I will bring good governance back to C'River - Epko

Mr. Eyo Ekpo, SDP governorship candidate in Cross River State

By Akachukwu Okonkwo&Blessing Harry

Governorship candidate of the Social Democratic Party (SDP) in Cross River State, Mr. Eyo Epko has promised to bring good governance back to the state if elected Governor in 2019.

Ekpo who stated this on Saturday while interacting with Journalists at his campaign office in Calabar said that there's complete absence of governance in the current administration of Sen. Ben Ayade.

The SDP candidate who was the Attorney General of the state and Commissioner for Justice between 2003-2007 under the Donald Duke administration said that he was optimistic that the state can be served a lot better with different set of people.

According to him "The major thing wrong with this current administration is complete absence of governance but we will bring back to Cross Riverians what they once had which is good governance.

"We believe that our state can be served a lot better by different set of people. Our common denomination is to serve with integrity, Competence, Transparency and Dedication.

"Even thought things are bad, we must remain hopeful; hope that is anchored on the competence of youthful energy".

While maintaining that "I see myself as someone who has  unconsciously been prepared overtime for the job", he added that "whoever will become Governor will not be going there to enjoy because a lot has gone wrong".

Speaking about the economic situation of the state, he averred that "in order to manage the state well, I will look at the stock of debt been held by the state, work out how to manage it and sort it out.

"We are pretending our debt doesn't exist. According to the 2017 figures, Cross River state has to look for an average of N3.5 billion monthly to meet our wage bill requirements. We're borrowing for recurrent expenditure and not for capital projects; a responsible government shouldn't borrow for recurrent expenditure".

Ekpo said his administration will not depend on monthly allocation from the federation account to fund projects.

In his words "It's an impossible task to do the things expected to be done with monthly allocation from the federal government. Anybody that depends on public funds alone in Nigeria to work is bound to fail.

"To succeed, you must commit yourself to bringing private sector and NGOs but before that, you have to create an enabling environment for them".

Ekpo said that his party, SDP "is the clear underdog in the race because we are not in government at any level but we are very determined and confident that we can serve our state a lot better".