The news of the approval by the Federal Executive Council (FEC) to refund N79.9Bn to Rivers State for federal projects executed in the past by the state government seems to elicit huge excitement.
No statement has come from the state government to gauge the level of excitement in government, but the people of the state have shown overwhelming reactions and as usual, it is taking partisan lines. The All Progressives Congress (APC) sympathizers are hailing former governor, Chibuike Rotmi Amaechi, who executed the projects that yielded the refund.
Some other Amaechi followers recall that it was fellow Niger Delta brother (Goodluck Jonathan as president) that sat on the request for refund until President Muhammadu Buhari came to do it. In saying this, they tried to insinuate the present governor, Nyesom Wike, was complicit in the refusal to refund the amouunts.
While handing over in 2015, Amaechi had put down the debt (N105Bn) as cash he handed over. The FG set up a panel in 2016 to evaluate the claims of the 36 states for refunds but they said the claims from Rivers and four other states did not meet verifications in terms of documentation.
According to the Minister of Information, Lai Mohammed, who spoke after the FEC virtual meeting on Wednesday, June 3, 2020, a fresh panel was set up to revisit the remaining states: Rivers, Bayelsa, Cross River, Osun and Ondo. This time, the states got N148Bn refund, thus: Rivers N78.9Bn; Bayelsa N38.Bn, Cross River N18.4Bn, Ondo N7.8Bn, and Osun N2.5Bn.
Public analysts have pointed to agricultural projects as the only way to wisely deploy the huge funds, mentioning the nearly completed Cassava Processing Plant (the largest in West Africa) that can employ 4,700 persons. They also pointed at the abandoned Rivers State Sustainable Development Agency (RSSDA) with the biggest Songhai Model Farm project in Africa at Tai, to bounce back, as well as the much-talked about School-To-Land Project mooted by Gov. Nyesom Wike, the abandoned fish projects expected to make Rivers a fish hub, the Etche Farm project that was to be done with Israelis, etc.
Some have suggested a N100m project in each of 319 wards in the state (N39Bn), while a few persons have pointed to the long-mentioned Trans-Kalabari Highway project.
Reacting, an APC stalwart, Eze Chukwuemeka Eze, who hailed Buhari for doing what Jonathan could not do, advised Gov. Wike to make peace with Amaechi on the score of the windfall and work together.
He pointed to where the funds should go to thus: “Reinvest the money into reviving the over 300 model primary health centres, 350 model primary schools and 24 international standard secondary schools built by Amaechi as well as most of the roads scattered all over the State screaming for attention.
“He should use part of the funds to pay pensioners their dues which he has refused to pay for reasons only known to him. Salaries of civil servants in the State should be settled within the next one week”.
