I was forced out of PDP – Otu Ita Toyo

Otu Ita Toyo

Former Akwa Ibom State Chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Arc. Otu Ita Toyo recently defected to the All Progressives Congress (APC). In this interview on Planet FM, the man popularly known as ‘Total Chair’ bared his mind on several important political issues. www.connoisseurng.blogspot.com brings you Excerpts:

Last Friday, you defected from PDP to APC. How was it?

A dramatic day I tell you. I don’t even consider the business of producing governor Akpabio as the highlight in my career as a party administrator. I think that belongs to the business of bringing back PDP into shape. By the time I came into the PDP it was in complete shreds. Everybody was fighting against each other. There was Abuja front, there was Uyo front. I think the most enduring legacy I want to be remembered for is bringing back that family into one big moving ship which every family in Akwa Ibom State belonged to. It was a party like no other, a party which every member had a sense of belonging and beyond that had a say in what affected him or her.

After uniting the party, you decided to abandon it. Why?

I had to; otherwise the ship will sink with quality people. Let me tell you something unique about my PDP. That was the PDP in which the membership of the party contributed money to run the party. It was not funded by government. 

And that never happened hitherto?

Don’t forget, our governor at the time had different ideas about what the party should do. He had the right to have different ideas. And so did every other member of the party who also had a right to have different ideas. And luckily for us, we had a governor who was a democrat, a very educated and much more importantly, a very cultured and well-bred man. Obong Attah decided to use the instruments open to him as a party leader and governor and then tried to get the party to bend to his will. He never did anything untoward. He just used his very acute, cerebral talent and he met his match in the party that was run by me at that time. So, there was this very interesting play and the governor didn’t do anything other than bend to the will of the party which is what a governor should do. He never tried to control the party. He just said okay you want to do it your way, do it your way. And we went on and did it our way and the gentleman, Godswill Akpabio emerged much to the disagreement of the then governor. I wonder what would have happened 8 years after. So that is why when we build this and handed it over to our governor, Godswill Akpabio, the greatest beneficiary of party supremacy, party efficiency, and party inclusiveness, he is the greatest beneficiary in the history of PDP. What did we do, what did we have? He ran an administration which creatively pocketed the party, put it in one of his friends or cousin’s house and that is where decisions were being made for the party. That we talked about for over 8 years, we tried to change it, we did everything but as you know the rest is history now. Take for instance the last election, from Councillor to Chairmen, to ward officials, to governorship was decided in one small room. When we were in charge of the PDP there were ward congresses, there were local government congresses, and the results were seen by everybody. That is why we had 58 aspirants for the post of governor and when we declared our results there was not a whimper. Nobody went to court, nobody challenged it because it was clear as this glass we are looking at now. 

What is fundamentally wrong with the PDP that you had to leave the party?

There is nothing wrong with the PDP. There is everything wrong with the people who hijacked the PDP, pocketed the party and then recreated it in their own skewed image.

But they were still members of the party as at when you were state chairman and these are still Akwa Ibomites. Or is there any external influences?

There are no external influences in Akwa Ibom PDP. And now let me also tell you something else. There is a distinct difference in the Akwa Ibom local politics and external politics. It was the intransigence of these people and the insensitivity to the ordinary people of the state. We didn’t bring you to power to go and build estates, stay in one room and drink choice brandy. As I was driving to this place today (Planet FM studio), I used to think Oron was bad and as someone said the other day that Oron is the only place (the biblical) Adam would recognize if he comes back to earth. I now see that there are other places old Adam would recognize. The whole of Uruan, from here to Uyo there is no new roof and that is a state that had had N4trillion fed into it. N4trillion to fund lifestyles, is to have Julius Berger build houses for you or is to make the small child in Uruan have opportunity like my father did in the colonial days to become a lawyer from the London School of Economics, coming from my downtrodden village, that N4trillion was for that boy, it was not for some greedy cabal to use and build estates in Lagos, Abuja, buy houses in Dubai, invest in the West Indies, and do something in Ghana. I mean for Christ’s sake there is a limit to that type of insensitivity and we must bring it to a stop otherwise your child (if you are an Akwa Ibom child) has no future. All their children are abroad, where is your own child? This is the kind of thing we are talking about. If their child could be abroad, yours should have a good secondary school here to attend. Where is that secondary school?

How did this cabal in the PDP come about? What is oiling its machinations?

