The Governor of Akwa Ibom state, Chief Godswill Akpabio has stated that for Nigeria to achieve greatness the walls of ethnicity must be broken and the diversity of the nation celebrated above tribalism.<\/p>\n
Governor Akpabio stated this while delivering a keynote address at the Newsworld\/Nigerian Pilot Lecture\/Awards and Dinner Nite in Abuja on Tuesday. The Newspaper in recognition of the developmental strides of Chief Akpabio named him the Governor of the Year 2012.<\/p>\n
He stressed that Nigeria should take a cue from the American example, which, despite their multi-cultural mix, have bonded together to form the greatest country on earth signposted by the emergence of Barack Obama, an African from Kenya, as the president:<\/p>\n
According to him \u2018\u2019the United States has become the greatest country in the world. They did not get to this status because the country is composed of one people. Rather the United States has the greatest cultural mix in the world, with citizens drawn from every nook and cranny of the world.<\/p>\n
\u201cAs a matter of fact, it has more cultural diversity than our country. Surely if Jewish Americans and Arab Americans and all the other ethnic units in America can unite and bond together, then we in Nigeria have no reason to be talking tribalism and ethnicity. History will not forgive us for failing to turn our diversity into strength,\u2019\u2019 he said.<\/p>\n
The Governor made reference to the Akwa Ibom state example where his administration has opened up the state to all Nigerians, irrespective of their origin, with the free and compulsory education policy and the employment policies in all projects which reflect the diversity of the country:<\/p>\n
Chief Akpabio also used the occasion to drum up support for President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan and maintained that he has shown exemplary leadership in power, gas, agriculture, infrastructure, gender and institutional reform and transformation, and called on Nigerians to keep him in their thoughts and prayers.<\/p>\n
The well attended ceremony had distinguished personalities from all sectors of the economy honoured for their outstanding achievements with the highpoint being the naming of Chief Akpabio as Governor of the year 2012.<\/p>\n
Anietie Ekong
\nSpecial Assistant (Media) To The Governor
\nAbuja<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Governor of Akwa Ibom state, Chief Godswill Akpabio has stated that for Nigeria to achieve greatness the walls of ethnicity must be broken and the diversity of the nation…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":7395,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7393","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"yoast_head":"\n