#EndBadGovernance: Fertilizer Distributed To Stop Protests Were Hijacked By Politicians In Cross River – ADP Boss

By CrossRiverWatch Admin

The Zonal Manager of Cross River Agriculture Development Project, (ADP), Mark Ewa says political office holders in the state hijacked the distribution process of agro inputs to eligible farmers in the zone.

The fertilizer was distributed as a plan to destabilize the nationwide protests against hunger and bad governance which held from August 1st to 10th with massive crackdown from the Government.

In Cross River State where the protest was peaceful, the ADC to Governor Bassey Otu led a team that beat up and arrested several protesters who were released a few hours later.

And, Ewa said the Federal Ministry of Agriculture had disbursed 5500 bags of fertilizers for distribution to farmers in northern Cross River few days to the planned nationwide #EndBadGovernance protest, and to be supervised by the State’s ministry of agriculture. However, politicians in the State hijacked the entire process.

According to him, each Local Government Area in the zone including Ogoja, Bekwara, Obudu, Obanliku was earmarked to have 1000 bags of fertilizer while Yala got 1500 bags in the sharing formula.

Mr Ewa said immediately the fertilizer arrived the ADP office in Ogoja, House of Assembly members, Commissioners and other state political office holders took over the premises with their security details and took all the fertilizers to their various Local Government Areas, and shared it to political “farmers” who aren’t captured in the State as authentic farmers.

“My brother, I had no single say in the entire distribution of the fertilizers to farmers.

“It was purely a political thing as political office holders hijacked the distribution process and shared the inputs among themselves.

“We have data of all farmers in the zone but we were not allowed to use it”, he said.

A quick check by CrossRiverWatch shows that several politicians including one House of Assembly member distributed fertilizer which they claimed was part of the dividends of democracy and facilitated by them between August 3rd and 31st 2024.

The distribution of food items is also marred in controversy with the Special Assistant to President Muhammadu Buhari on Prosecution, Okoi Obono-obla Esq accusing his party, the All Progressives Congress of being filled with thieves.

“The corruption in the Cross River State APC is despicable and pathological. Senator John Owan Enoh, Minister of Sports Development graciously under the Renewed Hope Agenda, distributed over 10,000 bags of Rice to 18 LGAs.
The APC is now distributing 27 bags per LGA and one bag per ward!! What happened to the remaining 4,512 bags of Rice?,” Obono-obla wrote on his Facebook handle on Thursday.

However, the Chairman of the APC in the State, Alphonsus Eba Esq has since denied the claims.

He told TNN newspapers in an interview that the party received only 732 bags of 25kg rice with instructions on how it should be shared which, according to him, the Sports Minister is aware of.