Senator Godswill Akpabio.
Abasifreke Effiong
Retired Assistant Inspector General of Police, Udom Ekpoudom, has said that he will support the President of the Senate, Senator Godswill Akpabio, to return to the senate in 2027, if he decides to contest, regardless of agitation by Abak 5.
Abak/Etim Ekpo/Ika federal constituency within the Abak 5 division has not produced a senator since 1999.
Ekpoudom, the Minister for Petroleum Resources (Gas), Mr Ekperikpe Ekpo, and former National Legal Adviser of the Peoples Democratic Party, Barr. Emmanuel Enoidem, hail from the federal constituency.
In 2023, the trio campaigned ferociously for the zoning when they sought election to represent the senatorial district.
Ekpoudom and Ekpo lost the campaign when Akpabio won the senatorial ticket of the APC and went on to defeat his former commissioner and legal adviser of the PDP, Enoidem, in the election.
Political actors in the area said after the 2023 elections that they will stay the agitation to produce a senator from the federal constituency.
Recently, indigenes of the area said they have regrouped to awaken their demand ahead of 2027.
AIG Ekpoudom in an exclusive interview with The Atlantic Observer said Akpabio will win the Ikot Ekpene senatorial district election in 2027 and return to the Senate.
“If you fight Akpabio, you are fighting yourself. He will come back as a senator in 2027. In fact when I came back home upon retirement and saw the state, I was so disturbed. I got to know it was Abak’s turn to produce a senator.
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“I was the first to call a press conference in 2023 and I told journalists, I don’t like eye service, I like what I’ve seen; how Akpabio had turned Akwa Ibom into a world-class place. I didn’t know Akpabio had plans to go to the senate a second time after his ministerial appointment. Earnestly I didn’t know. I only heard about Enoidem. So what I’m saying in a nutshell is that anybody that wants to struggle with Sen. Akpabio in 2027 is on his own.”
He said he will support Akpabio on the strength of his performance both as Governor and Senator.
“Let me begin by saying that anybody from Akwa Ibom State who does not respect the Senate President, Senator Godswill Obot Akpabio GCON for what he is, is not in his or her full senses. I am not saying this because Akpabio is my brother. But I think God created him in a special and different way. He doesn’t look at things the way many look at things. He is a goal-getter. If he wants to get anything he gets it because he is a good strategist. He is a good team player.
“I admire him and his style. If you don’t respect him, you are on your own. You have seen what has happened to the politics of this country, with Akpabio now the number three man in the country. He is not a selfish man. He thinks about the people, the masses. This is my first time of knowing that a senator can do something to impact the society.”
“We have been producing senators for the years, but this my first time seeing a senator so committed to empowering a lot of people. That thing is in Akpabio’s blood, making people happy. A senator essentially is supposed to take care of his senatorial district. Before he even became the Senate President, he has been touching lives through projects not just in Ikot Ekpene Senatorial District but across the three senatorial districts of the state, what I have not seen before.”
