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 As
against
Niger Delta Citizen and Budget
Platform(NDCBP) report which I also
adopted to present a paper recently at
Christian Rural and Urban Development
Association of Nigerian (CRUDAN) open
day, Enugu, Governor Amaechi’s government
has been most, prudent and( especially so
through
its) prioritization in allocations to health
and education. The publishing of its annual
budget in their website and providing
citizens of the State hard copy details of
incomes and expenditures show
transparency,
good governance and working government. I
had earlier supported NDCBP report (see
www.citizensbudget.org)
before I changed my mind. I requested and
got a copy of Rivers State “Sectoral Account
of Stewardship” from Oct, 2007 to Sept, 2010
report presented by His Excellency, Governor
Amaechi during his 3 years anniversary. A
review of the account and what has been
done with the money received informed the
change of mind to say, Governor Amaechi is a
working government.
An excerpt in the Governor’s own
words will convince you too: “Since the 26th
of October 2007, when it pleased God to
place in my hands, the mantle of leadership
of this wonderful State as Governor, I have
been both guided and inspired by the desire
to serve you. Over the years, our leaders
had traumatized our consciousness and made
us believe that we were to serve them as
masters. I have, in the past three years
made a conscious effort to live and work for
you according to the true tenets of
leadership as espoused by Christ Himself,
when he said in the Gospel according to St.
Mathew that,
“…whoever desires to become great among you,
let him be your servant.
And
whoever desires to be first among you, let
him be your slave ..
just as the Son of Man did not come
to be served, but to serve…”(Matthew
20:26-28a).
“Accountability is the cornerstone of true
service. It is, to my mind imperative
therefore, that I render a periodic account
of our stewardship to the stakeholders in
the Rivers State project, and give you the
opportunity to ask questions about how we
have managed our commonwealth in the past
years. In my forward to the second
Anniversary Account of Stewardship, I summed
my assessment of our performance in office
thus:
“The period under review has been eventful.
We have, in our modest view given it a good
shot, but, much more remains to be done. Let
me restate our commitment to the rebuilding
of our State through massive urban
regeneration programs, infrastructural
development by way of the construction and
maintenance of roads, schools, hospitals,
and health centers as well as the provision
of water, electricity and security of lives
and property for our people”.“This was a
year ago. Now, twelve months later, on this
day, in this historic edifice, I can say
assuredly, that we have kept faith. We have
been in office for three years and, during
this period; we have done a lot to rebuild
our health and educational infrastructure.
We have invested heavily on construction and
reconstruction of roads and bridges. In the
Riverine areas, we have invested enormous
resources on land reclamation. On the whole,
we cannot yet say uhuru, but we can say that
lives of Rivers people have not and will
never remain the same again. Whilst most of
our infrastructural projects have been
completed, others are at various stages of
completion. We are keenly aware however,
that it is not enough to build the essential
facilities in the health and education
sectors. Consequently, we are working
assiduously to build strong institutions
that will drive these facilities and support
them on a sustainable basis for us, for our
children and for generations to come.”
“What We Have Done: Education Sector -
Within the past three years, we have
embarked on the construction over 350 model
primary schools, about 120 of which have
been completed whilst others are at various
stages of completion. We are also building
24 model secondary schools across the State
at various stages of completion. During the
period under review, we have also undertaken
the following: *Provision of ICT in schools
and fully equipping the schools,
*Comprehensive training programmers’ for
teachers, *Overseas tertiary education for
indigenes of Rivers State, *Local tertiary
education scholarship for Rivers State. Our
massive investment in the education sector
is premised on the empirical truth that our
ability to harness the potentials of our
greatest asset, our youth, and not oil is
the substructure upon which the success or
failure of our future as a people is
anchored.”
“Health Care: In the health sector, our
policy objective is to provide integrated
health services anchored on efficient
primary health care delivery. To this end,
we embarked on the following: *Construction
of 160 Health Centers in all 23 LGAs of
Rivers State, *Construction of 1000 bed
specialist hospital, *The new Rivers State
Ultra Modern Dental and Maxillofacial
Hospital, *The new Kelsey Harrison (Niger)
Hospital, *Syringe factory, *Construction of
bio larvicide manufacturing company” “Infrastructure:
We have invested a minimum of N100
Billion yearly on roads/bridge
infrastructure in the past 3 years. Some of
the projects include: *800 km of roads under
construction (250km completed), *10 major
bridges under construction (3 completed),
*20 minor bridges under construction (4
completed), *2 flyovers/interchange under
construction, 2 already completed, *6 land
reclamation/shore protection projects (Andoni,
Opobo, Buguma, Abalama, Olombie/Owukiri
Island, Obama-Okirika) (1,140,000 sq km
completed), *2 major markets and a shopping
mall under construction (Phase 1 Mile 1
market housing 960 shops and two banking
halls completed)”
“Power:
Government has expended considerable
resources on the building, completion or
maintenance of the following power stations:
Omoku 150 Mega Watts, Trans Amadi 130Mega
Watts, Eleme 75 Mega Watts. We are also
building a 7 Transmission Stations 132/33
KV, 7 Distribution injection sub-station
33/11/KV and by June 2011, we will have
500MW available.” “Transportation:
Our primary focus in this sector is the
mass transportation. To this end, we have
embarked on the first Monorail project in
sub Saharan Africa which is estimated to
cost N60 billion, out of which N11 billion
has already been paid. We have also deployed
resources for the provision of buses, Land
and water Taxis and the construction of
three bus terminals in and around Port
Harcourt City.”
