As the convoy of the governor took off in a frenzy along the smooth beautiful road from the Victor Attah International Airport, Uyo, my phone rang. The governor himself, the cynosure of attention, was on the line.
“Your Excellency Sir”, I answered in a hurry.
“Please Sir, kindly go back to that bereaved family where we just stopped briefly. Find out for me how the young children are coping with the double burial of their mother and father on the same day. Please give me a feedback as soon as possible”, the governor said with a depressed tone. “Okay Sir, consider it done, Your Excellency”, I replied, surprised and overwhelmed by his deep sense of melancholy.
“Slow down, slow down and drop off the convoy”, I ordered Abednego, my driver, as Austin my personal aide on the front seat, wondered aloud what could be the matter. “Take the next U-turn and let’s go back to the funeral venue where the governor just left”, I said.
Governor Umo Eno of Akwa Ibom State, a known servant leader with the common touch, had just returned from the Council of States meeting, chaired by President Bola Tinubu, in Abuja. In his company, in the state-owned GulfStream Executive jet was the Speaker of the State House of Assembly, his deputy and other dignitaries. The governor was heading back to his office with his deputy who came to receive him, when he spotted a rural fruit market by the highway in Ekpene Ukim, Uruan Local Government Area (LGA), a village in the precinct of the airport. A dozen or so village women were selling fresh and roasted corn as well as assorted fruits harvested from their small nearby farms. The governor ordered the convoy to stop. Quickly he alighted from his Lexus LX 600 series, walked to the surprised women, chatted with them, laughed, bought some corn from each makeshift table, paid more than the value of what he bought before he gave out token money packed in envelopes to the jubilant women who besieged him to cheer and pour their love on him.
These struggling village women had never met a governor up-close before. Their joy knew no boundaries. It was clear this governor had made their day, as they jumped, screamed and turned ecstatic, some with their newborn babies in their hands and backs. As the governor stepped back to his car to leave, he noticed an ongoing funeral service next door to the street market. A husband and his wife – Effiong Okon Ekpo, 53, and his wife, Martha, 43 – were being buried. He walked up to the compound to console the bereaved family. He gave out a condolence purse in a white bulging envelope to a young man identified as the representative of the bereaved family. In a minute or two, he returned to his car looking sad and downcast by the sight of a relatively young couple buried on the same day.
Martha, the deceased woman being buried together with her husband, was one of the women selling roasted corn by the sidewalk of the highway. She had complained of stomach ache a few days before she died on 8th January 2023. Effiong, her husband, a local farmer, was inconsolable after the sudden death of his beloved wife. One of the main effects of poverty in Nigeria is poor health, as is reflected in Nigeria’s high infant mortality and low life expectancy. Poor people in Nigeria face several health issues that lead to sudden deaths as they lack money and access to basic health care. A sickness that N5,000 would cure often results in death in many poor homes and villages.
Neighbours say Effiong, the deceased man, was lonely and hardly himself any longer after the death of Martha, his beloved wife. Feeding became a challenge. In any case, his appetite for food was hardly there any longer, even when his only child, Uduakobong, visited often with her husband to prepare food for Effiong. On 28th February, about seven weeks after his wife died, Effiong decided to go pluck some afang leaves in the nearby family farm for the preparation of afang soup by the daughter. He was found dead in the farm, with the afang leaves tightly stuck to his hands.
Orphaned and left alone was their only child, Uduakong, 26, a dressmaker in Uyo. “My mother was nearly everything to me and to my father. She was not only my mother but my closest friend. Some people thought she was my sister because we looked alike so much, as she gave birth to me when she was a teenager”, Uduakobong said. Narrating the circumstance of her death she said her mother complained of stomachache. “We thought maybe it was ulcer pains since she sometimes eat late or once a day… Within one week the pains became too much for her and by the time I arrived the hospital with her, the doctor said she was already dead”, Uduakobong said, as she battled unsuccessfully to hold back her tears.
