Governor Ben Ayade of Cross Rivers State
It has been gathered that Cross Rivers State Civil servants and government contractors in are trying to adjust to the work pattern of Governor Benedict Ayade.
It was learnt that Governor Ayade is hardly in his office in Calabar.
Governor Benedict Ayade now works, gives directives and holds executive meetings with partners and lenders in hotel rooms abroad, Daily Trust gathered.
In Cross River, the governor rules the people using e-mail, electronics means, social media, otherwise called e-governance, the government’s staff told journalists recently.
At the end of the month, since he came to power, they get to hear that their salaries and payments for contracts executed have been signed on an aircraft, or from whichever part of the world the time for payment meets him; not necessarily in his office in Government House Calabar.
The workers do not mind wherever it is he signs their pay cheques from, so long as he lives up to his promise of paying them on or before 25th of every month.
Professor Ayade is used to travelling abroad often, having made a fortune from his international businesses and contracts. He has brought that mentality to governance.
He is at the verge of becoming the highest travelling governor yet in this dispensation.
A week after he was sworn in on 29 May 2015, about six months ago, he spent the next two weeks in Spain and Germany. He told journalists that the trip brought about the visit by 15 investors and partners to the state.
The governor has spent less than 60 days in his office out of the 133 working days in these six months, according to a source close to his office.
According to these government sources, every month he spends at least three weeks in one European or Asian country or the other.
The National vice chairman of the All Progressives Congress (APC) South South, Prince Hilliard Etta, recently accused the governor of “junketing” around the world and cautioned that governance was at risk in the state if he did not settle down to work.
He recalled that since the governor took over power from Senator Liyel Imoke in May, “he has on his own created a state of confusion and right now, Cross River is in a state of flux. There is motion, but no movement; so much talk, but no action; so much display of exuberance, but no real governance.”
According to him, “In all honesty, I would have wished that Senator Ben Ayade succeeds as governor of Cross River State because his success, regardless of party affiliation, will be to the glory of Cross Riverians. His failure will be our pains as well and this will exacerbate our problems as a state. And so, my prayer has always been that he succeeds,” he said.
“But this junketing from China to Spain, Germany to Ireland, and Japan to Malaysia will not do us any good. He should come and rule us because he wanted to be the governor. It is unfortunate that in Cross River, we have a culture of silence and anybody could come and hoodwink us and nobody will say anything,” Eta also noted.
He warned that such prolonged absence could jeopardize governance in the state.