His Royal Majesty, Major General Felix Mujakperuo (rtd.), Orhue I, CFR, mni, the Orodje of Okpe Kingdom, has thrown his weight behind the move by Sapele Memories and Development Foundation to restore the lost glory of Sapele town.
NaijaOnPoint.com.ng (NOP) reports Orodje Okpe to have said it is a thing of joy for him personally that Sapele Memories and Development Foundation is making the move towards seeing that the lost glory of the town is restored.
Speaking on Friday when he received representatives of Sapele Memories and Development Foundation led by Chief Rosalyn Egborge (Mrs), a member of the foundation’s Board of Trustees (BOT), HRM, Mujakperuo recalled with nostalgia the memory of his childhood in Sapele.
“First of all, I want to thank you people for this initiative to give Sapele a good look. I will say to some extent that I am a Sapele boy. I attended Sapele Boys Academy, which is now Okotie Eboh Primary School, from Primary 3 to Primary 6 and from there, I went to Urhobo College. I know every nook and cranny of Sapele.
“In the olden days, when I returned from school, I used to sell daily times to make money which I put in my pockets because I know everywhere in Sapele. But Sapele was not as big as this. It was a bubbling city. Those days, before you start talking about Ibadan, it is Sapele. Nobody even talks about Benin or Warri. It was Sapele.
“Sapele was the highest employer of labour with African Timber and Plywood (AT&P) back then. At that time, there was pipe-borne water everywhere, AT&P was generating electricity that never failed and it was redivision. If you had redivision in your compound, you were a special people. However, all of a sudden, Sapele started going down,” Mujakperuo said.
NOP reports the Orodje Okpe to have said one of the reasons Sapele went underground was lack of foresight, stressing that AT&P was removing timbers and taking them overseas without planting.
“It came to a stage, there was no more wood. That time, they were not even processing the wood here. They take the whole logs like that.
“Then, they began to take palm oil, palm kernel and when oil, petrochemicals started, everything started going down. Nigeria was no longer interested in agriculture. There was no longer farm produce to export and AT&P was not even planting trees. So, the trees were exhausted and that is why AT&P collapsed.
“At that time, nearly every family will say one of them is working in AT&P. All of a sudden, everything went away,” the Orodje said.
Speaking on infrastructural decay in Sapele, Mujakperuo flayed the lack of dualised roads in the town while noting that successive governments were never fair to Sapele.
He said: “Okpe kingdom is made up of two local government areas (LGAs): Okpe LGA and Sapele LGA. Because of the vastness of Okpe, the kingdom is divided into 12 districts. Sapele itself is a district, the biggest of the districts.
“If you look at all the towns, Sapele today has no dualised road. The only one is the one that they dualised from the roundabout to AT&P roundabout. Successive governments have never been fair to Sapele. That is the truth.
“One cannot say why is it that the most important roads in Sapele, from the market road to Adeola, not dualised? The Igbo road, which is now Okpe road, is not dualised. Sapele has become an abandoned city.
“To worsen the situation is that during the time of the late Senator Dafinone, they tried to revive the Sapele port but the port was taken over. Meanwhile, there is politics about ports in Nigeria. It is as if there is a deliberate policy to make sure that ports in the Niger Delta are not functional. You want to import something to Warri, you have to go through Lagos. It was a deliberate act”.
Speaking further Orodje Okpe said: “One thing that is very painful to me, is the Sapele Technical College. The college had the same status with Kaduna Technical College, Yaba Technical College, Ibadan Technical College and Enugu Technical College.
“They are all of the same status at the same time. But all the other ones, it is either they are now universities or polytechnics. Sapele Technical College is now like a secondary school. If the college is a university or at worse a polytechnic by now, the situation of Sapele would have been different.
“So, I am very happy with your thoughtfulness to start giving back to Sapele. It is a thing of joy to me. I will reach out to Okpe Leaders of Thought to see how they can support this endeavour. I am very happy and you have my support. By God’s grace, Sapele would be revived.
“It is like the issue of empires go and empires come. Even Warri recently suffered a setback and with the crisis then, the oil companies moved to Port Harcourt.
“I remember when Goodluck Jonathan was president, we met him and we told him that all these oil companies, let them move their headquarters to where they take oil from. I was there; I led that delegation. We told him, let Mobil move to Eket; let Shell move to Port Harcourt and let Chevron move to Warri.
“For instance, if Seplat should move its headquarters to Sapele now, the fortunes of the town will change. Not only that, that woman who is selling garri will sell more; the transporters will make more money, and even the State government will get more tax being paid to Lagos State. These are the challenges we are having.
“The politics of the ports is a big one. The Escravos bar, which they are supposed to be dredging every two years, they have refused to dredge. And if you do not dredge Escravos bar, ships cannot come to Sapele, Koko or Warri.
“Another challenge is that if the ships should come with imports, they have nothing to take back. So, the question is what are we producing that they can take back. These are some of the challenges”.
Earlier in her opening remarks, Chief Egborge had said her delegation was at the Orodje palace to inform the Delta monarch about the plans of the Sapele Memories and Development Foundation.
While appreciating His Royal Majesty for creating time to see representatives from the foundation, Egborge said the Sapele Memories and Development Foundation would be hosting carnival in Sapele later in the year.
She stressed the purpose of the carnival was to review the present state of Sapele and re-expose the town to new investment opportunities, adding that members of the foundation from across the globe woul be in attendance.
“We are a group of people, numbering presently about 500 formidable men and women from across Nigeria who have roots in Sapele by either being born in Sapele or lived there and taken Sapele as a second home or have their foundation in life in Sapele.
“We have members across the globe who are passionate about giving back to Sapele in their own small ways.
“The purpose of our visit is to acquaint His Majesty of the existence and purpose of this group. Your majesty, as earlier stated, we want to give back to Sapele, a town with which we have a bond.
“Going into history, we reminisce with nostalgia our days in Sapele when the town was booming with companies, industries, social life, and an active, bustling seaport with the World’s largest ocean vessels berthing along the Ethiope River in Sapele, giving twilight to the City at night; a Port that kept the town alive till daybreak.
“Companies like the African Timber and Plywood (AT&P), the World’s largest sawmill, the Kingsway Stores, Chellarams, Eternit, and Flour Mills presently show a ghost of themselves or are extinct. The Sapele Sea Port, which was second to Lagos in the Western Region, is no more. All the Companies moved, leaving Sapele as a shadow of itself.
“As a foundation, to give back to Sapele, we have decided to have a reunion/Carnival in Sapele later in the year. We are expecting our members to come from all over the world to attend this reunion and fiesta at which we will review the present state of Sapele and see what we can do to assist in revamping the economy and developing the town.
“As the Father of the Okpe Kingdom in which Sapele is located, we have deemed it fit to begin the consultation in your palace, so that your royal and fatherly blessings will see us through the planning stage and onto a successful reunion,” Egborge said.
On the delegation are Barr. Raymos Guanah, Secretary; Barr Kester Tawari, Legal Adviser; Mr. Ejiro Eghagha, Mr. Hartley Uromo and Mr. Thompson Uwagboi.