Using 2 Days to Reach Ikot Abasi From Uyo – A Bad Omen

By Matts Udoaka

It is now time that people have to drive on the road for 2 days before getting to Ikot Abasi from Uyo. If a prophecy was given about this, one would have been stupefied, and ask why an hour’s journey should become two days trip.

Anyone who goes to Lagos now knows he is to cover precisely 698 kilometers from Uyo to Lagos. With that distance, the trip does not take more than one day since Lagos road that used to delay traffic has been duly turned around. But in the contrary, Ikot Abasi, a local government in Akwa Ibom State, that is about 52 kilometers from Uyo takes a traveller two days to reach, especially if the journey was planned to start at about 3.pm with the mind set of using one hour to reach Ikot Abasi.

This has been our experience a couple of days ago. Yours truly had decided to reach Ikot Abasi at 4.pm. The journey started at 2.30pm. Unknowingly, at the village known as Ikot Osudu, there was a terrible hold up, of the type Lagosians used to experience in the hey days of oil boom. The distance of the holdup was not less than six poles. In deed, yours truly then wondered what could go wrong that road in a local area should have such a grid-lock. There was no vehicle coming from the opposite side. The few that came from the opposite direction were those whose drivers had waited for so long, expecting the movement to improve. That expectation became deceitful, as those who saw it thought that it would soon be through. That was an elusive hope. Those that came from the opposite direction were only coming back to start their journey through Mkpat Enin. So, after waiting for too long with heavy down pour, we summoned courage to walk under the rain to see what had delayed vehicular movement. It was then we discovered that trailers loaded with granites had fallen or got stuck in a ditch cut in the middle of the road by heavy down pour and the pressure from the excessive use of the road by such vehicles which pass through that road day and night for granites to Rivers and Bayelsa States.

The funny side was that a fellow road user on reaching the point of no return burst into callous laughter that irked me so much, and uttered the word “UNCOMMON TRANSFORMATION.” Was the echo of uncommon transformation reverberating across the side that damaged the road? That question needs an answer. What really disturbed in the whole hardship was that in turning to follow Mkpat Enin, the heavy down pour of that day had caused other trailers on diversion, a similar incidence that we met at Ikot Abasi road. There was no vehicle going or coming, apart from those who turned back to Uyo, or their starting points. However, for those of us who insisted to go to Ikot Abasi, we decided to take Etinan road through Ekparakwa. But the tiredness of the circumlocutious movement and the night fall being our fate ended us in a hotel at Onna. That invariably made us to use two days to travel to Ikot Abasi from Uyo.

According to a co-traveller, what an echo of ‘Uncommon Transformation’ that set everyone lamenting? The question then comes, does wind of Uncommon Transformation end at Uyo? To transform we believe should mean renewal of infrastructure, and what keeps Uyo fine is the massive urban road renewal; does the renewal end at Uyo, or some part of Ikot Ekepene and Abak? I remember that for umpteenth time, yours truly has orchestrated the problem of bad road at Iwukem in Etim Ekpo Local Government Area, Oron, and Ikot Abasi Local Government Areas too. The feed back we had was that Iwukem road is a federal road which contract has already been awarded to a Chinese firm. Oron, we were told that the state has already awarded the road to a construction company. What about Ikot Abasi, it is a no go area, because Ikot Abasi road is a federal road also. Which road in Akwa Ibom that links up with another state has not been a federal road?. Abak/Ikot Ekpene road, dualized by the state government is a federal road, but the Abak end is dualized while that link to Ikot Abasi remains. This is an unjustifiable apathy to road used by all. Aba/Ikot Ekpene road is a federal road that is being dualized by the state government, is it Abak/Ikot Abasi road alone that should be kept for the federal government to work on? Well, the reason why this is happening is best known to the government. But lkot Abasi played a great role in ensuring that this dispensation does not fail to govern Akwa Ibom State. There is nothing that the local government did to undermine the success of this administration to warrant the hatred of the powers that be.

Ikot Abasi road by right, should have been dualized by a reputable company of the Julius Berger standard as was done in Idoro/Ekit Itam road. It should have been dualized as its done in Aka/Nnung Udoe road. Yet Ikot Abasi road carries more heavy traffic than those other roads cleanly dualized, as all the heavy duty vehicles plying between Uyo and Port Harcourt, go through the Ikot Abasi road. Secondly, such a busy high way has no alternative road than this only one. When vehicles plying it day and night get problems, such problems affect the road, and the people of Ikot Abasi become helpless and totally cut off. Why should this be in Ikot Abasi, which evidently people are seeing the type of heavy traffic that plys  that road?

As far as roads are concerned, the government of Akwa Ibom State fixed the Mkpat Enin road that should have served as an alternative to Ikot Abasi road up to Minya village, which should have been linked by bridge to Ikot Abasi, and after that village, is Essene which is in Ikot Abasi, without linking the Ikot Abasi road.

By whatever reason or wisdom of those in power an order was given, the road did not cross Mkpat Enin to the next village which is Ikot Abasi. Therefore, the resources used in fixing that road are meaningless as no vehicles ply the road. How many vehicles pass to minya? Why has that end of the Ikot Abasi side not been fixed to create an easy alternative passage for road users who might have the kind of problem that is faced on Ikot Abasi road now? This should be viewed as man inhumanity to man, as the Ikot Abasi people are ardent believers and supporters of PDP in Akwa Ibom State and at the national level. The Ikot Abasi people have stated before now that if the government of Akwa Ibom loses no love for Ikot Abasi people, the government should remember Ibom Power Plant, ALSCON Power plant, and the NNS Jubilee which bases in Ikot Abasi, and fix the Ikot Abasi roads for Nigerians. Now that Ikot Abasi is not in the map of Akwa Ibom State, the people of the area believe at all times that after all the sparesly used roads have been fixed and dualized, God will one day send a Moses, who will remember that as one of the vital areas in Akwa Ibom State with littoral hydro-carbon resources, Ikot Abasi deserves good road net work and other life comforting resources.