Senators, their aides and journalists
attending a 2-day retreat for members of the 10th Senate in Ikot Ekpene, the hometown of President of the Senate, Godswill Akpabio were left in the lurch without accommodation on arrival.
The contingent from Abuja had arrived Uyo at about 7:45 pm on Wednesday after which the senators and others with them embarked on roughly another one hour drive out of Uyo, the capital of Akwa Ibom to Ikot-Ekpene.
But upon arrival, the rooms available were inadequate at the Four Points hotel to take everyone in.
Organizers of the retreat, the National Institute for Legislative and Democratic Studies, (NILDS) were in dishevelment trying to make up for the embarrassment after Senators waited endlessly at the hotel lobby.
The Nationalupdate gathered that NILDS had made accommodation arrangements for only the Senators, and about 12 resource persons at FourPoints hotel, which is also venue of the retreat.
It however did not take time for tempers to start flaring between some NILDS officials and some aides especially those from the Office of the President of the Senate about the shoddy handling of the entire trip starting with the flight from Abuja.
The aides were displeased with the entire arrangement by the Democratic Institute that brought them to Ikot Ekpene without rooms for them in the same hotel with their principals.
The situation was worse for the journalists who were invited by the Office of the President of the Senate to join in the trip to Akwa Ibom for the coverage of the retreat.
Many of them were seen stranded as they managed to squart on the couch in the hotel lobby for the night.