Prince Bassey Otu’s Cross River: Foundation, Not Fanfare — An Editorial for the Sceptics.

By Peter Agi

Leadership is easy to critique and hard to execute, and that truth matters when assessing Senator Prince Bassey Edet Otu’s nearly three years in office in Cross River State from May 2023 to May 2026. For a state long labelled a “civil service state” with moribund assets and dwindling economic relevance, the question is not whether everything is fixed, but whether the foundations for recovery have been laid. A dispassionate reading of records from 2023 to date suggests that yes, foundations are being laid. They are uneven, incomplete, and tested by Nigeria’s harsh fiscal climate, but they are visible across the strata of governance.

Otu campaigned on a “People First Agenda” and has tried to institutionalise it through consultation rather than command. He set up a State Elders’ Forum, an Economic Management Team, a Strategic Policy Advisory Committee, and a Party Caucus Forum, repeatedly saying he did not have all the answers and that development could only come through collective effort. That inclusivity has extended to his cabinet, which he says reflects every ethnic nationality, local government area, and senatorial district. Stakeholder groups, including the Cross River South Consultative Forum, have passed votes of confidence citing his grassroots connection and proactive appointments. For critics, the test of this style is whether consultation delivers results, and the record shows movement from talk to targeted projects.

The central economic challenge Otu inherited was over-dependence on federal allocation and a bloated civil service. His response has been to re-anchor the economy on agriculture, infrastructure, and private investment. Agriculture was repositioned as the backbone of the economy, with crop-specific clusters mapped across the state for rice, cassava, oil palm, cocoa, and coffee. In the first phase, 108 mini tractors were distributed to farmers’ cooperatives to cut the cost of land preparation, with plans to deploy 324 statewide. Over 12,000 hectares are being cleared for rice, maize, cassava, wheat, coffee, and cowpea, an intervention projected to lift thousands out of unemployment. The administration also distributed more than 625,000 oil palm seedlings, established 600 hectares of cassava farms, trained smallholder farmers, and completed digital soil fertility mapping, the first of its kind in the South-South, to guide agro-investors. Through federal and state schemes like LIFE-ND, FADAMA, and APPEALS, more than 2,000 youth and women have been empowered with inputs and processing equipment, yielding over ₦4.74 billion in income. Oil palm estates mismanaged for years were repossessed and handed to Wilmar for rehabilitation, while a Special Agro-Industrial Processing Zone was broken ground with the African Development Bank. A Deforestation-Free Policy was also launched to keep Cross River cocoa, coffee, and oil palm compliant with European market rules.

On industry and investment, the government is working to revive moribund assets such as the Cross River Noodles Factory, the Poultry Processing Plant, and Calapharm, while Tinapa Business and Resort Limited was reclaimed from AMCON and discussions with investors have begun. The biggest bet is the Bakassi Deep Seaport, which received Federal Executive Council approval with a $2.27 billion capital outlay and the Certificate of Compliance in December 2025. If delivered, it would reposition Cross River as a West African maritime and logistics hub. Infrastructure efforts have focused on roads like the Calabar-Akamkpa rehabilitation, Okuku-Yala Road, and rural access roads, alongside solar-powered streetlights in cities and solar mini-grids for rural communities. The Electricity Law of 2025 was passed to enable state-level generation and distribution. In human capital, facilities across the three senatorial districts were renovated and equipped, the General Hospital in Ikom is nearing completion, all Schools of Nursing gained accreditation, and a Maternal and Neonatal Mortality Reduction Initiative was introduced. Cross River ranked first nationwide in routine immunization coverage at 95 percent. Attention has also gone to the University of Cross River State, the College of Education Akamkpa, and youth skills training in agriculture, digital skills, and entrepreneurship.

Fiscal discipline has been another emphasis. Otu inherited what he described as an empty treasury and has paid ₦55 billion toward inherited debts. The 2026 budget of ₦780.6 billion allocates 67 percent to capital expenditure, with ₦421 billion for the economic sector. Salaries, pensions, and the new minimum wage are being paid across the tiers, and the first tranche of gratuities has been cleared with the second underway. The administration insists it cannot spend without legal appropriation, and a supplementary budget was signed for urgent road repairs, rural electrification, and counterpart funding for national projects.

No administration escapes criticism, and objectivity requires naming the gaps. Critics have flagged borrowing for airplanes without clear repayment plans and questioned spending on renovations at a time of fiscal strain. Tourism assets like Obudu Cattle Ranch and Tinapa have underperformed for years, and Cross River still lags in VAT contribution. Security challenges such as cultism, kidnapping, and cross-border crime remain national problems, though the government reactivated Operation Akpakwu and holds regular security council meetings. Homeland Security officials have commended improvements in the Central Senatorial District. The administration’s response has been to focus on asset recovery, public-private partnerships for oil palm estates, and using infrastructure as an enabler of stability.

Beyond projects, leadership is also about character. Otu frames governance as a sacred duty and service to the people, and observers often note his calm demeanour and unassuming disposition. The consistency of “People First” messaging, from budget speeches to New Year addresses, suggests a leader trying to anchor policy in moral responsibility. That matters in a polity weary of transactional politics.

To move from foundation to prosperity, the next phase must tighten the loop. Cross River must aggressively widen its internally generated revenue and tax net without burdening the poor, now that agro-zones, Bakassi, and revived factories are in the pipeline. Public-private partnerships should be expanded with transparent concession agreements and performance metrics. Reclaiming Tinapa is step one; operational management, marketing, and linking it to Calabar Carnival, Obudu Ranch, and Afi Mountain into a tourism circuit is step two. A public debt dashboard showing what was inherited, what is new, what asset backs each loan, and how repayment will work would build trust. And the income gains from agriculture must be scaled by linking cooperatives directly to off-takers so farmers are guaranteed markets, not just inputs.

Criticism is healthy because it keeps government honest, but criticism without context becomes noise. From 2023 to May 2026, Governor Bassey Otu has not performed miracles, and he does not claim to have. What the records show is a deliberate pivot away from a state defined only by salaries toward one defined by production, infrastructure, and investment readiness. The seaport is not yet built, but the final approval is secured. Farms are not yet exporting at full scale, but hectares are being cleared and soil maps exist. Tinapa is not yet humming, but ownership is back and investors are being courted. That is the definition of foundation-laying. It is less dramatic than ribbon-cutting, but more enduring than headlines. To naysayers, the task is to interrogate the data, demand accountability, and also acknowledge progress where it exists. If the next phase matches the discipline of the first three years, then the days of Cross River as just a civil service state may indeed be over. The work continues.

Peter Agi (FCA)
A Public Affairs Commentator
Writes from Ijegu-Ojor
Yala LGA