INTERVIEW: Why it’s okay to publicise Akpabio’s private communication with late friend – Ikiddeh

PT: You published on Facebook a private communication between the late Ufot Ebong and Senate President Godswill Akpabio. Did you get that (private) message from Akpabio?

IKIDDEH: The message was sent to me from an earlier post that someone had posted. I won’t have to disclose the source.

PT: Did the person post it on Facebook?

IKIDDEH: I don’t know. I just saw a text on WhatsApp where the person made references to show that Akpabio had actually helped Elder Ufot Ebong.

PT: Did you get Akpabio’s authorisation (before you release it)?

IKIDDEH: Well, he knew I had received it (his private communication with Ebong).

PT: I mean his authorisation before you put it out there?

IKIDDEH: I don’t know what you mean by authorisation.

PT: Did Akpabio approve of you making this private communication public?

IKIDDEH: I will have to discuss that with him first, if you don’t mind.

PT: Don’t you think it’s unethical to publicise private communication?

IKIDDEH: When you say something is unethical, I am wondering, are you using the law….

PT: Not the law; morality.

IKIDDEH: Okay, ordinarily, yes (it’s unethical). However, there are situations where if you have to defend yourself, you have to disclose personal chats you had with somebody. There is absolutely nothing wrong with that.

For example, if a woman accuses you of rape and says you raped her, but you have personal chats to show that all you did that evening with her was take her out, have a drink and drop her off. Everything is on the chat, you are going to show that in court, and you are allowed to show that to the public.

PT: But whoever accused the Senate president of not coming to Ufot Ebong’s aid, I am not sure the person is from late Ufot Ebong’s family.

IKIDDEH: Agreed. (But) Let me tell you, the post attracted thousands of views and hundreds of comments about how Godswill Akpabio had abandoned his childhood friend, Ufot Ebong. So this was not a private chat the person was having with someone; he put this out on the public space. And so the question is: what did you want the Senate president to do?

The fact is the Senate president also has people around him who are concerned, especially at a time like this when his name has been rubbished and some unfair comments have been made about him on social media. This is a man who is known for his compassion for reaching out and helping people. Now, this was his own personal friend, a childhood friend of his.

This was a serious indictment – that he helps other people but does not help the people who are close to him. There is a post that says it looks as if he enjoys attending the funeral of his friends and not helping them when they are crying out for help.

PT: How about the considerations that Ufot Ebong’s family could feel humiliated – the man’s wife, the children, and other relatives, seeing his private message to Senator Akpabio now being circulated on social media?

IKIDDEH: I am very sure that Akpabio has much information about what Ufot Ebong was going through, even personal conversations with the wife and children. None of those things has come out (in the public); what has come out is the specific accusation, and we need to stay on that point.

There is a specific accusation that he did not assist Ufot Ebong. And if you read the messages all you see is Ufot Ebong acknowledging the $35,000 received and the prayers he prayed for Akpabio. And he told Akpabio his room number (at the hospital where he was receiving treatment). That’s all.

PT: So you think this isn’t embarrassing to the family of late Ufot Ebong?

IKIDDEH: Absolutely not. If it was, the family would have come out, they would have contacted him. I have not heard that they have been in touch with him (in this regard).

PT: I think it was Michelle Obama, the former US first lady, who said ‘When they go low, we go high’. So if people go low, are we supposed to go low with them?

IKIDDEH: When your name, when your integrity, when your reputation is at stake…. You can’t take these bloggers to court for defamation. You can’t. It’s a waste of money and time. So you come out and defend yourself.

Akpabio has not gone low. Akpabio has just disclosed. In fact, not that he disclosed it; let me correct myself, someone disclosed a message that was sent by the deceased. How does that bring Akpabio low? And if he is not happy about it, his media aides would have come out to say so.

PT: What we are hearing out there is that Akpabio sent the money when his friend had died or was dying. Meaning that the money wasn’t really helpful at that point?

IKIDDEH: The people who are saying this don’t have any idea or a timeline. They don’t know the communication that was going on between Akpabio and Ufot Ebong and his wife and children. I spoke to somebody yesterday. Ufot Ebong was still talking. So people who said the children must have been the ones who were handling his phone don’t know what they are talking about. Ufot Ebong was still talking and was still having conversations with people a few days before he died.

PT: When was the money sent to him, and when did he die?

IKIDDEH: I have no idea.

PT: What was the money for?

IKIDDEH: He was in Uyo Specialist Hospital. And from what I have heard, he was supposed to be flown abroad for treatment.

PT: We need to ask you this before we let you go. Are you working with Akpabio as one of his aides or something?

IKIDDEH: I am not going to answer that question, please.

PT: You said the $35,000 was for Ufot Ebong’s treatment abroad. Isn’t this an indictment that Senator Akpabio was a governor of Akwa Ibom State, and he couldn’t build a hospital that could take care of residents?

IKIDDEH: When Akpabio was the governor of Akwa Ibom, he was the only governor who built a specialist hospital. The primary purpose of that hospital was to stop people from travelling out of Nigeria to London or the US. He brought in a team of expatriates before he left. When Governor Udom Emmanuel came, everything that Akpabio put in place, including the expatriate team, everything was completely taken out. There are even equipment that were imported but not installed.

PT: How about getting Ufot Ebong to another hospital in Nigeria that would have probably treated him?

IKIDDEH: Unfortunately, we are in a situation now in Nigeria where we don’t trust anything in this country. There might be hospitals out there in Nigeria that would have given Ufot Ebong the quality service he needed to survive, but you see when you are treated here in London, where I am, they don’t think about the money. And that is the difference between the health service here and the health service in Nigeria. The first thing on their mind is how to save you. But in Nigeria, the first thing they (the hospital) consider is how much money they are going to collect from you. That is why sending Ufot Ebong abroad was the best option.