The cabal started in the post-Attah PDP. And cabal simply means a group of people who seize the instrument of authority, seize the instrument of cohesion and then deal with people in a manner that is completely and totally insensitive and undemocratic.

In what ways are their actions demonstrated?

Let me give you an example. I’m a former state chairman of the PDP. I don’t know when the PDP held its nomination. I don’t know when it held ward congress, I don’t know when it held Local Government congress but I know that people have been put in the House of Assembly...

...could it be that you have not been attending meetings?

I don’t know but I know that if meetings are held at all....let me tell you the difference between meetings. Meetings of calling people who are deprived and hoping that something would come out of the meeting, putting them together, giving them N200,000 . Udoedehe said N3million, I don’t know where he got that from. Maybe he had another set of meetings, because usually nothing more than N200k is given to the caucus for transport and I think it is even a reasonable thing given the amount of trillions people have pocketed. You sit there, after you have been lectured, somebody then attaches the attendance register to communiqué and that’s it. I mean there was a limit to that kind of thing. The line had to be drawn. It is not correct that people did not speak against it. I did, definitively. I did in private, I did in public, I shouted myself hoarse. A dog that wants to get lost would never hear the master’s whistle. 

Are the Akwa Ibom people aware of this cabal you are trying to talk about?

I’m not a man who beats about the bush. If they say they are not aware, it is a very pitiful thing indeed. If they say they do not know what I was in 2007 and where I am now, compared to where they were in 2007 and where they are now and they look at it and say to themselves my goodness, we have done well, thank God for these leaders who have brought us to this past, if they say they don’t know it and they don’t see the difference between their lives and those who have run them aground then there is very little hope for Akwa Ibom people which is why we say no, we must stand up and tell them exactly what we have to do. It is the duty of the Akwa Ibom person to put these things in check not just a few individuals...the culture has grown in the last 8 years that you must belong, you must show loyalty. Loyalty means being idiotic, being stupid, not asking questions, taking hook, line and sinker what the master says. This is what they have done to Akwa Ibom people. Look at the youths, read the internet, the social media, every youth who writes in the social media, almost everyone of them has copied them and you talk they insult you rather than put forth their own ideas. All they know is insult. Why wouldn’t they insult people? I mean we’ve have insulted people like Obong Attah, we’ve insulted Uffot Ekaete, we’ve insulted Don Etiebet. When your mentor insults people you can’t do anything else but insult. So we must take our state back and begin to teach our children a culture of hard work, of the things that make people respect us, of honesty. Not going to build houses that you cannot afford and do things in a very brazen way against the interest of the people of the state. 

Doing this means moving from PDP to APC?

No, it is by reenergizing the PDP. But this gang has monopolized the instrument of change within the PDP and never let it work. This is how/why our governor emerged. The gentleman was brought from Lagos, green to politics, he is a nice man. He was put in one room they called him SSG, the next thing they just promoted him to governor and then they all surrounded him. So a man with the background of our governor, a man with a corporate background where things are done in proper ways, where laws are respected is now cowed by people who don’t have respect for rules and laws.

Now that you are in the APC, what’s the attraction?

It is difficult for me to talk about the APC. I heard the promo (of the interview) which described me as now a big whatever in the APC. I’m not a big anything in the APC. I joined the APC a week ago. So I’m just an ordinary member who joined the Party but I joined it for a reason. I joined it because the APC has luckily for us given an alternate platform for alternate ideas about how to rule Akwa Ibom can flourish. Luckily for us, the entire country is also experimenting on alternate platforms. So that is what APC represents to me, an alternate platform away from people who have muscularized the PDP and put it in their pockets and don’t let any other person talk. It is either things that would bring money to their back pocket or nothing. 

Is APC now the platform for all sorts of Akwa Ibom to join and rescue the state which has been held spell-bound according to you?

It is an intelligent thing to do in the emerging Nigeria. You can see where the drift is going. And we cannot afford to play the politics of the last 8 years where only man flew the flag of Akwa Ibom State nationally. See where it has led us, you take off that voice and Akwa Ibom is dead-silent. There is no other person. So now let’s prepare ourselves to go into where the cacophony of noise is taking place nationally and then also be fellow players. We now have people moving into the APC. We have a Minister who perhaps is one of the best in the country; we have Ita Enang who is the most experienced political electoral man in the country. We are beginning to showcase them under the platform of the APC. And when I went into the APC I wondered who is back there in the PDP. Everybody I knew who contributed to the big party called the PDP is now in the APC. I don’t think it was by choice. They were forced out as indeed I was because I waited and waited and waited and hoped that my former party will change. Let’s put it bluntly, there is nobody who is anybody in the APC in Akwa Ibom who was not a PDP member. Why did they all leave?

