Akwa Ibom APC: Two secretariats, many troubles

The Akwa Ibom state chapter of APC has two secretariats in Uyo, the state capital. They stand four kilometres apart, separated by acrimony and bad blood, but bonded by decay and abandonment. They are a clear restatement to the parlous conditions of the party in the state, long strewn in crisis, bitterness and infighting. At one end of the party are the Senate President Godswill Akpabio; minister of petroleum (Gas), Obong Ekperikpe Ekpo; former presidential adviser, Senator Ita Enang; Victor Antai, executive director, NDDC; Eunice Thomas, board member, NNPC; Imo Akpan, commissioner, RMAFC; and Emaeyak Ukpong, chairman, Federal University of Technology, Ikot Abasi, among others.

At the opposite end are former minister of petroleum, Atuekong Don Etiebet; former minister of Niger Delta Affairs, Obong Umana Umana; former managing Director of NDDC, Obong Nsima Ekere; former military governor of Ogun state and Rivers state, Group Captain Sam Enwang (rtd); Senator Nelson Effiong, among several others.

The two camps do not see eye to eye and, as the saying goes, when two elephants fight, the grass suffers. In this case, the grass has not only overgrown the secretariats, but the party members have become despondent; dejected and disappointed.

In 2018, APC was a large, formidable party in Akwa Ibom, poised to wrestle power from the PDP. Nsima Ekere, then managing director of NDDC, was getting set to contest for the governorship ticket of the party and go on to slug it out with Udom Emmanuel, who was going for his second term. APC’s secretariat was then located at 149, Ikot Ekpene Road, an old three-storey building built in the 1970s. The building was initially occupied by the PDP until it moved to another location in 2016. Today, PDP is occupying a purpose-built secretariat.

The imposing building at 149 Ikot Ekpene Road remained vacant until 2018 when APC moved in there with financial support from Ekere. In August 2018, just as APC was moving into the property, Akpabio decamped from the PDP to the party, creating a buoyant and upbeat mood among the rank and file. But there were leaders like former governor Victor Attah who warned publicly that Akapbio’s entry into the party would weaken, rather than strengthen it. Many people did not take him seriously.

Trouble started in 2021 and since then, the party has not remained the same. In October of that year, APC conducted its congresses to elect party leaders and delegates for the various party primaries in preparation for the 2023 elections. Senator John James Akpan Udoedehe, the interim national secretary of the party, was leading the charge. Akpabio was the minister of Niger Delta Affairs, but there was no love lost between the two men. They have been political enemies since 2009 when Udoedehe defected from PDP to ACN.

With the congresses concluded, Austine Ekanem, an Udoedehe acolyte who was the state secretary, was elected state chairman with 1,278 votes, to beat Stephen Ntokekpo, the youth leader, who scored only six votes. Ita Udosen, who was the acting chairman (the chairman, Ini Okopido, had died the previous year), was elected south-south zonal secretary at the national convention. All the ward executives and state officers of the party were carefully selected and put in place by Udoedehe who was also preparing to run for the 2023 governorship election. Austin Ekanem was duly sworn into office by the party’s acting national chairman, Abubakar Bello, (then the governor of Niger state) on March 7, 2022. Bello stood in for the then-national chairman, Governor Mai Mala Buni of Yobe state, who was on medical vacation.

The party’s structures were all in Udoedehe’s hands. Akpabio, completely sidelined, was livid with rage, but he did not show it. The new state chairman returned to Uyo and inaugurated his exco and ward executives. There were celebrations everywhere in the state; but the merriments were short-lived, for exactly 10 days after Austin Ekanem was sworn in as chairman, the Akpabio camp obtained a judgment from a federal high court in Abuja, affirming that Ntokekpo, who had scored only six votes, was the authentic state chairman.

Ntokekpo had filed the case in November 2021, soon after the congresses, but Ekanem was not joined as a defendant. Rather it was the APC that was the defendant, a clever tactic that ensured that the case was undefended. The court judgment was based on a fake result sheet in which Ntokekpo’s score was changed from 006 to 1006; while Ekanem’s score changed from 1,278 to 278. It was a mathematical abracadabra in which ‘’1’’ from Ekanem’s 1,278 votes was moved to Ntokekpo’s 006 votes to make it 1006. All other results were unchanged in the court filing. It was a pyrrhic for the party has not recovered from it since then.

