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On June 13, 2023, 15 days after being handed the mantle of Akwa Ibom leadership, Governor Umo Bassey Eno, who then was of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, initiated an apparently new political culture, one that appears to be aimed at putting a lie to Prof Emmanuel Ayandele’s most quoted words that the entity formerly called South-Eastern State is “an atomistic society perpetually at war with itself.” With his ever glittering look and the act of being the face behind the movement for cultural shift, Eno was the cynosure of all eyes at the reception in Abuja held in honour of Senator Godswill Akpabio, who, on the platform of the All Progressives Congress, APC, had emerged the president of the Nigerian Senate some hours earlier.
From his actions that day and the following days till the time of writing this piece, Eno could be said to have fully grasped the point that before a new trend could turn to tradition, it needs constant and fervent grooming for its acclimatization in an environment. Being a proponent of the new political life, he did not stop at Akpabio’s end in Abuja that Tuesday. He keeps doing it.
Regarding another reach out, precisely on September 25, 2024, what this writer stated in a column in The Guardian of October 16, 2024, is worth repeating here: “The celebration of Chief Don Etiebet by the Petroleum Club, Lagos, was the last public event attended by Governor Umo Eno before death came to his doorstep and snatched his beloved wife from the firm grip of his loving hands. It appears that the deceased was already on a sick bed before her husband took a trip to join a section of Nigeria’s business moguls in honouring the octogenarian elder statesman.
“The invaluable cost borne by the governor should not be estimated by the air trip from Akwa Ibom to Lagos or the hectic vehicular movement he embarked on from the airport in Ikeja to the venue of the programme in Victoria Island, but by the trouble he took in keeping the troubling issue of his wife at bay in order to present the face of the Akwa Ibom State government at an event celebrating a man he personally hold in very high esteem.
“Eno’s presence at the event was exceptional. It marks the first time in history that the Akwa Ibom State governor is honouring a man, who besides other painstaking contributions, was among those on the frontline for the creation of the state in 1987. The egregiousness of the governor’s act could be further underscored from the point that unlike some of Eno’s predecessors, nothing could be readily spotted to have been Etiebet’s personal quota to who the governor is today.”
On top of the governor’s presence at the event on that Wednesday, there were a number of marks worth noting. Eno was not then in the same APC with Etiebet. In fact, he said at the event that he was very proud of being in the PDP and attending event honouring a stalwart of the APC. The governor was there throughout the time the event lasted, along with his entourage, who included two former senators — Emmanuel Ibokessien and Effiong Bob.
On the face of it, it is possible to assert that history has already taken note that Eno’s actions of relating heartily with people at the top political echelon in the state is contrary to what obtained in the Cross River-Akwa Ibom axis at a time preceding his leadership. The Second Republic, which lasted between 1979 and 1983, was characterised by strife among top political leaders, who belonged to the same National Party of Nigeria, NPN. In fact, a political fault line was created within the NPN.
While Governor Clement Isong of the erstwhile Cross River State headed his home based loyalists, the then Senate President, Joseph Wayas, took charge of what was called the “Lagos Group”. Both ends were constantly at loggerhead with each other. It led to Isong being at the receiving end as he was defeated by Senator Donald Dick Etiebet of the NPN in the governorship election conducted on August 13, 1983.
The fourth Republic that commenced on May 29, 1999, but had its build-up from 1998, took its turn for the worst. From Uyo to Port Harcourt, Lagos to Abeokuta, Abuja to Jos, Victor Attah, while routing for Olusegun Obasanjo, was fervently working to thwart the presidential aspiration of Don Obot Etiebet. The fact that Attah was the major beneficiary of the political benevolence of Etiebet could not mend fences for the duo. It was not surprising that Etiebet and Attah parted ways shortly after the latter mounted the governorship throne of Akwa Ibom.
Aside from the two elephant fights between Etiebet and Attah, which climaxed in the former dumping the PDP to form the All Nigeria Peoples Party, ANPP, the bipolar blocks which existed in the Second Republic replicated itself in the Fourth Republic. Attah led the home front. With the exception of the likes of Ibokessien, the Abuja front, which included Senator John James Udoedehe, who represented Uyo Senatorial District that Attah hails from, had a number of national legislators in its fold. Expectedly, the two blocks were also counter-reaching each other.
