The Rivers State Chapter of All Progressives Congress, APC, is profoundly delighted with the visit of Acting President, Prof. Yemi Osinbajo SAN Thursday and his successful commissioning of the new ultra-modern world-class fertilizer plant built by Indorama Eleme Fertilizer and Chemicals Limited in Port Harcourt.
With production capacity of 4,000 metric tons of nitrogenous fertilizer per day and production capacity of 1.5 million metric tons of Urea fertilizer the plant built with 1.5 billion dollars is considered the world’s largest single-train Urea plant. It is supported by a port terminal at the nearby Onne Port Complex, and a dedicated Gas Pipeline of 83.5km for gas supply.
The implication and significance of this huge investment cannot be lost on the economy and people of Rivers State as it will perhaps provide the largest single employment opportunity to Rivers people and other Nigerians, especially in the downstream sector of agriculture where the plant’s products are important input.
The APC applauds the Acting President for personally commissioning the plant as the Indorama Eleme Petrochemical Limited remains perhaps the nation’s most viable privatisation scheme undertaken by the federal government.
However, we deplore the tantrum being thrown at the APC by the governor of Rivers State, Chief Nyesom Wike alleging that leaders of our party put pressure on the Acting President to decline commissioning his market and motor park projects.
The governor should understand that no President in Nigeria goes about commissioning local government projects such as markets and garages.
The Acting President, pressed for time, managed to commission the only two road projects that appeared to be of some significance – the Chokocho-Igbo-Etche-Rumuokurushi Road and Chokocho-Umuechem-Ozuzu Road.
Ordinarily, we expect Gov. Wike to show appreciation that the Acting President squeezed in the commissioning of those two projects into his very tight schedule and not accuse the Ag. President and APC of playing politics. If anyone played politics over the visit, it was Gov. Nyesom Wike.
We urge him to take the advice of the Acting President that public office holders should pay more attention to governance than playing politics.
The governor should have cleared the projects he wanted commissioned with the office of the Acting President prior to commencing his media propaganda instead he put the cart before the horse. Instead of taking the blame for mismanaging the process and deliberately lying to the people, he resorted to blaming the APC. Gov Wike should own up that his attempt to continue fooling the people crashed in his face this time around.
In the beginning, Gov. Nyesom Wike and PDP told Rivers people that the Acting President was visiting Rivers State to commission his projects.
They never mentioned the fertilizer plant at Eleme. On the other hand, APC told Rivers people that the major assignment the Acting President was coming to perform in Rivers State was the commissioning of the ultra-modern world-class fertilizer plant built by Indorama Eleme Fertilizer and Chemicals Limited.
With the visit having come and gone, we believe that Rivers people now know who tells them the truth.
Chris Finebone
State Publicity Secretary
28/07/2017.
