From Bamigbola Gbolagunte, Akure

The People’s Democratic Party (PDP) in Ondo State has criticised Governor Rotimi Akeredolu for planning to spend N2 billion for building a new governor’s lodge.

The party also lamented the mass resignation of medical doctors in the state.

It added that the resignation of 105 medical doctors from the employ of the state government portends danger for the health sector in the state.

The party said it showed that Governor Akeredolu has lost direction by building a new lodge when there are backlogs of unpaid salaries of workers.

State Chairman of the party Hon Fatai Adams, who spoke at a press briefing in Akure, said the building of another governor’s lodge was ‘height of callousness and wastefulness.’

Adams challenged Akeredolu to make public the defect in the governor’s lodge built by former Governor Olusegun Mimiko in 2013.

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He said Ondo State was the destination for medical tourism in the South West region under the PDP administration.

But the state government in its reaction said the statement made by the opposition PDP in respect of the proposed Governor’s Lodge did not come as a surprise.

The State Commissioner for Information, Donald Ojogo, in a statement, said: ‘Among others, the position of the opposition party had thrived at an inclement path of a fruitless incitement as it incredulously, suggested that Ondo State does not need a befitting Governor’s Lodge.

‘It is a conceded fact that an opposition party is at liberty to criticise any Government including, of course, the indiscretional display of ignorance on issues of governance.

‘The misplaced allusion to the Governor’s Lodge as well as the weak nexus between same and the issue of salaries betrays unpardonable amnesia on the part of a political party. It becomes immeasurably uncanny if such party had left the stage with the most uncharitable legacy of ‘unpaid seven months salaries ‘.

‘Perhaps, PDP deserves to know that the envisioned Governor’s Lodge is among the plethora of iconic projects targeted with the yet-to-be-fully accessed BOND. Suggesting, therefore, that government should “shelve” the project for salaries clearly shows a gross lack of knowledge of how bonds work. They are, as special purpose means of funding developmental initiatives, inconvertible to cash, hence undrawable by anyone.

‘Rather than abandon the welfare of workers for months without remorse under any guise, the Ondo State government led by Akeredolu shall, at all times, evolve ingenious means to address the issue of salaries in the face of excruciating global economic challenges,’ Ojogo added.