With this, Ntokekpo, an Akpabio ally, was sworn in as the state chairman, replacing Ekanem, who had been sworn in two weeks earlier. A protracted legal battle ensued between Ekanem and Ntokekpo with Akpabio and Udoedehe as the big behind-the-scene masquerades. But there were other problems. The chairman of the APC Akwa Ibom congress committee, Alhaji Banki Yusuf, wrote a petition to the police headquarters in Abuja, stating that Steven Ntokekpo had allegedly forged the result of the state congress. The police arrested Ntokekpo and investigated the allegation. Forgery was confirmed. The police then forwarded the result of their investigation to the DPP Office in Abuja and after the review of the police report and investigation; the DPP recommended that Steven Ntokekpo and others be charged to court. Till today, no case has been filed against Ntokekpo. There was a big masquerade behind him.

Akpabio had now assumed full control of the party structures in the state, but Ekanem was still fighting hard to reclaim his mandate. The forgery allegation was still swirling around; the congress matter was dragging in court in Abuja and the 2023 elections were approaching fast. APC was waltzing from one crisis to another, and events began to unfold at dizzying speed in quick succession. Senator Udoedehe decamped from the party to NNPP and picked up its governorship ticket; Akpabio resigned from Buhari’s cabinet to run for president and rented another storey building at No. 6 Ekpo Obot Street, Uyo, as the party’s state secretariat, abandoning the imposing building at 149, Ikot Ekpene Road, painted in APC colours. The acquisition of a new secretariat was the first formal indication of a gulf and disharmony in the party, and the discord has been growing.

Within that period, Akan Udofia, a swashbuckling oil industry contractor, emerged as the party’s governorship candidate through another dubious circumstance. Udofia had contested in the PDP governorship primary held a day before APC’s primary, and scored only one vote. But how he emerged victorious in APC’s primary conducted around midnight the following day is the stuff that ‘’Akpabiosm School of Politics’’ is made of.

Enter Senator Ita Enang, another APC governorship aspirant. A lawyer of over 40 years at the bar, Enang headed to the courts and obtained judgment at the Federal High Court, Abuja, against Udofia and APC. The court decided that since the midnight primary was not certified by INEC, the party was null and void, and the party had no governorship candidate for the 2023 election! By now, Akpabio had withdrawn from the presidential primary at Eagles Square in Abuja on March 6, 2022; bought a nomination form for the senate and by another abracadabra, another Senatorial primary was conducted for him in which he won the nomination. In the first senatorial primary, a retired deputy inspector general of police, Ekpo Ekpoudom, was nominated as a candidate. How Akpabio wrestled the ticket from Ekpoudom at the supreme court is yet another mystery of Nigerian democracy.

It’s been two years since the 2023 elections and with all the political dramas; dubious court judgments and mago-mago party primaries; APC emerged exhausted and withered. There has not been any party major activity since the election. Austin Ekanem, the ousted chairman, says the Secretariat at 149 Ikot Ekpene Road has been abandoned since 2022 and activity has ceased in the party since the end of the 2023 elections. He recalls that around October 2024, Senator Ita Enang had approached him, and apparently acting at the behest of the Senate President, invited him for some reconciliation meetings, but he rebuffed Enang, telling him that he would not be part of any reconciliation process that does not include other disaffected leaders like Umana Umana; Don Etiebet; Nsima Ekere; Sam Enwang; Bassey Dan-Abia; Senator Nelson Effiong and other leaders’’. The process has stalled.

But Ita Udosen, the south-south zonal secretary of the party, says although he’s a senior officer of the party, he has never been invited to any party event. His words: ‘’As you know, I was the acting chairman of the party for about two years, and I operated from 149, Ikot Ekpene Road. Stephen Ntokekpo was the youth leader then. In 2022, I was elected as the zonal secretary of the party; and my office is in Port Harcourt. I can tell you that I have never been invited to any party event at the Ekpo Obot Secretariat and I do not know what the conditions there are like.’’

Stephen Ntokekpo himself was quite effusive when I spoke to him. He said that there are plans to reconcile everybody and bring all sidelined persons back into one fold, noting that the Ekpo Obot secretariat is not only functioning but is well maintained. I did not see that. He paid tributes to the senate president and the minister for their contributions to the party. ‘’You know, the property we are occupying is owned by an APC stalwart (Chief Sunny Ibanga). I am aware that both the Senate President and the minister have been taking care of our landlord who has not been well. If I have any issue with the landlord, I will sort it ought with him. But I can tell you that the rent for the property is not due till March and the property is well kept.’’

Ntokekpo then veered off and praised Gov. Umo Eno for ‘’for bringing peace and harmony to the state’’. He said: ‘’Gov. Umo Eno has reached out to APC members in ways that show that he is the governor for all Akwa Ibom people, irrespective of party affiliations. The governor has identified with the Senate President, who is our grand leader, in a very respectful manner. To that extent, we in APC have decided that we should give the governor his due respect and allow the government a chance to govern. Elections have come and gone. It’s time for governance.’’

Akwa Ibom APC has been thoroughly weakened by its many troubles. It’s difficult to see how it would go through the 2027 elections.