By Victor Nwachukwu
Owerri – The Federal Ministry of Niger Delta Affairs has promised to resume work on pending projects in Imo as the ministry has already started working out modalities for their completion.
The ministry’s permanent secretary, Mr Olusade Adesola, made the disclosure while speaking with newsmen in Owerri on Friday after conducting a two-day inspection of projects in the state.
Adesola also disclosed that some of the projects would be handed over to credible managers upon their completion.
According to him, all the projects are capital intensive and will require an overhead cost for effective management hence the major reason why they will be handed over to independent managers.
He lauded communities hosting its projects for their supports describing their role as `very important’.
The permanent secretary also commended contractors handling the ministry’s various projects for quality service, adding that the ministry would not compromise its quality.
He added that the ministry would prioritise the projects so as to enable it make efficient use of available resources through effective allocation of resources.
He further said that the projects were not strictly for the benefit of oil producing communities but for the state at large.
“We thank our host communities for their support and we assure them that our minister, Sen. Godswill Akpabio, will not compromise quality even with very limited resources.
“We will continue to prioritise through the process of budgeting and when funds are made available, activities at project sites will resume immediately.
“The contractors are doing a good job even as we are making effective use of available resources so as to make maximum impact within the confines of our resources.
“Some communities and corporate organisations have expressed their interest to manage some of our projects and where we evaluate and discover that there is credible expression of interest, we will not hesitate to hand over the projects to them,’’ he said.
News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the inspected projects include the rehabilitation of the Okpuala – Igwurita and Owerri – Elele roads.
Others are the skills acquisition centre at Egbema and housing estate, Umuagwo both in Ohaji-Egbema Local Government Area (LGA) and the Information Communication Technology (ICT) centre at Osuiche in Oguta LGA.
(NAN)
