Venatius Ikem's Defection: A Storm in a Teacup That Will Not Fill The Sea.
By Asuquo Solomon
The defection of Venatius Ikem, immediate past Chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in Cross River State, to the All Progressives Congress (APC) has been dressed up as a masterstroke. In truth, it is nothing more than a storm in a teacup; noisy at the rim, empty at the centre.
Let us call it what it is. More than 100 days to a defining governorship contest, when history demands loyalty, sacrifice, and clarity of conviction, a man who sat atop the PDP for five long years, who enjoyed every privilege the party could bestow-State Chairman, former National Publicity Secretary, leader of leaders-chose to walk away at dusk. Not because the PDP changed, but because his personal compass shifted toward where the lights looked brighter in Obudu.
Ikem says the PDP lacks direction and coherence. But who was chairman when that direction was supposedly lost? Who presided over the ward congresses, the local government structures, the reconciliation meetings that failed? If the house lost direction, the watchman cannot claim innocence. He was the watchman.
What does the APC gain? A photograph. A rally in Obudu. A headline that lasts 48 hours. What does it not gain? The grassroots that never belonged to Ikem in the first place. Cross River PDP was never built on one man's charisma; it was built in the markets of Ikom, the creeks of Bakassi, the farms of Ogoja, the streets of Calabar South.
And to give this hollow defection a semblance of grandeur, the APC rolled out its choreographed speakers-and in their speeches lies the deception.
So let the APC roll out the carpets in Obudu. Let the Deputy Governor, Dr Peter Odey, call it an endorsement. The PDP knows better. The people know better. This is not any political earthquake. This is not a realignment. This is a man leaving his father's house because he saw a neighbour cooking meat.
The Chief of Staff to the Governor, Mr. Emmanuel Ironbar, standing in as the master facilitator of this "return," told the crowd that Ikem had finally "tasted the season of sweetness and accommodation." What an accidental confession.
Season of sweetness for whom? For the market woman in Watt Market who buys rice at N2,000 per cup? For the youth in Obudu who have no job despite the so-called transformation of the Ranch? For the civil servant whose salary cannot carry him to the end of the month?
The resignation of one Chairman does not erase the anger of Cross Riverians over bad governance, economic hardship, and the failed promises of the APC both at the State and national levels.
Ironbar's speech was not governance; it was public relations. He spoke of accommodation, a euphemism for political settlement. His weakness is that he reduced governance to stomach infrastructure. He did not speak of the cost of governance, of the debt profile of the state, of the measurable impact of Governor Otu's People First agenda after two years. He spoke of "sweetness." That is how you know a government that has run out of substance — when its Chief of Staff, its engine room, is reduced to marketing sweetness instead of showing statistics.
Ironbar also claimed credit for facilitating Ikem's return to "rebuild political relationships." But what relationships? The relationship between Ikem and his own PDP family is broken by his own hand. You cannot destroy a family and then ask your new landlord to praise you for rebuilding community. The deception is that Ironbar presents defection as development, as if moving one politician from one party to another will tar the Obudu-Abakaliki road or make the Bebi airstrip work.
Then the APC State Chairman, Hon. Chris Etta's speech was even more revealing. Weeks ago, he said cautiously that the APC "would receive Ikem if he decided to join." At the rally, he suddenly declared the defection as a sign of APC's growing appeal and invincibility in Cross River.
That contradiction is the weakness. If APC is truly popular and people-centred, as Etta claims, why does it need to import a former PDP chairman who just two months ago was condemning it? A truly strong party does not shop for opponents; it defeats them at the polls. Etta's celebration exposes an inferiority complex; a ruling party that still seeks validation from the opposition it claims to have defeated.
Etta also failed to answer the question every Cross Riverian is asking: Where is the register of new members? You claim thousands of supporters followed Ikem, but where are they? In Obudu, politics is not a rally; it is ward by ward. PDP still controls the hearts of the polling units because PDP people did not defect with Ikem. Only his cap moved.
Moreover, Etta's claim that this defection is a "setback for the PDP in the northern senatorial district" is political wishful thinking. The North that produced Senator Jarigbe Agom, Hon. Peter Akpanke, and strong PDP local structures did not empty into APC because one man moved. That is the delusion of chairman speeches; they mistake the noise of the high table for the voice of the field.
What's the future that awaits Ikem?
Let us project Ikem's political future with the clarity that deception provides.
A man who defects on greed never lands on solid ground. In the APC, he will find a crowded hall of older defectors, each promised heaven, each fighting for the same small stool near Governor Otu. He will be celebrated today as "an extraordinary endorsement" and forgotten tomorrow when a bigger fish jumps.
Again, deception has a short shelf life. The same tongue that told PDP members that APC had failed Cross Riverians will now tell APC members that PDP failed. People may clap at defection rallies, but in the secrecy of the ballot, they remember who stood with them when it mattered.
Finally, ambition without loyalty is a candle in the wind. Ikem may have bought temporary relevance, but he has sold the one asset every great politician needs: trust. Who will trust him in 2027 to stay? Who will give him the ticket, the structure, the war chest, knowing he abandoned the last party he led at the most critical hour?
History is littered with such men in Cross River politics; loud in defection, silent in election. They defect with drums; they return in whispers.
By February, the teacup will have settled. Ironbar's sweetness will have soured, Etta's celebration will have faded, and Ikem will discover what every political wanderer learns too late: you can defect to a ruling party, but you cannot defect to the ruling will of the people.
Solomon is a Policy and Development Communication Expert.
