C’River state gov locks out SSG, gov’s office staffers for lateness

The secretary to the government of Cross River state, Barrister Tina Agbor, was among the senior civil servants locked out by the governor, Prof Ben Ayade, on Wednesday.

The deputy governor, Professor Ivara Esu, narrowly escaped being locked out too. The governor was said to have arrived his office before 7:30 am when he observed that his office was yet to be opened for official duty.

When the office was eventually opened moments later, he directed that all entrances be locked and no one allowed gaining access to the office while he monitored the development on his CCTV. It was gathered that the chief press secretary to the governor, Mr. Christian Ita, was the only appointee in the office with two members of the Press corps; Daniel Williams and Nakanda Iyadim.

Interestingly, Prof Ayade’s deputy, Professor Ivara Esu, arrived a few minutes past 8:00am and was allowed in without hesitation while two security operatives sneaked in with his convoy much to the chagrin of their colleagues made little effort to stop them. However, source hinted that Professor Esu has been consistent in his time of arrival; he has been arriving office around 8:00am every time he is not out of Calabar.

At the main gate of the governor’s office, public and civil servants, security aides and other appointees were kept out by stern looking security operatives in the governor’s convoy. The gates were however opened at 9:00am with some staff allowed to go in while those who came later were still standing outside.

Interestingly, some staff who got in signed the time register for their colleagues and when present, were not allowed entry as the security operatives faulted claims that they had arrived earlier.

It will be recalled that Governor Ayade, upon resumption of duty in June 2015, locked out some staff that arrived late for duty (after 8am) which was the official resumption time for civil servants. Since then, yesterday’s incident was another major action on punctuality in recent time by the governor.