Air Commodore Otuekong Idongesit Nkanga (27 January 1952 – 24 December 2020) was a Nigerian former Air Commodore.

Career

He was governor of

Akwa Ibom State Akwa Ibom State is a state in the South-South geopolitical zone of Nigeria, bordered on the east by Cross River State, on the west by Rivers State and Abia State, and on the south by the Atlantic Ocean. The state takes its name from the Qua Iboe ...

Nigeria Nigeria ( ), , ig, Naìjíríyà, yo, Nàìjíríà, pcm, Naijá , ff, Naajeeriya, kcg, Naijeriya officially the Federal Republic of Nigeria, is a country in West Africa. It is situated between the Sahel to the north and the Gulf o ...

from September 1990 to January 1992 during the military regime of General

Ibrahim Babangida Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida (born 17 August, 1941) is a retired Nigerian Army general and politician. He served as military president of Nigeria from 1985 until his resignation in 1993. He rose through the ranks to serve from 1984 to 1985 as Ch ...

, handing over to an elected civilian Governor at the start of the

Nigerian Third Republic The Third Republic was the planned republican government of Nigeria in 1993 which was to be governed by the Third Republican constitution. Founded (1993) The constitution of the Third Republic was drafted in 1989. General Ibrahim Badamasi B ...

Idongesit Nkanga
When appointed in 1990, his deputy governor was Obong

Ufot Ekaette Ufot Ekaette (born 1939) was appointed the first Nigerian Minister of Niger Delta on 17 December 2008 by President Umaru Yar'Adua. He left office in March 2010 when acting president Goodluck Jonathan dissolved his cabinet. Background Ekaette w ...

, who later became Secretary to the Government of the Federation. The Akwa Ibom Broadcasting Corporation was established by edict in April 1988. Wing Commander Nkanga officially commissioned the station on 27 July 1991. In May 2001, Nkanga became a member of the board of the Cooperative Development Bank. In 2002, he was said to seeking to be candidate for the Nigeria Democratic Party (NDP) in the 2003 elections for Governor of Akwa-Ibom State. In 2007, Nkanga was appointed Chairman of the Akwa Ibom Airport Implementation Committee. The International airport was opened on November 26, 2009 Although the primary focus was on cargo traffic and airplane maintenance repair and overhaul, the airport started by serving commercial local passenger flights. In December 2009, as an elder of the

Ibibio people The Ibibio people (English: / ɪbɪˈbiːəʊ/) are a coastal people in southern Nigeria. They are mostly found in Akwa Ibom and Cross River States. They are related to the Efik people. During the colonial period in Nigeria, the Ibibio Union as ...

he was a strong supporter of Akwa-Ibom Governor

Godswill Akpabio Chief Godswill Obot Akpabio, (born 9 December 1962), is a Nigerian lawyer and politician. He is the former Minister of Niger Delta Affairs as he resigned on 11 May 2022 on the direction of President Muhammadu Buhari to contest at presidentia ...

. In January 2010, he was a member of the South-South Elders and Leaders' Forum. Discussing the issue of handing over from the ailing President

Umaru Yar'Adua Umaru Musa Yar'Adua (16 August 19515 May 2010) was a Nigerian politician who, was the President of Nigeria from 2007 to 2010. He was declared the winner of the Nigerian presidential election held on 21 April 2007, and was sworn in on 29 May 20 ...

to Vice-president

Goodluck Jonathan Goodluck Ebele Azikiwe Jonathan (born 20 November 1957)Lawson Heyford, ''The Source'' (Lagos), 11 December 2006. is a Nigerian politician who served as the President of Nigeria from 2010 to 2015. He lost the 2015 presidential election to fo ...

, he said the issue was not a north–south one, but was about following the constitution.

Death

Nkanga died from

COVID-19 Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a contagious disease caused by a virus, the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The first known case was COVID-19 pandemic in Hubei, identified in Wuhan, China, in December ...

on 24 December 2020, aged 69.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Nkanga, Idongesit 2020 deaths National Democratic Party (Nigeria) politicians Nigerian military governors of Akwa Ibom State Ibibio people 1952 births Deaths from the COVID-19 pandemic in Nigeria