From Tony John, Port Harcourt
RIVERS State Governor, Nyesom Wike has challenged his predecessor, Rotimi Chibuike Amaechi, to a public debate on the logic, financial cost and social value of the monorail project along Azikiwe Road in Port Harcourt.
Amaechi had recently criticised Wike for not completing the controversial project.
But, in its response, the state government said it would meet Amaechi for a debate on any platform, concerning projects abandoned by the previous government.
In a press statement by the Commissioner for Information and Communication, Dr. Austin Tam-George, government challenged Amaechi to come prepared with full explanations on other inflated contracts and unexecuted projects.
Dr. Tam-George also asked Amaechi to give reasons for pulling down a standard, well-equipped teaching hospital complete with doctors’ quarters along Hospital Road in Port Harcourt leaving weeds to grow wildly in the space were the hospital once stood.
“Will Amaechi also explain how N80 billion was spent on the Rainbow Town project, near Amadi Ama that was originally designated in 2010 to cost N40 billion? Why does that project remain uncompleted six years after?
“How about the billions of naira signed off by the state’s treasury in the name of the so-called Justice Karibi Whyte Specialist Hospital which is a fictional project that does not exist on land,sea or anywhere in Rivers?”
The commissioner reiterated the commitment of the Wike administration to complete any relevant project that could uplift the socio-economic life of the people of the state.