Again, following Attah’s failure to install Udoma Ekarika, his son-in-law, the benefactor-beneficiary feud that ensued between Etiebet and Attah continued to put the relationship of then Governor Akpabio, who was a commissioner under Attah, and his predecessor in frequent face off. Although Akpabio succeeded in making his preferred person, Udom Emmanuel, his successor, the war between godfather and god-son did not abate. It came to the fore immediately Akpabio dumbed the PDP for the APC, the same party he was lampooning with apostolic zeal in the previous general elections of 2015. The defection and the rift that followed culminated in Akpabio suffering senatorial defeat in the 2019 general elections.
Except those who make petty pecuniary profits from retrogressive happenings, the people have not been reaping from the situation factually narrated above. That could account for Eno deserving thumbs up from the people. But ideally, in a clime where politics is kept at bay after the electioneering period for the pursuit of good governance for the general good of the people, partisan interrelation or rubbing minds with fellow party bigwigs is neither something to roll out the drums for.
Only those with feeble and faltering sense of history and those who are so consumed by the current, thereby paving ways for amnesia to occupy their memory, would credit Eno as the first governor to nurture relationship across party lines. While on the governor’s seat, Udom had parleyed with then President Muhammadu Buhari, including being part of his entourage a number of times while still maintaining his membership of the PDP, and there was no grandstanding and ceremony about it.
Even though Akpabio controversially and unceremoniously relieved Umana Okon Umana of the position of Secretary to the State Government and replaced him with Udom, who later slugged it out with the former for the Akwa Ibom governorship in 2015, both of them had had alliance worth sampling for emulation. In a number of occasions, synergy was struck between the office of the governor and that of Umana who, on the platform of the APC, was the helmsman of the Oil and Gas Free Zone Authority, OGFZA.
On January 4, 2017, October 16, 2020 and May 20, 2021, Umana led a delegation from the OGFZA on visit to strike accord of development with then Governor Udom Emmanuel. As the Minister of Niger Delta Affairs, Umana visited the governor’s office again on September 14, 2022 to discuss possible means of joining forces for development in the Niger Delta region. Typical of the nature of the two leaders from the opposing political camps, no showmanship was attached to the parleys.
Given that trickery and counterfeits are not alien to politicians, should Eno’s collaboration with Akpabio be trusted? The question calls for more questions.
Would Eno have romanced with Akpabio if the latter did not become the Senate President and belong to the APC that now controls the national government? How developmental and people-oriented is the motive behind Eno’s defection to a party symmetrically opposed to the one that brought him to power? Why is Eno not showing robust relationship with Bassey Albert who was his archrival in the 2023 governorship election? Related questions can go on and on.
Whichever, it would be impossible for Eno to escape from being recorded by history as the first governor of Akwa Ibom who deploys subterranean measures to decimate the PDP after ascending the seat of government through the party’s wings. What is called PDP in Akwa Ibom today is an annex of the Governor’s Office, with overwhelming compromise to the APC’s antics and aspirations. The alliance or collaboration that is vehemently engaged in narrowing the democratic space, shutting doors of aspirations against targeted persons and parties, hence limiting people’s options to choose, constitutes crass debasement of democracy and an affront to the electorate. In fighting the culture of alienation and forging the frontiers of alliance, the political elites and other stakeholders should be guided that the Nigerian Constitution and multi-party politics encourage divergent views and freedom of association. So, a one-party system should not be foisted on the people under the guise of forging frontiers of questionable unity.
Alliance, as its meaning implies, entails cementing relationships with diverse people and entities. The opinion of Babafemi Ojudu, a former senator and journalist, on his Facebook Page on June 20, 2026, is quite apt: “Democracy is strengthened not by uniformity of opinion but by respect for differing views.”
Beyond the optics, and with thorough perusal, the grandiloquence trailing Eno and Akpabio’s collaboration keeps propping up questions upon questions. So, until a time when answers to those pertinent questions would come, the collaboration remains questionable.