered on equity, I think they are hell bent on spreading it across the state.
Your colleague, Rt. Hon Hilary Bisong, is perceived to be in the race, aren’t you afraid of him?
Why would I be afraid of him. I’m not afraid of anybody, I’m not afraid of Hilary Bisong. You know it’s like somebody that is going to steal from another. What he is doing is alien to that federal constituency. I can back it up with very strong point.
What points are you talking about?
There is never any time in the history of our politics that two things prepresented itself and the Boki man want the two to come to Boki. Beside that, it’s something that the Boki man should be worried about in the sense that Bisong’s personal ambition should not mar the peace we enjoy and that is what is paramount to all of us.
Most right thinking sons and daughters of Boki are on the same page with me, that Bisong’s personal ambition cannot mar the peaceful coexistence of our people.
It is very alien to us and we reject it. Any further aspiration by Bisong, will not be allowed to hold water, because we the Ikom people are playing that motherly role and never has the Boki man taken the Ikom man for granted.
Of course, you know that Boki and Etung were both carved out from Ikom. We used to be one local government and all of them were under Ikom. Later, for expansion, and political gains, Etung and Boki were carved out, but in a situation where the child armtwist the mother in an improper situation, because it should be the willingness of the mother to give, that is what Bisong is trying to do. That we have been very meek, accommodating and played that motherly role does not make us timid. Civility is not timidity. That we have been a very civil people, have done things the way a mother should do to a child, but in a situation where the child begins to batter the mother to get something is an aberration, an abnormal situation.
Can you tell me more about yourself?
I’m Elbert Eyabem, from a very low profile family, my father was in the military, but did not really amount to something big or a big name in the military. My mother is a petty trader, a farmer and an illiterate. I was born into a family of 15, my father was a polygamist and I am the seventh child of my father and the third child of my mother.
What about your academic qualifications?
All of my life I have schooled in my community. For my secondary education, I went to Community Secondary School, Nde, then proceeded to the Federal College of Education, then one or two things cropped up and I left.
I came back and was into commercial cycling; I rode it for quite a while and then proceeded to do some menial jobs, fetching of firewood, sand, gravel. And thereafter went back into commercial biking again in Calabar, doing the cyclist business and also pursuing a diploma programme in policy administration.
Dr. Mrs Itam Abang that is in the Assembly today taught me and Cynthia Nkasi, so two of us that she taught are now in the Assembly with her, you see the irony of life. Thereafter, I decided to seek for admission to study policy and administration again at the University of Calabar, where I graduated.
