Akwa Ibom State Governor, Chief Godswill Obot Akpabio, has entered the final stages of his electoral campaign with handouts from the state treasury. His entire campaign has been characterized by massive corruption and intimidation, highlighted by the shaking up of Akpanudoedehe, the Action Congress of Nigeria gubernatorial candidate.
Akwa Ibom State Governor, Chief Godswill Obot Akpabio, has entered the final stages of his electoral campaign with handouts from the state treasury. His entire campaign has been characterized by massive corruption and intimidation, highlighted by the shaking up of Akpanudoedehe, the Action Congress of Nigeria gubernatorial candidate.
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SaharaReporters gathered that the Government of Akwa Ibom is distributing 10 bags of rice per polling booth and an undisclosed amount of cash to be dispensed to largely impoverished voters in the state.
Some of the recipients who spoke to SaharaReporters said that they have received the rice but were yet to get the money accompanying it.
“We have got 10 bags of rice but the people have not released the money yet to us so I cannot be exact on the amount; our only fear is that the coordinators may divert the money,” said a beneficiary who did not want to be identified. “You know this is politics money and nobody accounts for it and moreover immediately the election is over it will be a bygone issue.”
An observer who spoke on the development decried the poverty level in Akwa Ibom State, which is one of the states that receives the largest allocation from the federation account.
“It is very sad that our people are physically and intellectually poor; you can see the open disgrace to our collective intelligence, how can we be so cheaply bought over?” he questioned.
“Ten bags of rice per polling booth where you have between 700 to 1,200 voters, how do you share it? And worse still, can you eat the rice for the next four years? It is unfortunate that people are selling their future for next to nothing, that is how bad things are here” he said.
It is widely-known that Akpabio has been financing his re-election bid from the Akwa Ibom State Treasury, the same source from which he assisted the election bid of president Goodluck Jonathan.
Recently, scores of youths were killed in a stampede that engulfed during the sharing of the largesse dolled out by Chief Akpabio to supporters recently at Akwa Ibom Govt House.
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