Tale of Two Governors: Between Duke and Imoke


Chris Abang

Reading recent interviews of former Cross River state governor Donald Duke and articles citing him, one is left with no doubt that all isn’t well between him and his former bosom friend and successor, Senator Liyel Imoke. While not much has been heard from Imoke, Duke has left no one guessing that he feels aggrieved, and has been unstinting in his criticisms.

In his May 30 interview with THISDAY newspaper, Duke denied that Imoke had any role, except the merest peripheral contribution, in his political ascendancy culminating in his becoming governor of Cross River State. In the next breath, he had this to say: “I, on the other hand, can justifiably state unequivocally and without regret that I was responsible for him (Imoke) being appointed a Special Adviser and later a Minister, at great expense and goodwill. And were it not for those appointments and the largesse he exploited thereof, where would he be today?’’

Such an assertion would be more fitting if made about a young law graduate who used to sell used cars on the streets of Lagos, for whom a big break then was getting a contract to sell a few Christmas hampers to the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation. As someone very closely known to both men,

I’m aware that as late as March 1999, this particular individual was residing at a very modest, rented mini-apartment on Augusto Close, Surulere, Lagos.

Then the forces of circumstance, on the 29th day of May, 1999, saw Duke sworn in as a state governor who would go on to serve two terms in office, leaving at the helm in the state for eight years. While his two terms were characterised by grandiose projects with no bearing on the daily realities of the people, such as the Tinapa and Obudu Ranch projects, those in the corridors of power made huge gains at the expense of the state that is now left with a huge debt burden.

The woes of Cross River State are now inversely proportional to the gains of Duke. While the state now bleeds to repay debts ran up under his rule, the former law graduate and car dealer is now a proud owner of the luxurious 1 Olu Holloway Road (formerly Temple Road), Ikoyi, Lagos. The average cost of a plot of land in this most expensive neighbourhood is about six hundred million naira.

The same former indigent lawyer also now owns a block of 42 luxury flats located at No. 3 Olu Holloway Road (formerly Temple Road), Ikoyi, Lagos. This block of luxury flats sits on more than two plots of land on the same Temple Road, Ikoyi, Lagos. The cost of acquiring the plots of land alone for these luxury flats is in excess of N1,500,000,000.00 (One billion five hundred million Naira). This sum is exclusive of the cost of construction and finishing of this state of the art residential edifice.

This character’s mansions in Ikoyi and Calabar, and the block of 42 flats in Ikoyi were built by two of the most expensive foreign contractors in Nigeria. Both contractors were major beneficiaries of contracts in his time as governor.

A man who never had a single private residence to his name in the state capital, Calabar, now owns three opulent mansions in very large premises. The first serves exclusively as his banquet hall, where he entertains his visitors lavishly while his people are living in excruciating and abject poverty.

The second mansion houses a cinema, a dance hall, music room (where he plays his trumpets and flutes) and a full-service, ultra-modern digitalised entertainment-recording studio. While the biggest building in the expansive premises is his “private country home” where he retreats when he is “tired” of his abode in Ikoyi, Lagos. Did he earn the income to acquire all these wealth from his pay as a governor?

Imoke, quite unlike Duke, after four years as Minister of Mines and Power and governor of Cross River State for eight years, all he has is landed property are two four-bedroom bungalows (his Calabar residence at Housing Estate, Calabar and his country home at Itigidi) and a simple duplex in Abuja.

The bungalows and the duplex in Abuja were acquired before he became governor of Cross Rivers State. Where he lives in Lagos on Anifowoshe Street, Victoria Island is a family house built by his late father, a renowned medical doctor, who was a Minister in the First Republic in the Eastern Region government. Senator Liyel Imoke has lived in these houses years before the advent of the fourth republic in 1999 and still lives there till date.

So much for comparing notes on the two former governors. Yet, Duke had the brass to claim in his THISDAY interview that, “corruption has become a national scourge”. Hear him: “The whole issue of corruption has to be addressed by the governing class not just politicians, but perhaps, the country’s legal framework and particularly the judiciary. That is where the solution lies. A weak judicial system as we have today breeds corruption and encourages impunity.”

Of course the judicial system is weak, that is why many people with unaccountable wealth, who should be explaining themselves to the authorities, are walking the streets free and even pointing fingers at others.

Source: http://www.thisdaylive.com/articles/tale-of-two-governors-between-duke-and-imoke/214915/