Essien Udim, Party After Party
By UbongAbasi Ise
Essien Udim local government area in Akwa Ibom State has become a spot where the flames of 2019 general elections have refused to die down. It has become a constituency that is helplessly vulnerable to cynical manipulation by anti-democratic devils that work tirelessly to guarantee "a victory for impunity, a victory for fraud and a victory for a political desperation and indiscipline," to say in the words of Prof. Itse Sagay.
After INEC declared Barr. Esse Umoh, a PDP candidate, as elected with 18,999 votes ahead of Sir Nse Ntuen who had earlier stated his disregard for the Saturday 25th January 2020 rerun election having described it as an illegal exercise but helplessly had 7,108 APC votes tied to his name, one does not need a soothsayer to foretell that Essien Udim State Constituency would soon be welcoming another buffet of political intrigues. Following March 9, 2019 polls, it was INEC returning officer for Essien Udim, Prof. Ignatius Uduk that declared Nse Ntuen at Afaha Ikot Ebak winner of the State Constituency election with 47,479 votes, while Esse Umoh of PDP trailed with 6,273 votes. It was the Akwa Ibom State Resident Electoral Commissioner, Barr. Mike Igini, who said the March 9 election result was declared under duress, hence the denial of Sir Nse Ntuen the Certificate of Return. But at the election petition tribunal, Prof. Uduk would testify as a subpoenaed witness that nobody forced him, and that he was very free when he was declaring the results. At the end of the marathon litigation, the appeal court at Calabar finally gave the disputing parties a Babel version of judgment which none of them would understand.
While Igini’s INEC told Nse Ntuen that he must contest the ‘court ordered’ election or else he forget about his ambition, Ntuen would beseech both the media and the legal practitioners to look at the appeal court judgment in order to confirm if there is any provision in it that ordered him to re-contest the election. With this bickering, it appears that the battle for the Essien Udim seat in the State House of Assembly might continue ad infinitum.
One point to note is that before Essien Udim people found themselves once more in the trappings of electioneering, they had already stayed for about seven months without being represented in Akwa Ibom State House of Assembly, courtesy of the debasement of electoral processes. Now that another election has produced another winner in Esse Umoh, while Nse Ntuen, the former winner with erstwhile majority votes still believes he is the right representative who is yet to be issued a certificate of return, it becomes clear that soon the trending hit, ‘parte after parte’ done by Ugandan hip pop sensation, Rowland Kaiza, a.k.a. Big Trill, would be played for Essien Udim people as they enjoy another party groove of litigation and legislative quagmire.
The pulling out of the APC from the electoral exercise in the eve of the rerun in Essien Udim has placed oversized question mark on the integrity and sincerity of INEC. Truth be told, INEC headquarters in Abuja has also constituted a major problem in the recent electoral kerfuffle in Akwa Ibom State. Since the APC in Akwa Ibom State have persistently expressed lack of confidence in Mike Igini and would see no credibility in the outcome of any election superintended by him, owing to his misguided and excoriating media remarks against the candidates of the APC, it wouldn’t have been out of place for the commission to deploy another resident electoral commissioner to Akwa Ibom to restore confidence in all the competing parties even if Igini’s hands are clean. Yes, the squalid political scenario in the state requires an umpire with proven moral rectitude who is unyielding to forces of corruption. But does it means that throughout the INEC Nigeria, the only man with integrity credentials is Mike Igini? If he is the only upright man available, then the commission should bury its face in shame for being peopled with corrupt elements that are incapable of conducting elections with utmost credibility.
No thanks to Akwa Ibom APC. The party’s last minute ditch of the court ordered rerun election was just like a kind of coitus interruptus that only satisfied the leadership without minding the enjoyment levels of the led. Withdrawing from the contest without proper consultation with the party followers after they might have been battle ready for the rerun, could cause a serious damage for the party’s future ambition because the followers might assume that the party leaders would be taking them for another ride. The abrupt withdrawal from the court ordered rerun elction could be seen as a bellwether of what would happen in 2023. Therefore it is time for the party’s leadership to meet with its ranks and file, relate with them and resolve whatever differences that might have occurred because what is coming in the future seems bigger than what have already been experienced.
Yes! I am UbongAbasi Ise. For comment, send SMS to 08189914609 | email: ubongabasiise@gmail.com
©The Sensor Newspaper
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