BY EMMANUEL SILAS
Based on the media reports and
allegations leveled against the former member representing Uyo State Constituency
in the Akwa Ibom State House of Assembly, Hon. Ekere Afia on the 27 parcels of
land in Ibiaku Issiet, said to have been acquired for federal government’s fish
project, the later has stated that the matter was resolved in the Uyo High
court in his favour.
Hon. Ekere Afia who stated this while
speaking with Weekly Insight in his
Uyo residence over the weekend, retorted that he was an indigene of Anan Ikono
in Uyo Local Government Area and that he bought the said parcels of land from
individuals with agreements in Ibiaku Issiet in Uruan Local Government Area for
his personal use since he was not from the area.
Explaining further, Hon. Afia said,
“Those that raised the story misled the people. It is not the federal
government project the way they are saying it, it is a community-based project
and so the framework of the community based project is not such that the
federal government would acquire a land for it, once it is approved, the
community in which that project is approved for, should be able to provide land
that is not owned by anybody.
“But Hon. Bassey Etim that influenced
the project for the community, did not even go to the community to ask for the
land but chose a land for himself, [and that is the] land that belongs to some
other person. We started buying land in that place as early as 2009. I bought
and Bassey Etim also bought some land there. At a point because he was paying
peanuts, they refused to sell the land to him.
“The land is more than 27 parcels; it’s
only that it was 27 parcels they encroached into. I have over 5 hectares in
that place and I bought it with my hard earned money. I did not inherit it. I
could remember a case where somebody was deported in South Africa, they came to
me and I had to provide the money. So it was not a matter of being a stumbling
block. He came in to the land with the project without my knowledge. The
village asked them to give them time to allocate plots of land for the project
as the land he is encroaching has been sold to some other person but he bluntly
refused and he is saying that I am a stumbling block. As I am talking to you
now, the project is no more there because we went to court in May 2011 and
Federal Ministry of Agriculture came after few adjournments and applied for out
of court settlement.”
The former lawmaker stated that the ministry
of agriculture and water resources and all those concerned in the matter
including Hon. Bassey Etim, met in the conference room of Ministry of Justice in
Abuja on this matter. “When he (Bassey Etim) realized that it was not going to
work, he now dragged in the state government, and told the governor that he has
attracted project from federal ministry of agriculture and water resources
worth about two billion naira and that the problem he had was land and that
there was a land in his community that government should come and acquire for
that purpose. It would be funny to know that on the first of February 2012, the
government published in the Pioneer
that they have acquired all the lands in that area for the purpose of community
based project particularly for the federal ministry of agriculture,” he stated.
He emphasized that on the 14 of
February, 2012, the federal ministry of agriculture and water resources and
Institute of Oceanography represented by their lawyers in the presence of Hon
Bassey Etim’s lawyer, came to the court and filed its written terms of
settlement that became the final judgment of the court that they have vacated
his land.
“All the lawyers adopted the terms of
settlement which became the final settlement of that very matter. All these
hiding [of] his face, sending people to make comment and media accusation, I
don’t know what it [is] all about.” he retorted.
According to him, “There is no such
project because when we were on the matter, the federal ministry of agriculture
and Institute of Oceanography stated that it was not in their policy to buy
land for such project, that any community that applied for that project should
be able to provide a land for them and that if they had known that the land
shown to them belonged to somebody who was not even a party to the project,
they wouldn’t have come. So they have since left. It could be if the community
showed them a land which is not in combat with anyway they would come back. But
as we are talking, there is no such project in that place.
“I claimed for damages of fifty million,
ten million for special damages and forty million for general damages. And they
said during the negotiation that they are not going to pay for any damages
because as they are leaving, there are some structures they put on ground which
automatically belonged to me that I should be satisfied with those ones and
that was what formed the terms of settlement. I don’t have any problem with Hon.
Bassey Etim, what I did was to protect my investments. If they had come to me,
then the two billion naira project of which even if they have spent one hundred
and fifty million, there wouldn’t have been a lost”.
Hon Afia stressed that he spent one
hundred and fifty million naira and used two years to locate the land in that
area, saying that if he had brought such a project, he should have realized
that the land was not a community land but was sold to him by individuals.
He said, “You don’t just bring a
community based project to the land which does not belong to the community. I
don’t have any problem with Bassey Etim, he is intelligent enough. By his
pedigree, he should know the implication of what he is doing. He had never
approached me. When I heard that they were bulldozing my land, I went there but
his man, one Akpanama was there and had brought thugs into the place. Because
of the way they were behaving, I left and instituted a case in the court.
“When I started buying that land, the
Ibiaku Issiet village council gave a letter with the list of requirements which
I have to fulfill before I continue buying the land. I fulfilled the
requirements by giving all they listed in the letter. After I had fulfilled the
requirements, they sent another letter approving my entry into the said parcels
of land. The land is not a communal land; it belongs to individual members of
that community who sold the land individually with individual agreements to
me.”
Meanwhile, in the terms of agreement as
contained in the Uyo High Court proceedings of Tuesday, February 14, 2012,
presided over by Hon. Justice Godwin Abraham and made available to Weekly Insight all the parties through
their counsels involved in the said matter had accepted to abide by the
conditions for amicable resolution of the imbroglio.
According to the document, A.B. Okoho
Esq., Umo Asuquo Esq., and Rosemary Kogbodi Esq. who were counsels to Hon.
Ekere Afia, Hon. Bassey Etim and Nigeria Institute of Oceanography & Marine
Research and Ministry of Agriculture and Water Resources respectively, adopted
the terms of settlement and urged the court to enter it as judgment.
The adopted terms of settlement, among
others in the document, declared Hon. Ekere Afia as “the owner of the
twenty-seven parcels of land lying, situate, known and called Usung Uduok in
Ibiaku Issiet, Uruan Local Government Area and entitled to a quiet and peaceful
enjoyment and a certificate of occupancy of those parcels of land. The order of
perpetual injunction restraining the defendants either agents, servants and/or
privies from committing further act of trespass
in whatever manner or form on the plaintiff’s said twenty-seven parcels
of land…
“The parties together with their lawyers
have met for an out of court settlement and have unanimously agree upon…That
the first defendant (Nigeria Institute of Oceanography and Marine Research) and
the third defendant (Ministry of Agriculture and Water Resources) are to vacate
the 27 parcels of land… And that the 1st and 3rd
defendant’s vacation of the 27 parcels of land is to represent the full and
final settlement of the reliefs in this action”
Accordingly the terms of settlement filed
by the parties was adopted as final judgment in the matter by the presiding
Justice Abraham.
It could be recalled
that Weekly Insight Vol. 5 No. 34 of
August 27 – August 30, 2012 reported on how the people of Uyo Federal Constituency
in Akwa Ibom State condemned in strong terms, the purported claim of 27 parcels
of land by Mr. Ekere Afia at the site of the Federal Government’s N2 billion aquaculture
development project in Ibiaku Issiet village, Uruan Local Government Area of
the state.
The report had also stated that the
former Chairman of Uyo Federal
Constituency committee, Elder Jimmy Akpanamma said the decision by Mr.
Ekere Afia to obstruct the construction of the fish project through spurious
claim of ownership of 27 parcels of land at the project site was a great
disservice, not only to Uyo Federal Constituency, the host community, but the
entire state and the south-south region, as the project, he observed, was the
only one of such projects sited in the region.
Ndipmonguwem Effiong, Idong Okpon and Elder Albert Akpan had spoken in
that story in condemnation of Ekere Afia’s alleged action but spoke in glowing
terms for the things said to have been achieved by Hon. Bassey Etim.
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