A special interview with the governorship candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in Akwa Ibom State and civil engineer, Engr. Dr Emem Coffie.
Engineer Dr Emem Coffie speaks on the values that shaped him, youth development, the need for industrialisation and why Akwa Ibom State must return to its original development plan.
Beyond his professional accomplishments, Engineer Dr Emem Coffie believes that values, integrity and compassion should guide leadership and public service.
A civil and structural engineer with about 35 years of professional experience, Coffie is also an entrepreneur, consultant and public figure whose interest in governance is shaped by his Christian upbringing and belief in the importance of human development.
In this interview, he speaks on his personal values, his passion for young people, the place of education in national development, the challenges confronting Nigeria and his vision for Akwa Ibom State under his proposed agenda, “A New Drive Back to the Genesis.”
Q: Beyond your professional achievements and public profile, who is Emem Coffie, and what values have shaped the man you have become?
Coffie: My name is Engineer Dr Emem Coffie. I am a civil and structural engineer, an entrepreneur and a practising engineer. I have been practising for about 35 years.
I’m married with children, male and female. I have contested before for the office of the Governor of Akwaibom state under the Accord Party and I will be going again in 2026 under the People’s Democratic Party.
I am also a Christian. I started my active Christian life at the age of 11. I was a member of the Scripture Union and later the Christian Union. I grew up with that level of consciousness and the values and virtues of the 1970s and 1980s.
That has made me intrinsically and extrinsically a very compassionate person.
The way it has affected me in business is that I have values and virtues, ethics, things that I feel are right and things I feel are wrong. I have boundaries for certain things I can do and cannot do in the pursuit of my career, whether in politics or in practice.
The things that you see as ethically wrong, particularly wrong, compassionately wrong, I have limits in everything I do. That has guided me, and that is why I have these programmes I do for youths and people.
I believe in good governance. I believe in a government where whoever is at the top is concerned about what people feel and what is going on with the people they are governing, not just playing and practising the 48 Laws of Power, which is what most of our leaders are doing.
You treat people like pawns and you do not really care what happens, provided you get your way through. That is not the kind of leadership I believe in.
Q: You have supported young people, including helping some with their education. What drives your passion for children and youth development, and what kind of future do you want for them?
Coffie: The truth is that there is a wave going around that people will begin to feel education is a waste of time. But education has created a system, and whether you like it or not, the countries that are developed today worked with those systems and became what they are.
I am an engineer, for example. You hear people say that all the theories you read are not important and that it is just the practicals that matter. The truth is that engineering is probably 90 per cent scientific theory and 10 per cent empirical.
Our academic system is still important to guide the youths. If you want to be a robotics engineer, for example, you must have an understanding of physics, chemistry and other relevant basic sciences. You must also understand mechanical engineering, electronics engineering and electrical engineering before you begin to specialise in robotics.
You cannot jump into robotics without a basic understanding of science.
My passion for the youths is that they finish their basic educational pursuits and, after that, they can specialise. You can become a photographer or do any other thing, but that basic understanding and knowledge puts you at an advantage over other people.
I want to see a country where the youths are very specific in their achievements and where they are going.
We complain that our leaders are old. The truth is that the leaders do not even find their feet when they are 50. Nobody believes in you until you are above 50. That is because you yourself did not find your feet on time.
There should be a system where we identify talents early, but education should be a basic norm, a basic denominator across the board.
Everybody does not need to go to university. That is where we get it wrong. Whatever level or trade you want to pursue, the government should support you, train you and make you relevant.
Q: After more than three decades in engineering, entrepreneurship and project development, what have you learnt about Nigeria and what do you believe needs to change?
Coffie: The truth is that Nigerians seem to have lost value and virtue. These are the two things that are missing, and in error, we have continually conflated towards failure.
As a consultant, the basic system that was working in this country before, and all over the world, is that you have checks and balances.
If you have an engineering project, for example, you have an expert who conceives and designs the project or designs it based on what has been conceived, and then monitors the execution.
But we have changed to a system where the executor is the alpha and omega. You give a project to an executor, and they go ahead and dictate what the design should be. When they cut corners, you do not know. When they inflate the project, you do not know. We just work based on what we have been told.
That is one of the things that has destroyed the economy.
We have a system where either the president is all-powerful or the state governor is almighty, without proper checks and balances. The system of values and virtues is totally gone.
