Group challenges Gov Wike to address critical issues raised by Dakuku on economy

A youth group in Port Harcourt, Rivers Renaissance, has called on the Rivers State Governor Nyesom Wike to address critical issues raised by the former Director-General of the Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency (NIMASA), Dr Dakuku Peterside, on the state’s economy and stop beating about the bush.

According to the group, Wike “should rather ignore the messenger and address the message instead of demonstrating that he was bereft of modern idea economy and walking away in a peekaboo in the presence of Governor Tambuwal of Sokoto State.”

Dr Peterside had in an interview in raised critical issues bedevilling the state, saying there had been an absence of governance in the last six years of Wike’s administration.

However, reacting to the statement, Wike slammed Peterside, saying he spoke ignorantly about the state’s economy and mocked his academic qualification by querying his comparison of Rivers State’s budget to that of Lagos and Akwa-Ibom States.

But the President General of the group, Dr Dokubo Dan-Tamuno, in a statement made available to Ripples Nigeria, frowned that rather than address the critical issues, Wike, “as usual, dictated a script to his staff, aimed at diverting attention from the questions raised in the interview, committing more gaffe and using a pseudonym “Amieyeofori Ibim” in a bid to cast aspersion and vituperation on the person of Dr Peterside.”

Dan-Tamuno said, “Rivers Renaissance further stands on the issues raised in the Independent Newspaper as it posed a lot of concern to the survival and aspiration of Rivers people and further challenged Governor Wike to make public his achievement in empowerment generation, following the revelations by National Bureau of Statistics that Rivers State is the headquarter of unemployment and underemployment with over 1.7 million, 714,800 populace representing 59.22 per cent unemployed in the state.

“This is an indictment on Gov Wike who pays scanty attention to real human capital development and parading himself as Mr Project, a sobriquet he coined for himself during an event at Rumuoparaeli and not the Vice president, Prof Yemi Osinbajo, as erroneously believed.”

Read also: Wike narrates how he edged Amaechi out of Rivers politics

The group noted that Wike’s lack of strategic economic policy to promote and drive investment and attract investors has become an impediment while difficulties experienced by investors in doing business in the state has caused organisational flight and relocation out of Port Harcourt.

“The report of a Presidential Enabling Business Environment Council of Nigeria Sub National Ease of Doing Business in partnership with KPMG professional service showed that a state like Rivers is challenged in implementing the ease of doing business policy; this is worrisome.

“More worrisome is the controversy surrounding its fiscal performance ranking in 2021 and its financial healthiness as Rivers State under Gov Wike has never made public its annual budget for citizens’ connection and consumption. BudgiT in its report stated that Rivers State does not make its annual budget transparent.

“However, the inaccessibility of the state budget was attributed to the inability of Gov. Wike to access bailout package, as publishing of budget was an enabler and a major part of condition set aside for states to access bailout package and other investors funding,” the statement read.

Furthermore, the group noted that disconnect among Ministries, Agencies and Parastatals with Rivers people had eroded open government partnerships, throwing to the wind, accountability, transparency and participation.

“Most agencies are moribund, even the State Secretariat is dilapidated. What a shame! Yet Gov Wike approves contracts arbitrarily based on the spot conviction and make full payments in public glare without recourse to the Rivers State Public Procurement Law of 2008.

“The Bureau of public procurement no longer bid for tender through publication for healthy competition and has been reduced to providing advisory services to small and medium scale enterprises. This is against open government partnerships as the open budget index ranks Rivers State low on fiscal transparency without a functioning Treasury Single Account (TSA).

“One wonders why there is never a difference in the cost of award of flyover contracts as Gov Wike unilaterally has pegged the cost of every flyover at N7 billion. His avarice for primitive acquisition and glamour for buying different media awards for himself has no significant impact on the lives of the citizenry,” the statement added.

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