“Environmental Sustainability: The
environment is a core component of the
Rivers State Government infrastructure
delivery package. Government is committed to
ensuring environmental sustainability
through various initiatives including the
construction of the waste to wealth and the
scrap to wealth yards.” “Urban
Renewal: Port Harcourt, popularly known
as the “Garden City” was characterized by
well planned infrastructure, but over the
years it has been stripped of this beauty
due to rapid increase in population and
influx of people, distortion of city plan
and poor management as well as uncontrolled
and unplanned spatial expansion and
infrastructure decay. To reverse this trend,
the Government has embarked on a State –
wide urban renewal programme and development
of infrastructure, Chief of which is the
Greater Port Harcourt project.”
“The Greater Port Harcourt City:
The Greater Port Harcourt city is planned to
be modern comprehensively serviced urban
areas of 2500 hectares of land with
residential accommodation for 30,000 housing
units, commencing with 3000 housing units in
phase 1A. Ongoing developments in Greater
Port Harcourt City include the All Nigeria
Sports Festival Games Village, the one
thousand beds Justice Adolphus Karibi –
Whyte Specialist Hospital and the New Rivers
State University of Science and Technology.”
“Guaranteed
Security: We
can now mostly assuredly guarantee the
security of lives and property within the
territory of Rivers State. This guarantee is
not based on negotiations or agreement with
any person or group of persons but is
anchored on the capacity we have built over
the past two years, to enforce law and order
within our State. The Government of Rivers
State under our watch has consistently
manifested the ability and political will to
protect corporate and individual residents
in the State pre and post the amnesty
programme. We are pleased to report
therefore, that Port Harcourt and indeed
Rivers State is safe for Nigerians foreign
Nationals to live and do business. We are
also confident that during the course of our
tenure in office, we will build sustainable
institutions that are structured after
tested models of governance institutions in
developed countries. This will in turn drive
a peaceful, just and harmonious society.”
I agree
with
Chief Chukwumeka
Eze’s submission
in
his press release that
Governor
Amaechi is
“an icon and epitome of excellence
and service, a man who has redefined
governance in
Nigeria and we are ready to support
him to provide more of such a glaring and
visible leadership to our people come 2011.
For a man to resolve to build a total new
city comparable with any modern city in
Europe, initiate the construction of a
monorail the first of its kind in Africa,
save on a monthly basis for the future of
our state the sum of N1B without tampering
with it the first of a such a move by any
government in Nigeria, offer scholarship and
free education to our children from primary
to secondary levels, construct and equipped
24 model Secondary Schools distributed and
sited in all the LGAs of the State,
constructed 260 functional Health Centres,
constructed 350 model Primary Schools,
offer of University scholarship to our
people both in
Canada,
India,
Ireland, Singapore and UK, engaged in
the construction of 800km of roads across
the State, construction of 10 major and 20
minor bridges, land reclamation/shore
protection projects at Andoni, Opobo, Buguma,
Abalama, Olobie/Owukiri, Oba Ama, Okirika,
construction of two major markets, a
shopping mall and two fly-over/interchange,
arrested the precarious insecurity in the
State, built and distributed 60 quality
projects to 60 Communities in 60 days a move
that can only be watched in a movie but a
reality only to be achieved by Amaechi,
attract foreign investors, build roads on
the Sea to link communities that don't
know how cars or roads look like, reclaim
lands from the seas, redefine governance,
If Gov Amaechi could achieve these much
within three years then we can only imagine
what Rivers State will look like if he is
given another opportunity of extra four
years.”
Clement
Eyo,
writing in Tide Newspaper
described this
working
government
tracing how
he emerged to what
he has
done to deserving
support
for
second term thus: “Governor Chibuike
Amaechi of Rivers State is the man that many
Nigerians, especially the Rivers people,
will always believe on(sic) anytime, any day and
everywhere in the society.
