BY DOMINIC KIDZU
Paul Obi, a renowned journalist and scholar, published an article last week in ThisDay newspapers titled “Cross River, Otu and the Crisis of Governance” in which he subtly tried to suggest that the infrastructure development going on in Cross River falls short of the volume of allocation coming into the state. He did not point out the amount that the state receives – month on month, and the cost of running government and the various on-going projects in the area.
This is not the first time that Paul Obi is showing keen interest in what is happening in the state or interrogating its governors on their performance at the office, only this time he has been a trifle unfair to Governor Bassey Otu in his overall assessment of his early performance. It is important for the critic, however committed to the course, to display total absence of malice against, or unfairness to the subject or target of their work as knight in shining armour vanguarding to right the wrongs in the society.
At the end of reading the well-worded piece one comes away with a fragile statement of claim. Is Obi saying that Governor Otu is not doing enough in the area of infrastructure development or that he is doing so but mostly in the southern part of the state? Unfortunately, Obi seems to be not too sure of what he means to communicate to his readers. The truth is that Governor Bassey Otu has done very well, so far, in the eyes of those who objectively review his work in the last nearly three years, given the chaos and miasma he met on ground. And this is not a rogue flagellation of his predecessor, since history will yet allot suitable chapters to all those who strut its stage as leaders.
Very often development is assessed only in terms of cement, sand and mortar, yet there is so much more that can be done to elevate the universal human condition beyond what cement, sand and mortar can achieve. Does Obi not know that there had been a blanket ban on employment in the state for two and a half solid decades before Governor Otu sat with his back to the coat of arms? Does Obi not know that every year the colleges and universities have continued to churn out thousands of Cross River youths with no hope of securing employment anywhere?
In the nearly three years of Governor Otu’s work that Obi has subjected to review more than 5,000 of these hopeless young people have been employed either by the state civil service commission or the local government service commission. A committee has just been set up to review the Iimproprieties noticed in the recruitment into the local government service. Governor Otu has also paid out ten billion naira in gratuities to pensioners who retired between 2009 to 2015 and is at the point of releasing more funds to cover gratuities from 2016 to date. This does not tell the story of crisis, it is rather an ode to responsibility to the people.
Thank God for small mercies that Obi himself pointed out Governor Otu’s strategic struggle to reclaim the state’s litoral status and substantial oil revenues that we have been denied as a result of institutional connivance and swash-buckling aggrandizement from our neighbour state. This is strategic planning and astute leadership. This is what can release the revenues we need for the grand development we hunger for. And this is the complete antithesis of Paul Obi’s phantom “Crisis of Governance.”
Some of the bad roads keeping Obi awake at night are actually federal roads, some of which have been awarded, but being delayed because of the inoperable budget saga. Governor Otu is building roads in all zones of the state, not only in the South.
In the Northern flank of the state, for instance, the Wanokom/Wanihem/Wanikade road, the communities can now heave a sigh of relief owing to the connectivity that has fostered an embrace among them, following a major road infrastructure constructed by Governor Otu’s administration.
Similar road projects could be found in the Central including Boki and Ikom. Ogoja has been given an urban face-lift, with vast network of roads criss-crossing the entire landscape. The score card is near endless, not being a government official, I am unable to reel out the full compendium thereof. My response is only a knee jerk reaction from a private citizen who is also interested in holding government officials to account, but fairly. Governor Otu is doing very well so far, let’s give him a fair shakes at the ice shop. ‘Prophetically’ he still has five years down the road and I am quite confident that at the end of his reign Cross River State will be singing a new song, a sweet song.
Dominic Kidzu writes from Bunyia Irruan, in Boki, CRS.