Everest Ezihe || Disturbed by series of criticism to Governor Rochas Okorocha of Imo State over his Government vision of molding and unveiling the statues of some distinguished African Leaders, Ambassador Peter Ohagwa says those attacking the project are unfair to the Governor and his rescue mission administration.
Ohagwa who is the Governor’s Special Adviser on Peace and Conflict Resolutions decried this while lamenting over the activities of oppositions and political detractors to truncate all the human oriented programmes of the Rescue Mission Administration.
According to him “It takes a man of vision and patriotism to do what Governor Okorocha is doing to uplift Imo State in the map of nations. How many State Governors in Nigeria have been able to attract one President either serving or former outside Nigeria? Emphatically, no.
Governor Okorocha deserves commendation instead of condemnation because it takes only a man of integrity and credibility for these personalities to leave the comfort of their countries and officially visit a start like Imo” he stated.
The Peace Ambassador noted that the visits and unveiling of the statue have enormous economic benefits to the state as each of the distinguished personalities signs MOU with the state government in areas of infrastructural development and upliftment of educational standard of the state.
On the issue of an alleged spending N520m for each of the statues, Ohagwa described that as “Filthy lies from the pit of hell. The political detractors in collaboration with oppositions are out to unjustly blackmail innocent person piloting a purposeful government”.
He swore that Governor Okorocha he knows and worked for about seven years cannot spend up to N10m for each of the statues.
According to him “How can any Government of a developing nation spend that kind of money for just a statue? How much is Imo State monthly allocation? How much is her monthly bill for recurrent and capital expenditures? From where did the state get that kind of money? it is simply, falsehood” he insisted.
It is pertinent to recall that Governor Okorocha within the last two months have molded and unveiled the statues of 3 distinguished African heads of states, given them Chieftaincy titles and naming a road after each of them.
The beneficiaries so far are Mr. Koffy Nana Akufor Ado, of Ghana, Mrs. Ellen Sirleaf Johnson of Liberia and Mr. Jacob Zuma of South Africa.
The opposition criticized the gestures as unnecessary wastage of public funds but the state government says, it is part of her strategy of building socio-economic bridge across African nations.
On the removal of Eke-Ukwu Owerre considering the sufferings it has inflicted on the masses and the heat it has generated, on this he described Governor Okorocha as “Man of indomitable courage and political will”.
Ohagwa stated that the ancient market belongs to the state government as the government equally built most of the shops.
He informed that before the demolition exercise that the traders were told and enough time given to them to relocate to the already built Ubomiri Ultra Modern Market and the Certificate of Occupancy for those shops occupied by them was equally revoked by the state government as original owner of the shops and the market.
Ohagwa alleged that the leadership of Owerri people deceived the people and the traders by not telling them the truth due to their selfish material gains.
The Peace Ambassador insisted that removal of the Eke-Ukwu market is one of the best thing that has happened to the state and its populace noting that the market was aggressively encroaching all the surrounding roads and streets, thereby making vehicular and human trafficking impossible.