AKWA IBOM 2015: Akpabio Earmarks N1B To Pave Way For Anointed Candidate In Face Of Growing Opposition Against Imposition

Akwa Ibom State governor, Godswill Akpabio is said to have earmarked about 1b naira to see through the mission of imposing the current Secretary to the State Government, Mr Emmanuel Udom as the next governor of the oil rich state.

According to an full page advertorial in the April 17, 2014 edition of The Nation newspaper, in the fall-out of the unmitigated failure of the governor’s town hall meeting in the state, he has decided to spend as much as 1b on the do or die project of forcing Udom on the people of the state who seem to have rejected the attempt to impose him.

The Advertorial, placed by the Save Akwa Ibom Initiative stated: “At an enlarged stakeholders meeting convened by former Senator of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, Senator Effiong Bob in his country home, Ikot Akpan Abia, Uyo last week, Saturday April 12, 2014, Akapabio’s Town Hall Meeting was dismissed as a charade and a ploy to deceive Akwa Ibom people. A consensus was also reached that the issue of who succeeds Governor Akpabio should be left to Akwa Ibom people to decide”

It went further to say that: “ A congregation of senior citizens of the state including the three serving senators of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, Senator Hellen Ita Enang, Senator Alloysius Etuk, Her Excellency, Senator Hellen Esuene also met at Amazing Grace Centre, Obia Imo Street on Monday April 15, 2014 to denounce zoning as ill conceived, self-interested and self-serving. They applauded the national leadership of the party’s call for open primaries and rejection of godfatherism

”The group thereafter went ahead to allege that the governor “is even planning to hugely induce the party to toe his line upon his return to the state

” It is however not clear how well this will work out for the governor and the candidate that he plans to impose on the people’