It would be recalled that this same
distinctive leader who held the
position of Rivers State House of Assembly
Speaker for eight unbroken years under the
leadership of the former Governor Dr. Peter
Odili, was once removed, denied of his right
as the flag-bearer of the People’s
Democratic Party (PDP) in 2007 governorship
election in Rivers State for reasons that
were not made clear to the public.” “But as
fate may have it, Amaechi did not relent. He
challenged the substitution of his name with
that of the former governor, Sir Celestine
Omehia. The Supreme Court later removed
Omehia to pave way for Amaechi as the duly
and authenticated winner of the 2007
governorship election in Rivers State.
On January 26, 2007, Amaechi was
sworn-in by the State Chief Judge as the
Executive Governor of the state.
Rivers State under the good
governance of Amaechi has recorded giant
strides in capacity building,
infrastructural facility, urban and
rural road rehabilitation.Understandingly,
good governance is the process whereby
public institutions conduct public affairs,
manage public resources and guarantees
realisation of human rights. Good governance
accomplishes this in a manner essentially
free of abuse and corruption, and with due
regards to the rule of law.” “The true test
of “Good Governance” is the degree to which
it delivers on the promise of human rights;
civil, cultural, economic, political and
social rights. Therefore, meaningful
development requires equitable distribution
of resources in a transparent and
accountable manner with political resolve
and commitment. The governor since
assumption of office has ensured
transparency, accountability, equality and
efficiency in the limelight of the
government socio-political agenda so as to
meet the target of the Millennium
Development Goals (MDGs) of Vision 20: 20 20
in Rivers State. Amaechi in his mission
statement declare fervently that; “he
promise to serve the people on the ground of
humility, transparency, accountability,
integrity and good governance” to improve
the human resource and quality of life of
the people of Rivers State. His laudable
victory will remain indelible in the annals
of Nigeria’s history, democracy and of
course the rule of law.”
“Every power has its source from the divine
and Amaechi has continued to acknowledge
this insisting that he wasn’t elected the
best out of the lots. It's obvious that;
outstanding people have one thing in common;
an absolute sense of mission “according to Zig-Ziglar. Governor Amaechi has been
steering the ship of “Good Governance” in
Rivers State government in order to
actualize his dream and vision on the
mission of transforming the state capital
and restoring its lost glory as the name
implies “the Garden City” of Port Harcourt
in due course. Following this
transformation, the governor has done enough
in terms of infrastructural development,
fiscal policy and massive road construction
across the state. About 570km of roads has
been constructed with 80 percent of them in
the rural areas including over-head bridges
in the outskirt of the city to decongest
traffic.”
“Also a credit to his administration
is the construction of new 250 model primary
schools with internet facilities,
construction of 160 new primary health-care
delivery centres across the 23 local
government areas of the state to enhances
free health-care delivery services to the
aged, children and pregnant women.
To put an end to frequent power
interruption in the state, the Chief
Executive has developed and injected about
100MW of power into the national grid to
boost the economy of the state. To further
strengthen his current effort on power
generation, over 300 rural electrification
project has been executed with more 800
transformers donated to various communities
in the state, with three gas turbine station
under construction which when completed
would put an end to power failures in garden
city.”
“The dynamic governor has done a lot in
improving the standard of education in
Rivers State. This follows the pronouncement
of “Free and Compulsory education” to
students in primary and post primary
schools, scholarship awards and sponsorship
of at least 300 indigenous graduates
annually to acquire a better training in
various institutions across the world.
On the chart of Amaechi’s good
governance is the restoration of lasting
peace and security of lives and property to
indigenes, non-indigenes as well as the
foreign investors doing business in the
state. Since the anointing of leadership is
bestowed upon (Amaechi) now, as it was in the
days of the Biblical Moses to lead the
covenant children of God to the promised
land, the Rivers State people must join
hands together both great and small to
support Governor Amaechi's second-term bid
beyond 2011, because the responsibility of
Rivers State Government does not rest with
him alone but with every Rivers State
indigenes, and though the cross is on his
shoulders but the burden shared are easier
to bear.”
What
more l can l
say, from the man’s own words to the
view s
of
individuals
and
groups
all
agree
that Governor
Amaechi is a working
government.
To substantiate still
I
reproduce
some
pictorial
view
of
Governor
Amaechi’s achievements in three
years(source:
Sectoral Account of
Stewardship Oct., 2007 – Sept.,2010)
.
Happy viewing. Have question you may
call: 08055059656 or write:
akpogena@yahoo.com.
Stay blessed.
Below are some pictures of projects/programmes
executed by Governor Amaechi's Administration
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