Governor Peter Obi of Anambra has dismissed claims by his predecessor, Senator Chris Ngige, that the Anambra State Government had received more that N2trillon in the last seven years from the federation account.
Obi, who was reacting to claims by Ngige that he (Obi) had nothing to show for the humongous amount of money he received since 2006 in the development of infrastructure, said he must be a magician to convert the paltry sum his government had been receiving from the federation account into trillions of naira.
Obi, who spoke while inspecting the rehabilitation of the Rojenny Stadium, Oba, said with the N3bn monthly allocation to the state, Anambra could not have got anything close to a quarter of a trillion naira in the seven years he had been in office.
He referred Ngige to the numerous development projects his government has been executing, which far outnumber the projects all the previous governments in the state had executed.
Obi said he knew the machinations of the enemies of the state under different guises to distract him, but that he would not be distracted.
“For those who hate the development of Anambra State or who scheme for the money meant for development to be shared among them, let me happily increase their blood pressure by announcing that by the end of the year, we will spend billions of naira to procure buses for all secondary schools in the state, buy computers for all primary schools in the state, among other revolutionary measures that are coming,” Obi said.
We did the math, and Obi is right. . In six years, all Anambra got if the rate is N3billion is N216billion – less than a quarter of a trillion naira. We also stumbled on this 2011 Vanguard piece where Obi’s information commissioner calls for an ‘improvement’ on his state’s N2billion allocation.
All this leaves us with the N2trillion question. Just how did Grandfather Ngige happen over the figure N2trillion?
PRESS STATEMENT
PETER OBI’S GOVERNMENT AND NGIGEPHOBIA
The attention of His Excellency, Dr. Chris Nwabueze Ngige (OON, KSJ) former governor of Anambra State, has been drawn to the continued smear campaign being waged against him and his erstwhile administration by officials of the present Obi administration in the state. From all indications, it does appear that these officials blame Dr. Ngige and his officials each time they are cornered to give account of the activities or inactions of the government under their watch. Such hatred and witch hunting was again displayed recently by the incumbent Anambra State Commissioner for Works and Housing, Architect Callistus Ilozumba. According to newspaper reports credited to the commissioner captioned “Anambra roads rehabilitation gulps N40bn”, which appeared in Saturday Champion of November 17, 2007 and another in Sunday Independent of Sunday November 18, 2007 following a Press briefing in which was profusely giving account of the road rehabilitation and construction by the Obi Administration, the commissioner who obviously appeared ill-informed, made some wild allegations, which clearly showed that he was out to either run Dr. Ngige down or has little knowledge of local government areas in Anambra state. The facts below will suffice to show his ignorance and/or mischief.
In the Champion publication, he was quoted as saying that the past Dr. Chris Ngige’s Administration failed to take into cognizance the unusual terrain of the State in road construction by way of providing necessary designs in the roads, an anomaly the present Obi-led government has redressed. He went further to say, “I think it was basically the entire administration’s fault and not that of the Governor alone. It’s the team that worked with him, including the commissioners, they should have advised him properly”. Continuing he said “Anambra is an erosion prone area and when you do not introduce the road design to channel the water to its final resting place, you are going to have problems and if you go to those erosion prone areas now, you will see what I am talking about”.
In the Sunday Independent, he accused Governor Ngige of not spreading road construction projects in the entire local government areas of the State, and that he limited the construction to the two council areas -Idemili North and South.
While it is not the intention of Gov. Ngige or that of those who served in the Administration to join issues with the Anambra Works & Housing Commissioner on his bogus claims, tissue of lies and pernicious propaganda, however, we owe it a duty to use this medium to put the records straight for the reading public, Nigerians in general and the Anambra people in particular.
The assertion of this commissioner in the Obi administration is both mischievous, evil intended and completely misleading and should be ignored.
First, the Ngige administration never awarded any road contract without proper design and all designs for the roads built by the administration included adequate and proper drainage facilities which in most bills were as costly as the roads themselves. In very serious cases, as exemplified in a few of the road projects like (1). Amawbia-Nibo-Mbaukwu-Agulu Road; (2) Onitsha-Enugu Express Way –(Ugwu Nwasike)-Ogidi-Abatete-Oraukwu-AdaziAni Road; (3) Igboukwu-Ezinifite-Uga-Amesi-Umuchu-Umuuzu Road, very colossal erosion control jobs were executed pari-passu with the roads in the immediate vicinities of the projects. These Road/Erosion Projects costing billions of Naira were executed by reputable Contractors employed by the Administration such as RCC Nig. Ltd, SETRACO Nig. Ltd, and Inter Bau Ltd and supervised by highly experienced consultants such as Obiukwu Okeke & Associates.
