HRM Etim Okon Edet is the immediate past chairman of Cross River State Traditional Rulers Council and the paramount ruler of Bakassi Local Government Area. In this interview with CLEMENT JAMES, he speaks on governance in the state, the of role traditional rulers and other issues
Tell us your experience as someone who has managed traditional rulers in Cross River State for more than 10 years?
Well, the experience is inborn. I’m a traditional ruler, and at the local government level, you are supposed to manage it well and it is supposed to prepare anybody for future managerial activities whether at the local government level, the state or even at the national level.
The local government is supposed to be a training ground and that’s what gave me the training to be able to look at people’s psychology and their tendencies to be able to act according to their will.
As traditional rulers, we are supposed to act according to the will of the people and not according to our own will. It is not about our personal idiosyncrasies.
It is not about how we feel but the peoples feeling. That is one thing that helps us to succeed in leadership.
As chairman of the state traditional rulers’ council for more than 10 years, you may have left some legacies behind. What are they?
I really don’t want to blow my own trumpet but if you are in the minds of your people, you have achieved a lot.
Whatever anybody does, whether you construct roads or you do anything else, if you are not in the minds of the people, you have done nothing, you have not left any legacy. The legacies are in the minds of the people.
If you ask any traditional ruler in the state, he will tell you that I am like an indwelling Christ in their minds. I will tell you the truth; there is no paramount ruler that will say anything untoward about me. Although nobody is perfect, I tried my best to carry everyone along. Now, even the House of Assembly’ resolution did not indict me.
The only thing they said was that I overstayed my tenure and that was not my own making. Past governors made me to stay that long. Throughout my period, there was no crisis in the selection of a paramount ruler in the state. The only crisis was about boundary and farmlands and these were not under my control.
During your tenure, there was crisis over the exalted stool of Obong of Calabar and that of the Munene of Efut, and you were accused of having a hand in all of them. Can you clarify what happened?
For the Obong of Calabar, I have tremendous respect for the stool. So, I had no business creating any problem. The whole thing was just about suspicion and nothing else.
People don’t really understand me because I am not an outward person. Jesus Christ even said that people should not look at the outward part of a thing but inward part of it.
The Obong himself can testify that I am a good man. You know that being a follower is different from being a leader. His followers may have misinformed him but he is convinced beyond all reasonable doubt, and he has been saying it that I have no issues with him.
There was a time I wanted to leave the chairmanship position of the Traditional Rulers’ Council, but the Obong called me and asked me to stay on. I still have the document that he signed and asked me to stay. I never stayed on my own. There are so many things underneath that I don’t want to say. We took an oath not to reveal things that we see.
So, for me, I have no business with the stool and I respect that stool a lot. Recall that there was a time I was made chairman of Utomo Obong (an annual tradition of paying homage to the Obong). Besides, there was crisis between former governor Ben Ayade and the Obong of Calabar and I brokered peace between them. But I have left everything to God.
On the Munene of Efut matter, let me appeal to anybody who will succeed me to be loyal to those in authority. It was in the night that Ayade sent a text message to me, asking me what was happening. He sent me a photograph of some people attending a meeting.
And I asked who attended a PDP meeting. At the end of the day, Prof. Hogan Itam, the Munene of Efut told me he attended the meeting. Itam himself confessed that he attended the meeting and Ayade asked me to remove him as the paramount ruler of Calabar South and Munene of Efut for going into politics.
I told Ayade that we will give him fair hearing. He was given fair hearing but Ayade asked that he should be removed and he was removed. I want to advise anyone coming to replace me to follow the dictates of the governor that is on sit and support him till the end of his tenure.
The governor has power to remove any traditional ruler and that was what Ayade did in the case of Prof. Hogan Itam. But I have restored him based on the instruction of the present governor and he is there now as the Munene of Efut. I don’t hate anybody and I don’t have the heart to keep malice.
On May 29, when Governor Bassey Otu celebrated his one year in office, you said something that many people thought was not palatable to the governor. Why informed that? You know that I am one person who speaks truth to power. If I say it privately and you don’t want to heed, I will say it openly.
I have access to the governor, so I don’t need to say some things publicly except I am compelled either by him or by circumstances. Up to this moment, paramount rulers in the state do not know the Special Adviser to the Governor on Chieftaincy Matters. Somebody was appointed, and from day one, he said he was going to remove me from office.
So, I informed the governor accordingly. When the governor did not take action, I had to tell him in the presence of other paramount rulers that we don’t know the SA to the Governor on Chieftaincy Matters. In other places, traditional rulers will just tell the governor that they don’t need the person and the governor will redeploy him to somewhere else.
Even when I was still chairman of Traditional Rulers Council, he brought some policemen to lock up my office. I told the governor privately what the he person he appointed as Special Adviser on Chieftaincy Matters but the governor refused to do anything about it. The man is still there up till now.
So, what I told the governor on May 29 was the simple truth. I told him that up till now we don’t know your SA on Chieftaincy Affairs. Normally, a governor would have used that occasion where all the traditional rulers were gathered and introduce him. But up till now, he has not done that. I was the person who asked other paramount rulers if they know the SA and they said no.
What was unpalatable about that? In fact, any governor would have been angry that he visited Traditional rulers and his SA was not there. They don’t need to embarrass me out of office. In this state, I have stopped so many industrial actions be it by the National Union of Teachers (NUT), students’ union groups or market women.
The current Secretary to the State Government can attest to it when he was the Provost of College of Education, Akamkpa. There was a strike in that school and I wadded into it and stopped it. I have done things for the state and I expect a glorious exit.
A few months ago, the clan head of Akpabuyo was removed from office and accusing fingers were pointed at you as the mastermind of the incident. Can you explain your own side of the story?
The governor is a person and as it is, he needs a lot of guidance by way of advice. What happened was that the SA misinformed the governor and that was the reason the clan head was removed.
I have asked the governor to work with him for three days and see the kind of SA he has. After misinforming the governor, I was the one who intervened and in his fatherly wisdom, he withdrew the suspension of those traditional rulers, who were suspended.