by Culled from Caliton
The Senator representing Cross River North in Nigeria’s Senate, Jarigbe Agom Jarigbe, says he is fully involved and has endorsed the idea of creating Ogoja State, out of present day Cross River State.
Jarigbe also came clear that his insistence that Ogoja State be created out of Cross River State, is not an endorsement that seeks to
dismember CRS, but a well intentioned endorsement that will take development to one of Nigeria’s oldest province, still largely underdeveloped and marginalised in the scheme of things.
The senator who bared his mind early Saturday morning, June 22, 2024, when he appeared as guest on “The Public View”, HIT 95.9 FM, Calabar’s flagship news and current affairs programme, was particular that, “Ebonyi is what it is today because it was carved out of Enugu and made a state. It has brought development to that part of Nigeria
and there’s the added advantage of bringing governance close to the people. As I speak, Ogoja is the only old provincial headquarters in Nigeria that has not been made a state capital and this is sad, I must say.”
On attempts to classify and position Ogoja as belonging to Nigeria’s middle belt, Jarigbe insisted that, “Ogoja belongs to the South-South of Nigeria, we do not belong to the Middle belt because our people are in the South-South, our culture, our tradition; and we cannot be classified as belonging to the Middle because we are not.”