Secondly, no road contract was awarded without its coming to the State Executive Council where every member made inputs before it went for tender. Most times the memo and bill were referred to the Ministry for the necessary inputs and bills to be inline with the due process procedures of the administration. The essence is to ensure that no contract will be lacking in engineering design/input and that appropriate pricing was done. Most times, the contractor with the lowest, most realistic pricing and a good track record got the job.
Arc. Ilozumba’s swipe at our Government is mischievous, careless and smacks of ignorance and lack of knowledge of what is going on in his Ministry now. We advise him to spend some time studying the project files and the “As-built” drawings for these projects. Presently, the Administration he serves cannot boast of having designed and constructed up to 30 km of Roads with drains in their 22 months life span. But what they have taken pride in doing is to take people on guided tours of the well constructed roads built by the Ngige Administration. These roads are heavily fortified and reinforced and our Principal, Dr. Ngige, informed Anambra People during the construction of these roads that they will last 20years with proper and adequate maintenance. Therefore, instead of dissipating energy in unnecessary witch hunt and propaganda, Arc. Ilozumba and his principal should do the proper thing by engaging the services of Grade “A” contractors and consultants as opposed to the hordes of quack, half baked and inexperienced contractors and consultants that Mr. Ilozumba has presently recruited and flooded the State with.
The Ngige Administration funded their projects all year round and work was going on all year round. In fact in the rainy season, our contractors concentrated their work on erosion and concrete drains works and their certificates were promptly paid against the present visionless practice, of asking contractor to demobilize from March to November (8 months), because of the rains for the whole 2007 year. Moreover, the lack of proper pricing, due process and malnourished funding of the projects have resulted in a lot of abandoned projects. Rather than jealously criticize the solid road net work bequeathed to Anambra people, he should fashion a way of, first, kick starting the abandoned Zik Avenue, Awka dualization (which is one of the bone of contention between the Obi Administration and Awka People); Ojoto (Mimli John)-Ichi Road; Onitsha-Owerri Express-Obosi-Eke Ora (Eze Iweka Road); and Onitsha-Atani-Ossomala-Ogwu Ikpele Road; and Nkwo Nnewi-Nkwo Oraifite Road, Nibo-Umuawulu-Amaokpala-Oko Road all very strategic roads awarded and started by the Ngige Administration but abandoned by the present administration.
On the issue of spread of the Road works done by the Ngige Administration, we note that Mr. Illozumba is being economical with the truth for reasons best known to him and his master, but he should realize that white lies do not stand empirical test. “Seeing is believing” is also an English adage, but even the dumb and deaf and Anambrarians and visitors to the State know that the asphalted roads like Aguleri-Umuleri-Nteje-Awkuzu-Ifite Dunu-Oyeagu Abagana-Umunnachi-Eziowelle-Abatete-Uke-Ideani-Nnobi transverse the six Local Governments of Anambra West and East LGA, Oyi LGA, Njikoka LGA, Idemili North LGA and Idemili South LGA; while the 57 km Igbokwu-Ezinifite-Uga-Amesi-Umuchu-Umunze-Ogbunka-Owerre Ezukala-Isuochi/Abia State Border covered the two LGAs of Aguata and Orumba, while Agulu-Adazi Ani-Nnokwa-Nnobi-Nnewi-Ozubulu-Okija transverses 5 LGAs of Anaocha, Idemili South, Nnewi North, Ekwusigo and Ihiala LGAs, while its counter part from Neni-Awka Etiti-Nnewi-Utu-Ukpor-Orsumoghu-Isseke (Imo Boarder) transverses 5 LGAs: Idemili South, Nnewi North, Nnewi South and Ihiala LGAs. All these roads were built with asphalt overlay and reinforced concrete drains and erosion works.
Being economical with the truth by any administration is usually counter productive, for the populace will stop trusting such a Government, a situation which the Ngige Administration has divorced from the psyche of Anambra people.
A bad workman will always quarrel with his tools, even if you give him all the resources in the world. Anambra people have not seen any trace of Mr. Ilozumba’s N12bn completed road network, much more the bogus N40bn. It’s now 22 months of the Obi administration and we will only add that the types of Arc. Ilozumba will lead it to perdition with their jaundiced professional advice. A word is enough for the wise.
Fred Chukwuelobe
Media Consultant to Dr. Ngige
November 19, 2007
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