That is why people are saying they are not angels

You must make a distinction from members who members of the party and were not given a platform to express or even influence the party. There are people who held the party captive and then led it down this part to perdition. So when I say everybody who was in PDP is now in APC, it is a clear indictment of those who held PDP captive. The PDP was a big movement in Akwa Ibom State. I know because I was one of those who tried and made it so. But from the moment we stepped out, this people just saw PDP as a cow which has to be milked to death. 

Don’t you think it is risky for the APC to open the door so wide for all and sundry just because they want to receive all and gain population so as to fight the PDP? You are also allowing all sorts of persons, corrupt, clean, dubious into the APC which in time will also be the seed of destruction.

There of course is that risk. I admit it but as our people say ‘yak ebine akukwo ndien editwak unen idiok ukot isang’. First you must get them into a position of decision making and then you can judge them. You cannot begin now and say we have thieves, rogues and even Reverend Fathers and then it will self-destruct. Nobody gave the APC a change two years ago. The PDP was entrenched for 16 years and it is amazing how the party disintegrated. The only reason it disintegrated was that the leadership was completely divorced from the membership of the party and that membership is still aggrieved till today because you cannot undo the evils you have done in 16 years under just few months. That is the difficulty of the PDP. And worse still, they have refused to even accept that they were doing wrong. 

You said the PDP is heading into perdition. Is there no hope of redemption?

Of course there is. 

Why didn’t you believe in that instead of leaving?

If the gangsters would just move aside. It is like a murderer who has noticed that there are three witnesses, and he is condemned to killing those three witnesses in order to hide the initial murder. So PDP is in that kind of situation. Who is the National Chairman of the PDP today? Is it Gulak? Is it Secondus? Who is their spokesman? It is Olisa? Who in PDP is in charge? Today somebody says people should go and answer to what they did, tomorrow they say PDP did not make any statement, that man is expressing his own self. Have you been noticing that? That is the problem of my former party. Sadly, it is going to increase except God intervenes. God has always intervened. If you recall that when I came in there was that kind of intervention. The PDP was in deep trouble and God always brings somebody to help. If the PDP does not wake it does not matter, but if it does it is good for Nigeria because Nigeria needs a credible opposition. Not an opposition by ruffians who talk about every and any thing. We want opposition like Chief Obafemi Awolowo and Ebenezar Babatope. 

Do you see the APC maintaining this lead, post 2019?

I am not a prophet. If the APC does not do well for the Nigerian people, they should in fact be voted out. It is time for the Nigerian people to stand up and know who is on their side. That is why I’m asking Akwa Ibom people to do this same thing. Know those who have cheated you in the last 8 years and don’t vote them back into power if you have the chance. And the same goes to any other political party. So the APC must work very hard.

If you say so, then some people would say the gubernatorial candidate of APC, Umana Okon Umana was in government in the past 7 years, why vote him now?

The truth is that it is not all that glitters that is gold. It is not everybody that was in the PDP who was a gangster. I can tell you something about Umana. I didn’t even want to talk about him but I should. I knew Umana as a young man in SPC in Calabar. Smart guy, first class boy. We were much more senior than they were. He led his class throughout. He went into Unical, led his class throughout. He graduated as the best student in his department/faculty. He came into his chosen profession and rose to the top. If you know him like everybody does, he is not a man given to too many words. And he has done everything he has touched excellently. I nominated Obong Umana Okon Umana to Godswill Akpabio to become Secretary to government because Godswill offered that position to me. I said no, I don’t want that position, we need people who know this job. I told Godswill, I have never worked in government and we have just taken over from Obong Attah and Obong Attah is a great guy, a thinker, so we can’t afford to fall below the standard he has set. So, let us put the right people in the right place. I persuaded Godswill to come let’s go to Umana that I will not be the Secretary to government. For over two weeks Godswill and I went back and forth and I said I won’t take it. He asked what do you want? I said I want to be National Vice Chairman of the PDP which was open to Akwa Ibom. That is a different story. Godswill’s own ways are amazing ways. But let’s concentrate on Umana. We went to Umana and the gentleman said he doesn’t quite like politics. Being trust into that position bothers him a bit, that he would rather not take it. 