To make matters worse, Uduakobong’s father followed suit in a matter of weeks. “I was with my father the day before he died. There was no sign of any serious illness. He had gradually recovered from the shock of my mother’s demise. I normally come in from Uyo (15 minutes drive away) to cook for him. I was supposed to cook soup for him the next day and he went to the family farm to pluck some afang leaves… That is where my father was found dead in the farm… I was devastated… It took the grace of God for me to overcome the pains of losing my wonderful parents within a few weeks… I couldn’t bear it… My father used to help my mother to roast corn by the roadside… I loved them so much and they were very proud of me as their only child… We did not even have the money to bury them and had to take a loan… But God honoured my parents and brought the state governor and all the big men and women in Akwa Ibom State to the burial without any invitation… The envelope the governor gave us was big enough to pay back some debts… This is a miracle from the God of The Apostolic Church, where my parents worshipped faithfully… That same God will never fail nor forsake Governor Umo Eno. Where have you heard that type of miracle before…”, Uduakobong said, with her jobless husband, David, a graduate of Business Administration who championed the burial, by her side.
It is the same tempo of prayers by Udualobong that the Governor has attracted from various poor and rural people that he has suddenly and unexpectedly touched their lives and make the difference. A little over a week ago, it was a similar story, when he brought his convoy to a halt at a roadside fruit market in Itreto, Nsit Ubium LGA. And just last week, he gave a pleasant surprise to the children of policemen along the Metro Road Police Barracks in Uyo. The police barracks is separated from the sprawling Government House, by a thick welded wire fencing.
The Governor was going around in the company of some aides to inspect facilities on the grounds of he Government House when he spotted some police children playing across the fence, constructed by Julius Berger. Dressed in a black T-shirt and blue jeans, he waved at the children, smiling. Then he abandoned his aides and walked towards the children, with his security guards running after him. Perhaps scared by the security guards, the children began to run away. “Come, come, come back“, the Governor called out to the children. One after another, the children returned and stood face-to-face with the Governor across the wired fence. They were not sure how to greet him. While some said “Good afternoon, Sir” with broad smiles on their faces, others mumbled good something else in awe, with blended knees.
“How are you (all),” the Governor asked.
“We are fine”, the children chorused.
“How’s Daddy and Mummy”, he asked.
“They are fine”, they chorused
“You are all police children?”
“Yesssss!”
“I am a police child too…and I grew up in the barracks like you”, the Governor said, adding “I want you to take your studies very seriously, so that one day you will also become a Governor, a President, a doctor, a lawyer. OK”?
“Yes Sir,” they chorused again
“Don’t let anyone deceive you that a police child cannot do well. You are what God says you will be”, the Governor said as the evangelist in him took over. Then he presented a gift of a white envelope to the children and watched as they raced away excitedly to break the news of meeting the Governor to their parents and the entire barracks, just as the Itreto and Ekpene Ukim women have done ever since.
I sat down with the Governor in his king size office last Friday after I returned from the Ekpene Ukim bereaved family and asked him in between his busy workload: “Your Excellency, I remember that you began this idea of stopping suddenly on the road to attend to impoverished people during your campaign bus tour of the state. Why do you do the spontaneous things that is fast becoming a trademark of your government” ?
“(Smiling) Sir, you see, those street traders I am attracted to are my real friends… They are not lazy, but struggling and hardworking people and I need to connect with them and appreciate their labour for their families…”.
According to him: “This governor had gone through what the street traders are going through now. I was once a street trader like them and I can empathise with them… Some of those women are feeding and training their children, even in high institutions, from that street trading. Sadly, most of them, if not all, hardly benefit from any structured government stipend or assistance … Government should be able to think outside the box and device innovative methods to assist these impoverished but hardworking women, who go from farm to market and back the farm everyday, just to eke a living. Let us all begin to show love to these tireless and heroic women who are often the bread winners in many homes”, he said.
“So more spontaneous stops should be expected, Sir,” I asked.
His answer pointedly reminded me that Akwa Ibom had elected a governor and a pastor rolled into one man: “Everywhere Jesus went, He was doing good…so will I”, he said smiling.
As for Uduakobong, an only child, who buried her two parents the same day on Friday, 16th June 2023, good news certainly awaits her from the Governor. “She will never walk alone”, the Governor said.
Usen is the Senior Special Assistant (Media and Publicity) to Governor Umo Eno