We also have a system where it does not matter how you make money. Once you have the money, you are respected. Questions are not asked.
When you lose value and virtue, your system produces the wrong leaders. I always say something: a leader is a subset of a society. Leaders do not fall from heaven. When the values and virtues of a society are wrong, they are going to have wrong leaders.
We are looking for a better Nigeria where we should probably go back to where we were before, where value and virtue are key. Questionable wealth is questionable wealth.
We also have policy inconsistency. I am the coordinator of JG Vanguard, and we started in 2014. We advocated for consistency in policies.
Nigeria is like a country that takes five steps forward and four steps backwards. A government comes and makes policies, and when it leaves, another government comes, condemns all the policies and starts all over again.
We need continuity in governance. A new administration should examine what its predecessors have done, identify what worked and what needs improvement, and build on the progress already made.
Q: If you are elected Governor of Akwa Ibom, what would you do differently from what previous administrations have done, and what would be your priorities for building a more productive state?
Coffie: For this period, we need to go back to the genesis. Go back to the plan. Increase the execution of projects that are very important in the development of Akwa Ibom State.
Akwa Ibom is a very rich state, but when you go down to the state, the people are very poor.
Like I tell people, yes, I am an engineer. Road construction is interesting, but road construction does not put food on the table of people.
When you read economics, one of the reasons for siting an industry wherever you site it is access roads. If you do the roads and you do not have the requisite industries that utilise the roads, then the roads will be used by Okada, Keke and the very one per cent of rich people who have cars.
The people are poor. Akwa Ibom has no industries. I stand to be proven wrong.
We should be looking at a system where we go back to the master plan, look at the projects that were done and those that need to be done, and then begin to look at human capital development.
If Akwa Ibom is a technology state and you have oil, you should look at oil and gas industries coming there. You should have refineries coming there. What should be your preferred area of speciality? You train the youths in those areas that will make them relevant in the industries that will be coming in.
We should have gas-to-liquid plants, refineries, gas plants and steel plants. Then, where will our youths be? Will they be capable of working in those places? You begin to prepare them and empower them to learn such skills. During that period, pay them, even if they are participating in an apprenticeship scheme, so that you can encourage them.
I would also want to have more SME programmes and small-scale industries. Encourage Nigerian banks that are warehousing our state funds to give soft loans to small businesses so that they can establish themselves.
There should be a fruit market. People selling agricultural products on a small scale should be given support to increase their capital base. Those doing supermarket businesses should also be supported.
I am looking at having cottage industries in local governments. Akwa Ibom has palm oil, and it is among the best. I do not know why we cannot have palm oil refineries, co-managed through a public-private partnership between the state government and investors.
We can also use palm kernel to produce briquettes. These are raw materials for industries, and there are a lot of them available.
I want to embark on cottage industries across local governments that will employ the youths, create value for suppliers and provide markets for distributors. That way, money will circulate without having to come from the governor or the government.
We need to build up the average Akwa Ibom man and woman. The average Akwa Ibom man and woman are poor outside politics. They may have skills, but they do not have the means of establishing themselves.
Q: You speak about “A New Drive Back to the Genesis.” What does this mean to you, and what legacy do you want to leave for the people, especially the younger generation?
Coffie: When I say “Genesis”, I mean going back to the original master plan for Akwa Ibom State and continuing the development projects that were conceived for the state.
In 1999, we had a governor who had a plan. His name was Obong Victor Attah. There was a master plan for the development of Akwa Ibom State. The airport we are benefiting from today was part of that plan.
The much-talked-about deep seaport, road network, airport, power plants and science park were also part of the programme. These were long-term projects, and no single administration could have completed all of them.
By now, we should have executed most of those projects. Instead of abandoning plans whenever a new government comes in, we should return to the master plan and continue from where the previous administration stopped.
The science park, for example, was supposed to empower youths. More than 20 years later, nothing has happened. As an engineer, I know what a science park can do for young people.
If we need a deep seaport, it does not matter where it is located along the coastline, provided it can benefit the communities and the state. We should stop arguing about location and return to the plan.
Development is not just the construction of roads. We need to look at the development of human beings, the establishment of people in business and the encouragement of those with skills to become the best in their areas of core competence.
I want a system where people can put food on their tables without having to chase anybody for money.
We need to build a state where young people can acquire skills, find jobs, establish businesses and contribute to the economy. That is what I mean by going back to the genesis and moving Akwa Ibom forward.