But he served in Attah’s government as Commissioner for Finance. Is that not being in politics? I guess he was already in politics.

In that case every human being is in politics. He was not an active politician. He was a technocrat. He sympathies for us, that is why I nominated him in the first place. Oh, you need to know a man like Obong Attah. That is a first class man. Commissioners in his government went to him and said they don’t support his candidate, he didn’t do anything. He just laughed and said no problem, just go and try your luck but I’m going to beat you anyway. Obong Umana was in support of Godswill Akpabio and he was in government, Attah didn’t hound him, he didn’t shut down his house, he didn’t do anything. Can you imagine a commissioner in the last government or perhaps this one who says I don’t support Udom Emmanuel? Oh my goodness, the man had better packed his bags. That’s the time of government we want to go back to; where there was tolerance, where there was intellectualism, where there was capacity, not the government of mediocrity. All of us must be held responsible for PDP’s mishap because we were members of the PDP. Yes, but that is where it stops. The buck stops at the table of the man who ran the party and the government. It cannot be any person else. It cannot be Umana’s fault.

Commissioner for Commerce, Trade and Investment, Barr Emmanuel Enoidem said you and others who recently defected from PDP to APC cannot win election in your unit, hence the PDP is not missing you guys. How do you react to that?

I would think Enoidem is being true-to-type. As a matter of fact he is part of the cabal now but if you recall he was against Godswill Akpabio in the whole exercise. After that, it was I again who took him to Godswill and said this guy works hard, it doesn’t matter that he opposed you. Take him in, make him a commissioner. Godswill said over his dead boy he can’t do that. And I said well, you will soon hear from me. I was Total Chair. Wasn’t I? I went and I put it down in writing that Enoidem is the nominee of the party into your government. And while I was chairman the party held sway. Let’s not bother about Enoidem. A man who comes and tells you that people who built the party for him to enjoy are now useless; that is just an indictment on themselves. Can you imagine that people who ran the PDP, all of us who made Godswill Akpabio governor in 2007 are now retired and useless? What does that tell you about them? I am very glad he made the statement. It is a self indicting statement. It shows why he betrayed Don Etiebet who brought him into Attah’s government; why he betrayed Attah and went into Akpabio’s government and why he would betray Akpabio and betray Udom and come back to the next government. Just watch it. I can tell you that. 

Why didn’t you follow Umana and decamp in 2014?

Because I still believed in the PDP. I believed in PDP until one week ago. I wasn’t in any illusion that PDP would win. I knew they would lose but I was prepared again to sit back and build that party because it had potentials. I still have a feeling that the APC don’t have what the PDP has. The PDP has recognition, it has loyalty. It is people who ran the PDP who messed up the party. The moment they are thrown out or they step aside you will see the PDP step up again. 

It is believed that our politicians are fair-weathered politicians. They don’t believe in party ideologies but are only willing to seek their selfish interest in the ruling party. Is this right political culture we should imbibe?

You don’t talk about political culture when you have no discipline. Now, let me ask you which politician (in Akwa Ibom) do you have admired for his political stand? Or which politician do you admire for saying the truth and can tell it anywhere? It is not possible for you to identify them. First of all, those in power, those who should have the primary responsibility of building that platform on truth are just gamblers. They don’t believe in these things. If they believe the ordinary child in Akwa Ibom today would have a very good school to go to after N4trillion. When you talk about the political person being fair weather it is first in terms of creativity by leadership. If you are a leader and the first thing you do is to come and go to your village and build one big house, put swimming pool, put everything, and you are not yet six months in office. Where is this ideology? People like Fidel Castro led by example.

99% of the populace look up to the 1% who are politicians. They talk about them day-in day-out. What is the way out?

A populace which is largely untrained, a precipitate population which has been cheated so much that the average 25 year old today cannot think. All they do is to look for where to survive. And because of the mismanagement of the economy, there is no way that man can even showcase his talent. The only thing a boy today of 18 to 35 does is to look for a politician who does not depend on his or her salary but takes something on side. I will tell you what a senior person in government told me when I challenged him on something. He said if you want to be a leader, you should be a leader like (he mentioned somebody) who feeds like 10,000 young people. That is a leader, you shouldn’t come here and criticize me. I said to him I don’t even want to feed even one person. I want every Akwa Ibomite to be able to feed himself or herself. Politics is geared at making people dependent on others. That is what we must stop. That is why I’m in the APC because it has some good understanding of politics. It is not yet ideological but it is better than the PDP in terms of its positioning. I’m not yet in the APC with any strength. I’m just a member. Nobody should come here and tell me I’m a big man in APC. I was a big man in PDP because I contributed to building that party.

