It is most probably that “the celebration of Chief Don Obot Etiebet ‘ by the Petroleum Club Lagos was the last public event attended by Governor Umo Eno before death came to his doorstep and snatched his beloved wife from the firm grip of his loving hands. It appears that the deceased was already on sick bed before her husband took a trip to join a section of Nigeria’s business moguls in honouring the octogenarian elder statesman.

The invaluable cost borne by the governor should not be estimated by the air trip from Akwa Ibom to Lagos or the hectic vehicular movement he embarked on from the airport in Ikeja to the venue of the programme in Victoria Island, but by the trouble he took in keeping the troubling issue of his wife’s health at bay in order to present the face of Akwa Ibom State government at an event celebrating a man he personally hold in a very high esteem.

Eno’s presence at the event was exceptional. It marks the first time in history that Akwa Ibom state governor participated in honouring a man, who, besides other painstaking contributions, was among those on the frontline for the creation of the state in 1987. The egregiousness of the governor’s act could be further underscored from the point that unlike some of Eno’s predecessors, nothing could be readily spotted to have been Etiebet’s personal quota to who the governor is today. 

Over the years in Akwa Ibom, the geophysicist and ICT guru has been given a caterpillar treatment – considered best at bulldozing a tract and bad and dangerous to ply the same bulldozed tract. What Eno’s outing for Etiebet about 24 hours before the death of the First Lady shows is that leadership, especially at the public realm, entails abandonment of personal matters to achieve  public good. 

It is unfortunate for leaders that it is only the glorious face of power, always glittering with happiness that may not be gold, that people often see, and not their personal naturalness, including wear and tears, which those on leadership throne, like the rest of the people in the world, are not immune from. In one of her speeches to parliament in 1601 dubbed “Golden Speech”, Queen Elizabeth 1, put it this way: “To be a king and wear a crown is a thing more glorious to them that see it than it is a pleasant to them that bear it.” 

There is no guarantee that Patience Umo Eno’s life would have been saved had the husband stayed put around her bedside for 365 days, but the governor would have had some sort of consolatory relief had he spent considerable length of time with her before she passed on. That was one of the worrisome part of leadership that the governor bore around the hours of her wife’s death.

Patience, whose name was prefixed with “Pastor” like her husband, was a prime factor in what predominantly characterises the Umo Eno leadership. Only very few persons would attempt to dispute Etiebet’s joint statement with his wife, Nike Imaobong Etiebet, that she “was a virtuous woman, worth more than gold and diamonds to her husband, … caring, loving and mother to all Akwa Ibomites irrespective of which political divide you belong.”

When Eno’s name was embroiled in scandal-woven controversy over alleged discrepancies in his curriculum vitae, which led to multifaceted litigations climaxing at Nigeria’s apex court, a number of writers and analysts at formal and informal platforms, including the anchor of this piece, were so verbose in dragging the pastor-politician to precipice of garbage. Amidst the hullaballoo, Patience patiently struck a stinger with no strand of venom but springboard, soothing with romantic love and assuaging with motherly milk. The hilarity that attained Patience’s public pronouncement that Umo Eno is her “Golden Boy” spiraled beyond the spontaneity and momentousness of the day.

Even before the final court of the land ruled in Eno’s favour the about-to-be rotten name was subsumed by “Golden Boy.” Nothing could be more comforting and boosting than when one’s closest person comes to public protection or projection of the name of a loved one pummeling in pillory in an action the protector or projector might not have been privy of. Patience Umo Eno posthumously deserves to be in the class of few women that should be chaired by Hillary Clinton, former U.S. First Lady and later Secretary of State.

In the course of grieving, life still goes on for the living. Amidst weakness occasioned by sorrow that death of a loved one subjects the living to, it is onerous on the part of the mourners, especially closed relatives of the dead, to summon more strength, for it is by being strengthened that they can contain the worrisome situation that the demise of their loved one has subjected them to. No one would be more grieving than the Umo Enos as far as this particular death is the subject matter. 

Owing to the public position occupied by the patriarch of the family, their grieving is undergoing a dimension different from what other folks affected by such occurrence are going through. Even the publicity that Patience’s passage has assumed is problematic on its own – and it is hard to insulate from it. 

However illustrious and loveable a dead person was while alive, death, at the moment can only draw a curtain on the life of the dead and not the living. Patience demise has, evidently, landed Eno a mourning honey moon – in addition to the one he got earlier on account of his humble disposition and free-flow of amity. 

Since honey moon is always temporary, in a very short time, people will start asking the governor to put on golden action to governance in Akwa Ibom, especially in terms of improving economic welfare of vast number of impoverished Akwa Ibom people.

Questions may be asked on when the implementation of COVID-19 Economic Recovery, which the governor was a member under the immediate past Udom Emmanuel administration will come up. Questions will still be asked on the standard of education as envisaged in Education Summit organised in the previous administration.

Questions upon questions will continue as to when the proposed General Hospital in Ukanafun (commenced 16 years ago but unlawful abandoned with impunity by the very administration that initiated it) will be completed, especially since the governor has resolved the legal logjam and caused work to resume in batches. 

Such questions should not be seen as inconsiderate but the worrying part of public leadership. After all, the governor has since been carrying out other public responsibilities, including leading his party to victory on October 5, local government polls.

With no sign of a disturbed person seen on the face of the governor on that September 25 in Lagos, he alluded to his being nicknamed “Golden boy” and categorised Etiebet’s wife, whom he called “Golden Lady” of being his type. Now he needs more strength than what he showed a night before his wife’s death to lighten millions of lives.

Gratifyingly, the remnants deeds of the departed Akwa Ibom First Lady are not going with her remains to the grave. The Golden boy, which gives rise to the Umo Eno Administration being called “Golden Era” will be lingering privately and publicly with the governor. 

The lingering of that legacy will be of both tears and thrills. Thrilling that within a relatively short time, Patience Umo Eno left an imprint that could be tapped for greater good of humanity. The tears, which will always come, and can only be controlled for the rest of the governor’s life, is where the new worries of the Golden boy will be stemming from. 
Ekanem sent this piece from Lagos. He can be reached via:[email protected]