By David Ojong
Recent developments in the politics of Ikom has thrown up so many emergency groups agitating for their preferred interests. One of such, is the one headed by one Pastor Tony Bassey, a decampee from the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, who has desperately tried to malign the truth.
It is pertinent at this point to state the facts so that those who are gullible don’t buy the wrong narratives trending in the media space.
The truth is that Akparabong, Olulumo and Ofutop 1 wards are yet to have elected council chairmen, while Olulumo and Ofutop 1 wards once had appointed chief executives with full executive powers to pilot affairs of the local government council, Akparabong had never in the history of the local government area had any opportunity to sit at the helms of affairs of the council secretariat.
In fact, in the archives of Ikom Local Government Area, it is only Akparabong ward that does not have any of it’s sons or daughters’ picture displayed out of the 11 wards.
In the past, the slogan the Akparabong man hear is that, “You people have senator Victor Ndoma-Egba at the Senate, you can’t take the Senate and also take the local government council chairman position. Today Victor Ndoma-Egba is no longer in the Senate, I think it’s high time an Akparabong man is given a chance as far as council chairmanship position is concerned.
In the build up to the 2023 general elections, the All Progressives Congress, APC, Akparabong chapter clearly stated what it wanted, stressing that the chairmanship position was so dear to it, that accounted for the reason why the Akparabong man refused to vie for the Cross River State House of Assembly seat on the platform of ruling All Progressives Congress, APC, notwithstanding the fact that they had many with proven integrity and capacity to vie for the Assembly seat on the platform of the APC, rather its party faithful threw their weight solidly behind Ikom Urban 1 ward to produce Comrade Agbor Bassey.
Unfortunately, the opposition PDP whose way of thinking and ideology did the contrary and decided to pick it’s candidate from Akparabong ward and that’s where the politics of betrayal began. While Akparabong made a bold statement by voting massively for the APC and its candidates – Senator Prince Bassey Otu and Agbor Bassey, the Olulumo and Ofutop APC members, because of the struggle to cling to the chairmanship position voted for the PDP candidates and that scenario led to the emergence of the PDP candidate at the state House of Assembly, leading to loss of the Cross River State House of Assembly seat by the APC.
It’s rather shocking to hear people begin to complain about Akparabong having an Assembly member from the PDP who they voted into power, even when Akparabong voted against him.
At this point, should we reward political betrayal? What if our amiable governor, Senator Prince Bassey Otu, needed those two wards to cling to power in the last general elections, would he have become the state governor today? Would we be talking about chairmanship elections in the APC today? The answer is No!
It is instructive to note that most, if not all, the aspirants from Olulumo and Ofutop 1 wards are people who were in the PDP and worked against the APC in the 2023 election, and only came to APC after the Supreme Court ruling against their candidate.
One begins to wonder, if their candidate had succeeded in the court of law, would they be here today in the APC or would they have contested under the PDP? These are questions that are still begging for answers.
About appointments, let’s not dwell on that as it’s at the discretion of the state chief executive to appoints whoever he chooses to appoint, so long as he finds the fellow worthy to drive his policies and programmes.
What we need now as Ikom people is one with the wealth of experience from any of the three wards, one who can connect with the state and work in tandem with the governor’s ‘People First Agenda’ to attract development to Ikom and not to allow any ethnic bigot with a selfish intention to serve his community alone mount the saddle so that we don’t regret at the end of the day.
What Ikom people need at the moment, is one with robust capacity to expand the fast growing town to decongest the city centre and not an ethnic jingoist, whose major pre-occupation would be to use the resources of the people to foster the selfish agenda of his immediate community.
It would be wise for Akparabong, Olulumo and Ofutop to see the need to present their best brains and allow the people of Ikom to elect whoever they think have capacity to lead the local government area to witness a turnaround.
