Akwa Ibom State Commissioner, Mr. Ephraim Inyang, in an interview with our reporter recently, put paid to the controversy surrounding the construction of Youth Avenue, Uyo, and other sundry matters. Excerpts:
How true is the allegation that you stopped construction work by the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC), a 300M Road, at Youth Avenue along Oron Roard, Uyo?
We did not stop NDDC. That road had been abandoned by NDDC in the last six years. They did the drains and they left six years ago. When the Accountant General of Akwa Ibom State, Mr. Uwem Essien, was going to do Thanksgiving on Monday, October 2, 2017, he called my attention to the said road on Saturday and said it was impassable and that the Governor, Mr. Udom Emmanuel, will not be able to access the Winners’ Chapel Church, venue of the event. So, I mobilized my people and we went there and did a few fixing to allow access. When the Governor got to the Church and wanted to know what he could do in thanksgiving to God for them in that church, the only request they made was that the road, which is about 300M – 350M, be fixed and the Governor immediately directed the Ministry of Works to get that done only for us to wake up this morning and discover that an emergency contractor has been put in place by the NDDC and the contractor rushed to the site. From the Oron Road end of the said road, the contractor began to put stone base on a road yet to be excavated of unsuitable. Now, when you are doing road construction, if have done the drainages, what you do at every site is to remove the unsuitable and what are these unsuitable? These are materials that must have accumulated on the road over time, you have to take them out and replace them with earth materials that could be sharp sand, if it is a muddy area or red earth so that the red earth below and the one you are putting will be the same, they will compress and compact together. If you put red earth on top of waterproof and other material, which is called the unsuitable, they will not be able to come together and what you notice is that from inside, they will open and that is what causes the collapse of these roads.
So, I got to the site and found out a road yet for the unsuitable to be removed was with stone base and they were priming it to put asphalts and I immediate called up the Director in Charge of Akwa Ibom in the NDDC to ask what was going on and he told me he was not aware of such project or the contractor. He went to site and even came to my office and repeated same, that he is not aware of the project. We did not just asked them to go from the site, we directed the people we found on the site to get us the technical drawings of the project for us to know what they are doing, when they are doing it, the name of the contractor so that we can follow up to ensure that the job is properly done.
Akwa Ibom State Government wants to work with NDDC, want to monitor what they are doing. We do not want any further abandoned projects; we already have over 598 abandoned projects by the Commission that we sent to the Presidency, which informed the reason why the Presidency sent the Minister of Niger Delta Affairs to come and have an on-the-spot assessment. We took him round and that was why he made the comments he made, which was an open thing. We are not saying that NDDC should not work. Just this morning, the Director in Charge of Akwa Ibom Projects came to my office and also said that the road that runs from Obong Itam to Ikid Itam to Mbiya to Udu Uruan to Nduetong, the totality of the road is almost 16Km, was awarded to someone in August 2015 and the contractor never showed up on the site until the Akwa Ibom State Government stepped in, a contract awarded in 2015 and not mobilized in 2017. Why are you showing up now that the State Government has taken it upon itself not to allow our people to continue to suffer anymore? So, we see a situation where NDDC abandons projects in the state and whenever the state government steps in, the contractors run to the site and if the state government pulls out, they walk away.
Let me show you another example: during the second anniversary of Akwa Ibom state, the Vice Chancellor of the University of Uyo, Prof Enefiok Essien, appealed to the State Governor that in November, they will be having their convocation and that the Governor should help them create access roads to their campus and in May 2017, that contract was awarded and flagged of by the Governor. Just after that, the rain came and so we could not do earth work so I appealed to the Vice Chancellor to exercise patience with us that as soon as the rain stopped in October that we will work day and night to make sure the job is delivered. I was in Abuja in July when the Vice Chancellor called to inform me that NDDC have come with equipment to do the job. As we speak, you can go to the main campus of the University of Uyo to find out, NDDC has abandoned that project.
So, we see it as an orchestration that anything the state government wants to do, they run there, not that they will do the job, but to abandon it. Let also show you another example, sometimes in August last year we were have heavy down pour in Uyo and people within the Ukana Offot and Esuene Street axis complained of flood and I went on radio and said it was not going to be feasible for the state government to spent money on Ukana Offot, Esuene Street and its environ because they were in the low basin of IBB way and that if we fix those road without doing the drainage at IBB Way to take out the waters that collect there being the lowest point that those roads will be damaged. As soon as I came out of the studio, NDDC mobilized to these areas and today, I want you to go to Ukana Offot, Esuene Street and its environ and see things for yourself. Just at the beginning of rain in June this year those road are damaged. I see on social media where a Honda Accord car was floating on water there and these were the things we discussed.
