By Ogenyi Ogenyi, Uyo
The Ibeno Clan Council has described the Eket People’s Union (EPU) as an unelected opposition accusing the group of abandoning its cultural mandate and objectives into a political pressure group bent on obstructing development in Akwa Ibom State.
The Secretary of Ibeno Clan Council, Chief Udofia Okon Udofia said this in an interaction with newsmen in Upenekang stating that, EPU has “metamorphosed from a sociocultural body into an unelected opposition, with a mission to sabotage governance, investment and institutional authority in the state.”
According to him, the turning point in the life of EPU came after Governor Umo Eno declined to endorse union’s false claims over the Stubbs Creek Reserve Forest (Odorokuku/Utan Ibeno).
“That lawful refusal, based on records and the responsibility of government to all citizens, became the trigger for an all-out confrontation. From that moment, EPU stopped arguing its case and began prosecuting a vendetta against the state,” he said.
The Ibeno Clan Council Secretary noted that, instead of seeking legal redress in court or peace committee as earlier proposed by Governor Eno, EPU allegedly resorted to what he described as “insult, incitement and personal attacks” against the Governor and the institutions of government.
“The language directed at the Governor was not accidental. It was strategic. By attempting to desecrate the office, they sought to weaken the state itself,” he said, adding that EPU had shifted from grievance to what he called “weaponized hostility.”
The Council further alleged that EPU now pose propaganda, all focused on one objective: bringing down Governor Umo Eno’s administration without seeking a mandate from the people,” the Secretary said.
He added that policy and development initiatives are no longer judged on merit but filtered through “ethnic absolutism and permanent opposition.”
According to him, EPU’s posture is hostile to investors, thereby endangering major projects envisioned by the state government.
“In its obsession with territorial claims, EPU projects the state as unsafe for serious investments. Investors thrive on predictability, but EPU thrives on disruption,” the Secretary said.
He listed economic interests and infrastructure projects involving BUA, Seplat, Tulcan and the Coastal Highway as targets of what he described as “rhetorical sabotage.”
“Instead of seeing jobs, roads and revenue, they see leverage. Capital investment does not negotiate with chaos; it simply leaves,” he warned.
The Ibeno Clan Council maintained that, Governor Umo Eno’s refusal to validate disputed claims was an act of governance, not oppression.
“No Governor sworn to protect the entire state and people can surrender public trust to sectional or ethnic pressure: the law does not yield to volume, and records do not dissolve under insults,” the Secretary said.
He argued that EPU’s actions reveal a contradiction: demanding respect for identity while showing “utter contempt for institutions that protect all identities” adding that, history would judge EPU not by how loudly it protested, but by what it stood against.
“At a critical moment when Akwa Ibom needs stability, cohesion and investment, one union chose antagonism over engagement and obstruction over development.
“This is not just a dispute over land; it is a warning about what happens when cultural organisations abandon their moral values and attempt to replace law with ethnicity and politics with hostility.”
“Governments come and go. Records remain. Development, once lost, is hard to recover and no union has ever succeeded in bullying truth, institutions and time into submission.”
