In June 2021, I penned down my thoughts on the fate of politics in Cross River State consequent upon the defection of Governor Ben Ayade from the PDP to the APC in May 2021. My thoughts (with slight modifications on typo/syntax errors and the rationale for John Owan Enoh’s defection from the APP/ANPP to the PDP) are hereunder reproduced for the benefit of those who never read same when published in 2021.
Without any form of ambivalence, I answer in the affirmative that there is a reset in the politics of Cross River State. The competitiveness which characterized the politics of the State in 1999 has returned.
Today, unlike it happened in 2003, 2007, 2011, 2015 and 2019 (when the State was a one party-PDP-State), the 2023 elections and their outcome have changed the colouration and narrative in the state’s politics.
Indeed, the state’s politics has left the realm of ‘Governor ofu nen’, ‘Governor yah’, ‘Governor aroh’ and ‘Governor seh’. Time, it was when our people (including those who hadn’t direct access to the State Governors) will tell us ‘the Governor has said the ticket should be given to A and not B’. We ignorantly and helplessly believed all of those lies (baram, bawu and owang) until Jarigbe Agom Jarigbe and Alex Egbona made daring moves which paid off.
There is now an alteration in the system which hitherto made PDP candidature for any position a settled matter. In the just concluded elections, people worked and ‘walked’ to earn their mandates.
The era where the Cross River State House of Assembly had no Minor Leader, Minority Whip and Chair, Public Accounts Committee is over. The 10th Assembly in the State will parade 19 APC, 5 PDP and 1 LP Legislators. There will, once again as it was in 1999, be a Minority Leader, a Minority Whip, a Minority Caucus and a Public Account’s Committee to be chaired by a minority/opposition member of the House.
The NASS team from Cross River will, this time, comprise of Legislators from three political parties – APC(two Senators and 5 Rep members), PDP (0ne Senator and two Rep members) and LP (one Rep member)- as opposed to the one party show it used to be between 2003 and 2015 before Alex Egbona sprang a surprise in 2019.
While hoping for the return of the vibrancy and courage which the foursome of Orok Otu Duke, John Owan Enoh, Cletus Mbia Obun and Emperor Owa brought to bear on the 4th Assembly of the State, I seize the initiative to thank all the actors (party men and women as well as contestants at the 2022/2023 primary/general elections) who paid the price leading to the resetting of the politics of the State. The PDP, which is now in opposition, is looked up to for the resetting of Local Government Area elections – there should truly be elections and not coronation as has been the case since about 2002.
Max Ogar is an Abuja based legal practitioner.
