Akwa Ibom APC Governorship Primary: Nsima Ekere Wins, Promises New Approach

Nsima Ekere, the Managing Director of the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC) fought off a challenge from the left and captured the All Progressives Congress (APC) nomination for governor over the week-end as Akwa Ibom people rejected Bassey Dan-Abia Snr, Edet Efretui and Akpan Udoedehe in the party’s state primary.

“I will lead you with a purpose. I will lead you to victory, he said.

“Now, we’ve got a state to rebuild and I am ready if you are. The journey begins now! Thank you and God bless you all,” he wrote on his verified Twitter page on Monday.

“Our great Party, the APC, has spoken. Akwaibomites have spoken.

“They have spoken with one strong voice. They’ve told me to carry the flag of our party and represent them in the next gubernatorial election.

“This is a historic mandate. It is an honour and a duty I don’t take lightly.

“My special thanks to the leadership and every member of our Party for the confidence reposed in me.

Ekere, popularly called ONE, and acronym for Obong Nsima Ekere, attended the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, and graduated with a B.Sc. Honours Degree in Estate Management in 1986. He had attended Regina Coeli College, Essene, Ikot Abasi, and Mary Knoll College Ogoja, Cross River State. He was briefly at The Polytechnic, Calabar, from 1981 to 1982. A Fellow of the Nigerian Institution of Estate Surveyors and Valuers (FNIVS); Registered Member, Estate Surveyors and Valuers Registration Board of Nigeria, ESVRBN; Senior Certified Valuer, International Real Estate Institute, IREI, Minnesota, he began his political career in December 1997.

He had contested and won election into the Akwa Ibom State House of Assembly on the platform of the Grassroots Democratic Movement, GDM, one of the five political parties registered under the Abacha Transition. He had before joining politics been a passionate private sector player where he was Principal Partner of Ekere and Associates, a firm of estate valuers and real estate development consultants, which was established in 1993. He had, in 1989, set up Gassons Nigeria Limited, an indigenous anti-corrosion, environmental, fabrication/maintenance engineering company.