Reprieve may be coming the way of embattled “Mama Bakassi”, Florence Ita-Giwa, and soft landing gained in the aftermath of her widely reported spat with Cross River State governor, Ben Ayade, over the distribution of relief materials meant for the Internally Displaced Persons, IDPs, of Bakassi origin.
A top aide to Ayade informed www.calitown.com that Ita-Giwa had in the last couple of days sought the audience of several prominent sons and daughters of the state, including the Obong of Calabar, Edidem Ekpo Okon Abasi-Otu V, hoping for intercession, in a desperate attempt to bring down the intensity of her spat with the governor. It was further revealed that they are co-ordinated attempts being presently made to secretly apologise to the governor after Ita-Giwa was made to understand that she had no justification for attempting to rubbish the governor with the allegation that Ayade superintendend over the distribution of the relief materials she said were stolen.
A handful of those she has so far contacted, within and outside the state we gathered, point her to the fact that engaging the governor based on her unverifiable assumptions is “faulty, costly and exposes her to danger”, as one source said. “You have seen the way government responded to her allegations and how her image was torn to shreds, if she continues, I can assure you that so much will be thrown up and this woman will never be able to operate in open space unless things that bother on her image do not matter to her”, the source continued.
While state governor, Ben Ayade, has issued an official statement as a direct response, describing her allegations as a “distraction”, Ita-Giwa yesterday, June 21, 2017, maintained on local radio station, HIT 95.9 FM, that she has no problem with the governor but with some of his aides who she fingers as being behind the disappearance of the relief materials.
Investigations by www.calitown.com however show that the Bakassi relief materials scam has been a long going one. Several key political figures in the area and beyond have at one time of the other taken delivery of items meant for the Bakassi IDPs and no dust was raised. As this political bloc disintegrated recently, with the defection of Ita-Giwa to the APC, what is playing out now appears to be a clear case of actors washing their dirty linen in public. Our government source maintains still that “even if Ita-Giwa rolls on the floor, Ayade now understands that this woman can never be embraced and what she attempted to do with this smear action is enough justification for us to ensure that her political paralysis sets in”. It remains to be seen if this will indeed happen.