Dakkada Nigeria

Orange is the official colour of Akwa Ibom State and a revolution appears on. Her “Orange Revolution”, however, isn’t exactly the kind that gripped Ukraine, between November 22, 2004 and January 23, 2005. A leader was not wanted in Kyiv. The grim will of the people, powered the preferred into office. Ukrainians appear a resolute bunch, but the comedian leading them, is too blinded by adulation, to see that it is home that is being destroyed. I digress.

I was in Akwa-Ibom and saw wonderment. Daddy G.O says if you what to understand a thing better, just look at the opposite. On 23rd September, 1987, military President, Ibrahim Babangida created Akwa Ibom and Katsina States. Let’s call them twins, in the mould of Esau and Jacob. Here, Katsina, the original Power State of Nigeria, is Esau, by a fraction of breath.

Celebrated novelist, Charles Dickens, is mostly remembered for his 1859 historical novel, A Tale of Two Cities, which is mainly about the French Doctor Manette, his 18-year-long imprisonment in the Bastille in Paris, and his release to live in London with his daughter Lucie whom he had never met and the conditions that led up to the French Revolution. But most people didn’t know him, a journalist and publisher; of a 24-page weekly “Household Words” dispatch. In a particular edition in 1854, on available indices, he predicted the future prosperity and problems of Britain and America. 175 years after, his journalistic writings have become prophesy-fulfilled.

I have not been to Katsina but the State has been speaking its state. After producing Presidents and powerful Army Generals, it is now practically under the curse of time. The other day, the Governor completely killed hope, when he asked his subjects, to take over the responsibility of the state, to live. I saw Akwa Ibom, but didn’t die, though his twin up North, will likely want to die, to be in the place of Udom Emmanuel’s peaceful mini-Kyoto, the Japanese city, arguably considered the world’s most beautiful.

From the airport, the road network is great, connecting town after town. I can’t remember being driven on a kilometre of rough road. The smoothness of those roads, will shame road projects in states I don’t want to mention that I have been to. A state, once administered by the one with native cap that resembles that of a Celestial leader, should be weeping, at the sight of roads outside Uyo, the state capital. And Akwa Ibom is still constructing!

Even the current airport the State is about dumping for a more-ambitious one, under construction and reputed to be one of its kind in Africa, is still, by a wide margin, better in all departments; aesthetic, efficiency, functionality, service delivery and neatness–the overreaching DNA, defining the state like a Telco advert; everywhere you go–than what you get in airports of most States in Nigeria. When the project, projected to be one of its kind in Africa, is delivered next year, as planned, hopefully by Udom who dreamt it into reality, to avoid transitional delay, maybe those running the antiquity assemblage in Ibadan, can retrofit it with the one Akwa Ibom is consigning to her enviable history.

From the impressive St. Gabriel Coconut Oil Refinery, where one of the purest and safest edible oil is oozing, and its state-wide prosperity capacity, to the under-construction stunning Worship Centre, to the Vegetable Green House along Airport Road, to the General Hospital and the architectural wonder 21-storey Dakkada Tower, among others, the central theme is class and quality; in design, in execution.

Is Akwa Ibom now a mini-London. Far from it. But Yoruba will say, bomo eni ba dara kawi (good is good, regardless of the doer). Akwa-Ibom is currently working and kudos must be given those running her administrative engine. One

business opportunity I feel the State isn’t exploring is leveraging on the massive raffia plantation in Ikot-Ekpene, to mass-produce wigs for Nigerian lawyers and judges and even export. The ‘cane’ is the most important raw material for the wig.

Now that the governor has also provided a befitting Tower for oil companies to relocate their head offices to where they make their humongous wealth, he would have to stop being a gentleman with the recalcitrant ones. Of course, the tax matter will matter and except he adopts a bit of Nyesom Wike’s rough tactics, they are likely to keep playing him for a sucker. There is also this talk about him being over-frugal. Well, I see some positives in being parsimonious with people’s money. Credible bankers of old are of that mould. They pinch money before they spend. If Udom isn’t wasteful with the commonwealth he holds in trust for his people, he should be applauded. There isn’t also any public accusation he is stuffing the stuff in his trouser’s inner pocket. I feel he remains a good news for state and country.

Does that make him the saint-patron of public service and governance in Nigeria? I will wait till the end of his tenure to answer this. But my Yoruba stock has a way, of at least, giving due where and when it is due, with “eni se obe aidun, e ni ki ebora pa” (if you are angling to hang the one who did the job, maybe not satisfactorily, what about the indolent who folded his hands).

The sad part of the current reality of the wise-saying, is that those who are not cooking the soup for their people, are loading the ingredients in their bulging cheeks and midriff.  Someday, they will vomit.

Unlike Katsina, Akwa-Ibom is yet to produce the President of Nigeria though both Emmanuel and his estranged “helper”, Godswill Akpabio are in the race, but it appears God has been specially kind to the state on leadership. Say what you may about the two before Emmanuel, they weren’t less in classy projects.

The issue in-between, is accountability. In that regard, Akpabio, is lowly rated.

But give vision to the trio, give top-notch delivery to them.

Years back, I visited Calabar. The beauty of the street, was overwhelming. Learnt things depreciated under the bombastic Professor-Governor. Uyo is gripping. The Victor Attah International Airport is welcoming. But home is home. While exiting the State, I asked someone the meaning of Dakkada, littering projects everywhere. Learnt it is Ibibio word for “Arise”If that clarion call has worked renaissance for Akwa Ibom, may Nigeria, should just adopt it. Maybe, it will rouse this snoring giant. Just maybe.

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