Building Cross River is our collective duty… Speaker, AG and Women Affairs Commissioner

By Emmanuel Ulayi

Cross Riverians at home and in the Diasporas have been called
upon to pull their collective weight behind Governor Ben Ayade in
his developmental aspiration for the state.
This challenge was handed down by the Speaker, Cross River
House of Assembly, Rt. Hon. John Gaul Lebo, the Attorney-
General and Commissioner for Justice, Barrister Joe Oshie Abang
and the Commissioner for Women Affairs, Hon. Stella Odey while
speaking on Radio programme tagged “Ayade’s Cross River” on a
topic, “Building the Cross River State of our dream” on Monday in
Calabar.
The programme which is an initiative of the Governor’s Office
Press Department will be a weekly programme that will run every
Monday with a repeat edition on Thursday and anchored by the
trio of the Governor Media Aides, Beatrice Akpala, Emmanuel Ulayi
and Solomon Asha.
All the speakers agreed that it is incumbent on the people of
Cross River to give their total support to Governor Ben Ayade as
a morale boost to enable him carry on with the numerous
development projects like the super highway, deep seaport, and
garment factory, among others, stressing that allowing foreigners
to dictate what we should do and how we should manage our
forests resources, to build roads or not to build is a clear
indication of imperialism and neo-colonialism.

On the super highway, they collectively agreed that it was total
unpatriotic for some indigenes of Cross River to fight against the
actualization of the super highway, asserting that if the Federal
Government has agreed to expand the existence Calabar-Ikom-Og
oja-Katsina Ala highway to a four lane highway as proposed by
the Cross River government, there would have been no need for
the new super highway to serve as evacuation corridor to the
deep seaport.

They explained that it is complete negative propaganda to claim
that the super highway will take 10km right and left of the road
and that those who have turned the social media into a battle
arena against Governor Ayade lack adequate information,
stressing that the super highway will be the biggest booster of
the state’s ecotourism industry and that it is vain effort to
attempt to stop Cross River from having a super highway, adding
that it was wicked to think that the same government that fight
against illegal logging will at the same time be involve in the
same act.
In the area of Women development, the speakers also agreed
that the administration of Senator ben Ayade has given women
more opportunities, broaden their scope of participation to
contribute to the development of the state through
empowerment, training , registration into associations and
cooperatives to benefit from the Bank of Industry and other banks
loans, adding that the women of the state were totally in support
of the Super highway project because of the immense economic
benefits it will bring to them and their families.

As part of the deliberate effort of the Ayade leadership to provide
a solid legal foundation that will be of immense benefit to the
ordinary Cross Riverian, they also informed members of the public
that the Cross River House of Assembly have initiated 48 Bills out
of which 18 have been passed into law, adding that the
Homeland security Service Bill when passed onto law will equally
ensure the recruitment of 3000 volunteers who will help in
providing safety, ensure home identity, code and share
information to the security agents.

They equally disclosed that the administration of Governor Ayade
has reduced the numbers of cases inherited from 786 to about
500 as well as reduced the numbers of cases against
government which stood at more than 90 percent at the inception
of this administration, and called on all Cross Riverians to support
the government of Senator Ayade to succeed for the good of
all.