How do we change the situation?

Young people should look at things through the prism of productivity and honesty, and not on the prism of what do I take, what will go into my back pocket. 

You said it is the fault of the youth

It is the fault of everybody, particularly the youth in terms of the fact that they have abdicated the traditional role of young people to ask questions. The young people of today don’t ask questions. If you look at, for instance, National Association of Nigerian Students, that is a joke compared to what they were when we were younger. What does a student need a jeep for? What does a student need to dress up like a filmstar for? What does a President of NANS need money in his back pocket to be giving out to other people who are shouting Presido, preside? This is the position we’ve found ourselves but you cannot even blame them. The people they are copying are those who are supposed to be the mentors. They are supposed to be role models. 

Do you think we have mentorship in politics?

We do. We have people like Atuekong Etiebet. We have people like Obong Attah. We have people like Uffot Ekaete. If you are a young man and you want to learn you can go there. That is where we went. You have people like me. I have learnt a lot, I can impart. I don’t have deep pockets. Young people want people with deep pockets where they go and do all sorts of irrelevant things. They don’t want to develop their brains. They don’t want to develop their character. Character is everything.  Character tells you don’t take this money. It belongs to the state. So when a man comes and say people who put him in power are irrelevant you must question his character. 

You are from Oron ethnic group, and from Eket Senatorial District. Judging from the federal constituencies townhall meeting of the last administration, it was decided that governorship should go to Eket Senatorial District. You are now a beneficiary. But you are now canvassing for Umana who is from Uyo Senatorial District. What do you think you are doing for your Senatorial District?

Absolutely nothing. I’m trying to save it from itself. I’m trying to save it and this state from perdition. The business of running a state of different/diverse people is an art and that art was recognized at the beginning by the paramount rulers of this state when in 1987 they came together and swore and anointed this state as standing on a tripod. And the three legs of that tripod were the major linguistic groups of the state. The Ibibio, the Annang, and the Oro. That was not also saying that there were no other linguistic groups. It was acknowledged in their postulations. And they insisted that for this state to run in unity and to do well, things must be shared in this state naturally using the tripod. And eventually, when it goes round we sit down and reassess it. That is how is started right from Akpan Isemin’s time. The moment party politics came into the state, it went to the largest  ethnic (the Akpan, the Ibibios). Unfortunately, Obong Akpan Isemin didn’t last his term. When it came back, at that time people like Don Etiebet, an Annang man was holding sway in this state. Don could take anybody, he could take a student who is 35 years old and make him a governor. He could do that at that time. But good sense prevailed. Don Etiebet went back to the original agreement and then brought Obong Attah to complete the session of the Ibibios and that was done beautifully. The post of governorship would always have gone to the Ibibio, Annang or Oro. And the post of the Deputy Governor will go to one or the other, and the post of Speaker and Chairman of the ruling party will go the other. Then all other positions are also shared in quantum of the population in consideration of all other linguistic groups. 

But what is constitutional is sharing based on senatorial district not on ethnic group

Sharing positions based on senatorial Districts is 419. It came from the brain system of people who were completely determined to deceive the people. Let’s take it one after the other. The Nigerian constitution has not in any way (when it is talking of federal character) talked about the senatorial districts as units for balance. 

It wasn’t from the Nigerian constitution. It was from the Akwa Ibom PDP

The constitution of the PDP even goes further. It states that in achieving balance linguistic groups must be given priority. That is the PDP constitution. It never even mentioned senatorial districts. If you look at what is happening across the country, everywhere there is shift it is to linguistic group. If you go to Ogun State, it is either the Egba, or the Ijebus or any other linguistic group.

Is it not justice that a man from Onna is governor?

