ATTAH’S LIFETIME AWARD AND WANING LEGACIES: AKPABIO, UDOM, AND WHY WE SHOULD ALL BE ASHAMED
Since after Nigeria returned to democracy in 1999, Akwa Ibom State has sunk hundreds of billions of Naira into infrastructure. The amount thereof — capable of transforming the state into a world class tourist and investment destination. Sadly, 20 years on; all that has been built in the time spanning almost three political dispensations (of eight years each) — are either rotting, or underutilized, or politicized. Today, rife unemployment and other developmental concerns that are supposed to lodge in history — still inundate our everyday discussions.
My disenchantment with the system is that we have had succeeding governments that don’t understand what it entails to build value. No apology. In 1999, we were fortunate to select a governor with the right skillset and experience, who understood the burden of assignment; of championing the renaissance of a new and prosperous state. His blueprint and idea of a city-state — was a cutting edge architectural design that should have transformed Akwa Ibom if only succeeding governments built to plan, even by par for the course.
Get me wrong if you may, I don’t give a flipping care at this time. It is true that while succeeding leaderships have pursued development in ways deemed fitting, it has been in total neglect of, or deviation from Attah’s vision for the state. I understand the compulsive need of leaders to want to make nonpareil history, however, the ultimate need is to make that a fitting chapter of a progressive bigger history. Anything less than that is unacceptable if you are building anything of enduring economic significance. That is why developed countries take to the polls seriously.
But I’m not here to talk politics, or why a governor failed to do what and all that parochial bull crap. No! I’m writing to air my annoyance, if you please, or not — at how blatantly wasteful Akwa Ibom has been as a state; and to emphasize how not committing to the ideals of vision has cost us, and hampered our most promising sector — tourism.
You have to agree that every successful city today, that boasts great economic opportunities is always set against the backdrop of strategic, magnificent infrastructural engineering — that attracts all categories of interests. At the heart of this setup is usually tourism and hospitality. Attah’s infrastructural setup of Akwa Ibom is testament to his remarkable grasping of the A to Z of building a modern state complete with world-standard facilities. It is for the reason his administration was deliberate about delivering on a fitting development framework that would offer a conducive environment for creative and knowledge-driven industries.
When you look back, critically, you discover that of all the public goods we have built from Attah’s time through Akpabio’s — and now Udom — none functions at hundred percent capacity. Building a cosmopolitan city is a slow, painstaking process of doing the right thing over time. Not the knee-jerk execution of unmatchable projects with no tailored plan to reap the socioeconomic benefits. Building a cosmopolitan city consists executing programmes and policies that are informed by sound economic planning and change in time.
Akwa Ibom was setup to build on the back of its vast tourism potential. And we had just one job, but we failed. What we built that was required, we failed to protect. What we should have built that was required, we did not. What was not necessary at the time, we built. What we should have developed, we took for granted. What needed completion, we politicized. Once we had failed at that intermediary stage, to develop tourism into a refined product and build the local economy around something — subsequent social and capital programmes were bound to flop because we had neither the class-diverse population nor the market for them to subsist on. How do you grow an economy when you streamline nothing? Attract nothing? Sell nothing? Do nothing right?
But imagine that Akpabio had persisted on Attah’s vision to practically grow tourism as a business — by carefully tailoring his ‘Transformation Agenda’ for maximum socioeconomic benefits. And Udom had continued likewise, by leveraging on what Akpabio had built to execute his ‘Industrialization’ plan. Just for once, imagine that these men had astutely committed to utilizing potential, as assiduously as they did with the aviation industry that has got Nigerians talking. And that they had built with a single objective and unity of purpose, like the Americans do, irrespective of political differences.
Perhaps, I should put it to you what idyllic model-society we could have been living in, priding in. How ours could have emerged Nigeria’s newest most secure, trusted investment market and tourism destination. How we could have churned out impressive economic indices (by nominal GDP) bettered each succeeding year. How we could have near-flattened the unemployment curve, raised per capita income and upgraded our health and education sectors far above the Nigerian standard.
But shame on us; for spending 20 years wasting away potential and running in circles. Shame on us; for once again proving right the white man’s judgement of the black man’s inability to plan. Shame on us; for failing to build on Attah’s legacies; legacies that are now fading faster than the man is aging. Don’t even mention the airport, because we could have done better, could have opened the International Wing and MRO facility (a major generator of aviation revenue) for business. And don’t mention Ibom Hotel and Golf Resort either, because even that subsists on government subsidy. Or the Ibom Plaza that has been reduced to a sweaty, crowded marketplace overrun by street urchins and petty traders. Or the Ibibio Culture Museum which purpose has been defeated and its green-park in utter disarray. Or the world class motor-parks that nature is aggressively reclaiming. Don’t even…
While it is great to see Attah recognized for his outstanding contribution to nation-building, it is ironic that at the heart of this poignant story lies the ruins of the very thing he is being celebrated for. Rather than an occasion for our leaders (immediate-past and present) to make a mockery of themselves under the guise of extending a congratulatory hand, this award should have evoked sober reflective moments in various quarters of the state — where we ask ourselves some serious leadership questions about how well or not we have upheld objective and built on the man’s legacies. But we are not wired like that. No? The takeaway here, is that we are looped in on this spinning wheel of eroding legacies, for as long as we resist a change of mentality. Well, until, perhaps we are fortunate to vote in a leader who appreciates the long-term (profound) effect of overlapping sound government programmes and policies. But that in itself is a very unlikely occurrence.
©Akpama Ntia
