EBERE WABARA [email protected] 08055001948

AS a former Public Relations Manager in Eq­uitorial Trust Bank Limited (the partnership that works/worked), Globacom Telecommunica­tions Limited (the next-generation network) and Sterling Bank PLC (the one-customer bank)— before gracefully resigning— I know full well what it takes to be an Executive Director in a first-tier bank or indeed any other institution with the same organisational profile. Therefore, the transition of Mr. Udom Emmanuel from one of the top-notch banks in Nigeria as an Executive Director to be at the helm of affair in Akwa Ibom State as the current governor can only be demonstrative of core professionalism superlatively amplified in governance.

With the aforementioned profound occupa­tional pedigree, the only thing expected from this man of God is quintessential administration, especially coming on the heels of the uncom­mon transformative legacy institutionalized by his predecessor in office and now a senator, Bar­rister Godswill Akpabio. In the past one year or thereabouts, Udom Emmanuel has not just been basking on the euphoria of the attainments of the immediate-past governor, but has gone ahead to make them foundational props for his own inerasable marks in the historicality of Akwa Ibom State.

Therefore, going by his robust career an­tecedents, Udom Emmanuel is not one of those professional politicians who do not comprehend the essence of good governance let alone internalising it. I have established the incontrovertible fact that our subject this week is a professional in politics with empha­sy on financial re-engineering and prudential fiscal management. It is this rich background, which is responsible, largely, for the novelties in the steering of the state in the past one year, that has made all the distinction.

When the Akwa Ibom State governorship tussle got to the Supreme Court, I declared unequivocally in a full-page analysis in this medium and another one in THISDAY, THE SATURDAY NEWSPAPER, contempo­raneously, that victory was under way for Udom Emmanuel’s divine mandate. One stupid lawyer from the state sent me an idi­otic SMS that I was foolish by insisting that this mandate will be revalidated and that I should note that Udom Emmanuel was not like his predecessor in office who allegedly doled out large sums of money to a person like me from the public tilt! As a columnist used to such bovine interjections from numb­skull and venomous readers, I laughed off the crass ignorance.

Of course, the revalidation happened and my vindication is now history, as they say. The lawyer was so daft that he said he knew I was from Abia State and I had the temerity to be talking authoritatively about his state! Little wonder the quality of law scholarship and practice has gone absymally down, al­most irredeemable, with lawyers like this and one Barrister James Okpara.

Again, ahead of his one year in office, I de­clare that considering what he has achieved in the state already, all by God’s grace, Gov. Udom Emmanuel should start looking beyond 2019 as his re-election enjoys unparalleled foreclosure by virtue of the profundity of current achievements, which speak volumes of what to expect now and in the future. This realisation informed my pas­sionate belief in this governor and my unflinching anticipatoriness through my affirmative choice of curious headline and overall standpoint of inalien­ability on this ordained anticipation. In just about one year, Udom Emmanuel’s indelible stamp on the state is becoming obviously immeasurable, as it is almost unbelievable that anyone could better Senator Akpabio’s first year as governor and pos­sibly the remaining seven years for Udom Em­manuel, as projected here!

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During electioneering, most politicians make wild promises on how they will do impossible things that had never been done. They live in a dream world where utopia is the order of the day. Not so with Udom Emmanuel who has set about massively industrializng his state as if he is striv­ing after a Japan-like model. He enthuses that the civil service bureaucratic machinery cannot take the state to where it should be. Shortly, Akwa Ibom will become the country’s technological base. The rapidity of the on-going re-engineering of the state is aimed at not just human capital de­velopment, but a laudable source of revenue to the state. This is what happens when profession­als run states—not marginally literate ex-civil ser­vants or tycoons.

Already, investors are invading the state in ex­ploration of joint-venture businesses with multi­farious memoranda of understanding consum­mated. In the months ahead, cottage industries and factories will renew the landscape of the entirety of Akwa Ibom State. Presently, too, the automobile assembly plant inaugurated on his as­sumption of office will buzz with life, just as the LED factory and the metering establishment in Awa-Iman, Onne, will soon embark on produc­tion for national and transnational utility.

Equally receiving the governor’s attention are social infrastructural facilities in all the senato­rial zones. Very soon, the state will wear a dif­ferent new look with the currency of most parts of it looking like engineering sites. It is no longe going to be just the state capital, Uyo, which will become a novelty, as the uplift is generic in every ramification.

At the heart of all the foregoing is the en­thronement of the ‘Dakkada’ philosophy, which has given the state a new definition of life. There is no more dependence of citizens on govern­ment for everything they need or being slavish in the alternative. The message of this philo­sophical journey has been internalised by Akwa Ibomites who now more than ever before ap­preciate the need for economic independence.

Perhaps, the leadership style of the governor has really contributed to the human and physi­cal changes in the state, as Governor Udom Emmnanuel sees himself as a servant-leader shorn of the haughtiness of most of his peers in the corridors of power. An easy-going and God-fearing man, this is a governor, who has redefined governance and conducts himself with superfluous humility that you may hardly notice his presence if not revealed! His accom­plishments speak for him wherever you step in.

With the diligent support of his delectable wife, Deacon Martha, it is not surprising that God is using this couple to bring a new lease of life to the inhabitants of this state through the instrumentalities of employment genera­tion; wealth-creation initiatives; human capital transformation; girl-child upbringing and care for widows (at the instance of madam); indus­trialization of course; relentless and feverish upgrade of social infrastructures; and, above all, holistic governance with the fear of our Creator.

Governor Udom Emmanuel, God is with you, indeed!