Leave this man (Udom) alone. I’m in sympathy with him, really. Because actually he is not the issue. The issue is that there was a system on ground and it was going to a point where we could recalibrate and then this gentleman (Godswill Akpabio) just comes in his typical style and destroys the rhythm that brought peace and harmony to the entire state. Let us even face it, if you go to Eket Senatorial District and you want to take a governor in fairness would you go to Onna? Onna has had a governor before. So, it would not even be a man from Onna. And when you talk of Senatorial District, to show that that was a fraudulent act, you can see that the PDP under Godswill Akpabio did not even follow that senatorial thing because if you had a governor from Eket Senatorial District, the deputy governor should have come from Uyo Senatorial District. But, they took the governor from Eket Senatorial District because of senatorial district, then why don’t you take the governor from Uyo Senatorial District? They said, no no no, Uyo will be Ibibio. Why do you introduce the ethnic element? Why don’t you stick to senatorial element? These are the thing? And then they come and they go around and they say that they are doing townhall meeting and that crap. Let me tell you, you did not need townhall meeting in Akwa Ibom State to know where the next governor was going. Every honest man knew that the next governor was going to come from Oron. Necessarily because Oron was good or bad, it was our own attempt at confidence-building. And every honest Akwa Ibomite will tell you today that that was what it was. 

If the PDP were wrong about that, why did the APC not chose their gubernatorial candidate from Oron?

APC just came two years ago. They are struggling to find their feet. You can even see the dilemma of the APC. They were sitting there until the PDP swamped them and took over the place. So, really you can’t blame the APC for anything. If you are talking about APC, you will look at them as saviours of the state because they have come back and re-entrenched confidence. See what they are doing. They are trying to make sure everybody has a sense of belonging. My brother, if you want to go to Oron and see what Godswill Akpabio did to my people, a once proud and very progressive set of people. Go and see what 8 years of complete, total neglect has done to them.

Don’t you think the Udom administration is trying to address that?

I wish Udom luck. I’m sure he is a nice, kind-hearted man. I also wish he could go and sleep in Oro for one day. That is all I wish him.

The immediate past MD of NDDC who is from Eket Senatorial District was sacked just before Christmas. What is your opinion on that?

It is an unfortunate situation. The last has not been heard of that yet because from the way I see it, the lady in charge may have had a particular reason for having been put there. Because there instability at this moment but that has not impugned on the remaining two years of Akwa Ibom State and I’m sure the APC would correct that in time. I mean, these things happen. When Udom came in, he was advised by this same people to dissolve all boards and he did. He dissolved even statutory boards. Anybody from a statutory board who goes to court now will get action against the governor and win. But the poor chap was deceived that because you are the governor you can sack anybody. Even Buhari hasn’t sacked statutory  boards. Senator Emmanuel Ibokessien who goes around with Governor Udom is in a statutory board and he is still there. When you are in a statutory board you remain there until your tenure expires. But they didn’t tell this young man this. He came from the bank and they all swamped him. They don’t tell him the real story and the young people of the state don’t know the real story. 

What would you remember Godswill Akpabio for?

Godswill Akpabio was not an accident. He is a product of a well-organized election exercise. Right from the Ward level to the gubernatorial level. Every Akwa Ibomite who was there in 2007 would tell you that that was the truth. Godswill won and he went on to win more than 90% of the popular votes in the general election. He was not an accident. It is not something to regret his victory. What I am regretting is that he just misdirected himself in his focus. He left his primary focus which is the ordinary person, that woman in the market, her child, and then built road to Essien Udim. That is not what we came here for. 

Thanks for coming to our studio for the interview

Thank you very much. Before I leave let me leave a word for the Commissioner of Police. I lost my brother Okpo Ekere to violence, we lost to Oyong Asuquo to some unknown circumstances, we lost Okon Uwah to violence, we lost Paul Inyang to violence, we lost many people. And I’m telling you my Commissioner, violence is beginning to rear its head again in the politics of this state by some young people who say they are in power. I want you to look at it. This is in time I’m giving this warning. If you go to Oron now, you will see some people, some of them are in government, they are busy whipping up ‘Nnabo’, whipping up ‘Ekpu’ all in preparation for the next election. My Commissioner sir, please whatever you do, first ensure that those who killed Okpo Ekere (I hear two of them are in your custody) are brought to justice. And those who killed Okon Uwah with over 50 witnesses are brought to justice. Please do that for us, and make sure that the coming election is policed properly so that the will of the people (not just those who carry boxes and run because they have guns to shoot) prevails in Akwa Ibom. And I want Akwa Ibom people to have a glorious future.