So, my position is very simple. Do not waste the resources that are supposed to accrue to Akwa Ibom State for proper construction. If you have roads to do, tell us and we will agree on the modality and do join supervision so that Akwa Ibom people can derive maximum benefit. As we speak all those roads done around Ukana Offot and Esuene Street have been damaged by the one year rain. About the month of July, when the rain was at its peak, I was told by a very influential Akwa Ibom elder statesman that NDDC were doing asphalting at F-Line in Ewet Housing Estate at about 10pm in the night. I quickly mobilized my team and we went there to see what they were doing and to our surprise, water was coming out from the ground and they were still doing asphalting. Can you imagine that? These are the things we are saying must no longer continue. If NDDC is doing jobs in Akwa Ibom, they should tell us, they should do a proper job so that our people can benefit from the jobs. Not that the money that was supposed to be accruable to Akwa Ibom would be wasted on projects that will not stand the test of time. It is not in the interest of our people. So, basically, we are not going to keep quiet, fold our hand and allow them just jump on any road and do a shoddy job. Maybe when you leave here I can give you and engineer to drive you to Youth Avenue to see thing for yourself.
The man who is supposed to coordinate project in Akwa Ibom, a man from Bayelsa State, said he is not aware of this project. So, we have a problem in Akw Ibom State unlike what is happening Rivers, Bayelsa State and others where intervention like these are channeled through their Director in the state who will eventually liaise with the Ministry of Works in the state and work together so that the people of the state will derive the benefit. We are determined that we will not have abandoned projects by the NDDC, we will make public any project handle by NDDC in state and we will do analysis of any inferior job they do for the public to see. We are not driving NDDC away but we are saying, NDDC if you want to work in Akwa Ibom, work with us, let us know what you are doing and follow the programmes of the technical dimension of what you are doing so that we can derive maximum benefits. We say no to shoddy jobs and overnight jobs by the NDDC.
How best can Akwa Ibom position itself to collaborate with NDDC without having any friction?
Do not forget that we had an MD of NDDC who left office sometime last year or year before the last and if you can recall, did we have any issue? Why was there no issue? It was because the man was relating with us very well. So, the present situation that we have is unfortunate, the State Government is willing and open to work with NDDC and NDDC wants to help us develop our state, like I told the Director that came here this morning. If NDDC have 200 jobs to do in Akwa Ibom, the State Government is willing to support them do the 200 jobs even if they were the same jobs we wanted to do, we have over 3000 roads in our rural areas waiting for attention. But the point is that: we demand just two simple things from NDDC. One, the roads must be done to specifications and you cannot do a road to specification except you have the technical details. Two, Akwa Ibom is not will to continue to accept or tolerate any situation of abandoned projects by the NDDC. We are telling NDDC to help us complete all the 587 documented abandoned projects. Don’t initiate new ones, complete the old ones first ones. We have many boreholes, bridges and roads abandoned by the NDDC; they should help us fix those ones instead running after new ones that we trust would also be abandoned. So, we are well positioned to receive the benefits of NDDC once they are willing to do the right thing
What is the progress level of the Uyo-Ikot Ekpene Road, handled by the Julius Berger and alleged to terminate at the border between Akwa Ibom and Abia State?
If you go back to that road today, you will find out that the first 15Kilometres of that dualized road that was earlier completed is receiving the final level of asphalts. I am also using this opportunity to invite you to join me next week the site, we will be paying compensations on few of those structures that had issues from Kilometer 18 to 23. And once we are done with the compensations and link up with the Roundabout, we will be at the Filling Station, the remaining 2 Kilometers that will take us to Four-Point by Sheraton, which is where the Phase One of that project, a 25Kilometres Road, terminates. It does not stop at the border between Akwa Ibom and Abia State; it actually terminates at the Four-Point by Sheraton. It is the Phase Two that is supposed to start from Four-Point by Sheraton to the border between Akwa Ibom and Abia State and believe you me, once the Phase One of that project is completed and if we have the luck to have some of our verified claims of what we had expended on Federal Roads, even part of it paid to the State Government, it would have strengthened our hands to do more. We have sank in so much and we have not received anything at all and it runs into hundreds of billion Naira, and they are all verified debt, I have presented this position before the joined Committee of the National Assembly, we have gone to the Federal Minister of Works and the Minister also came here with his Directors and they have verified this claims.
So, if we have part of our refunds on Federal Roads paid to the State Government, at the completion of Phase One, which I believe should be ready for commissioning anytime early next year, we should be able to take up the Phase Two of the project.
