Gov Eno Identifies Critical Areas For Collaboration With FG

By Bassey Nkponam
UYO
The Akwa Ibom governor has identified critical areas of collaboration between his administration in the State and the Bola Ahmed Tinubu-led federal government.
  Pastor Umo Eno, who was fielding questions from Government House correspondents, Saturday, at the Victor Attah International Airport, Uyo, shortly on his arrival from a meeting with President Bola Ahmed Tinubu at the State House in Abuja, said this was his request from the President during the meeting.
Eno, who led stakeholders in the State to the meeting, said he, during the visit, extended an invitation to the President for a working visit to the State, while offering prayers and words of encouragement for the success of his administration.
He said he formally invited President Tinubu to visit Akwa Ibom in May 2025 to commission the ARISE Park and Resort, a flagship project aimed at enhancing the state’s tourism potentials and some roads infrastructure. 
Eno said the purpose of the visit was to provide opportunity for stakeholders who saw the need to express the appreciation of the government and people of Akwa Ibom to President Tinubu for his support and that of their party and to express gratitude for the President’s support, particularly in facilitating the emergence of Senator Godswill Akpabio as Senate President and appointing prominent Akwa Ibom sons and daughters to key federal positions, including Obong Ekperikpe Ekpo as Minister of State for Petroleum Resources (Gas).
The governor also made known that he sought federal support for key projects, particularly the long-awaited Ibom Deep Seaport, which promises to transform the state’s economy and boost regional and national economic growth, while also appealing for more federal appointments for Akwa Ibom indigenes and other interventions to further accelerate the state’s development.
He saw the visit to Abuja as a successful mission, as it offered an opportunity for Akwa Ibom leaders to present a common front which demonstrated his all-inclusive disposition to government. 
“As the Bible says, with thanksgiving, make your request known, we used the opportunity also to make our requests”, the governor said, enumerating the request to include, primarily, issues surrounding the actualisation of the Ibom Deep Seaport project, Presidential intervention in ecological challenges plaguing the State.
“That audience is very important to us. That shows that he is a father of the nation. He listens to all his children. So we thank him. I have always said that political parties are platforms to contest election and after that, we should unite the State and make progress. And that was shown yesterday in the composition of the stakeholders. 
“I have said it over and over again, let’s not deceive ourselves, no State government can push a Deep Seaport alone. There must be collaboration. So we used the opportunity of that visit to appeal for Presidential intervention, and of course, the ecological issues that we have: the gully erosion affecting us everywhere. We have spent so much on reclamation and we also need a Presidential intervention.
“The third thing was to formally invite the President on a working visit to Akwa Ibom to commission some of our projects, including the the ARISE Resort. These were the things that we did.
“I must say that the visit also was to encourage the President on the earnest task of the government. It is not as easy to govern people. As a governor, I can tell you even in our State it is not easy. So every leader needs encouragement. We were also there to show support and to encourage him,” Eno said.
He lauded the President’s inclusiveness in governance and thanked him for granting audience to the Akwa Ibom delegation at the State House amid his crowded schedule, irrespective of difference in political leaning.