The attention of the Abia PDP has been drawn to a misleading news item circulating on social media and evidently sponsored by the unintelligent propaganda machinery of Alex Otti and the Labour Party wherein it alleged that Abia State under their watch attracted a Foreign Direct Investment, FDI of $150.9m which placed it in the third position when measured against other States that attracted FDI in 2023.
The said news item is not only misleading and false but also dangerous and unintelligent because no Foreign Direct Investment, FDI has come into Abia State since March 29, 2023 when he assumed office despite his numerous trips on Abia tax payers money to poor Eastern European countries like Hungary to market Aba-Made-Shoes, no single investor has stepped into Abia with a dollar. It is important to emphasise that external borrowing does not in anyway constitue or translate to Foreign Direct Investment, FDI.
It is disappointing that a graduate of economics who rose to the pinnacle of banking would easily mistake a bank loan for the construction of roads and combating the menaces of erosion in different parts of the State as a Foreign Direct Investment, FDI which is brought in by investors through the Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN into the real sectors to create employment, transfer technology and in the process buoy the Gross Domestic Product, GDP of the receiving country for economic growth and development.
To put the records straight, the only money that has filtered into Abia State outside the shores of Nigeria is the $115m approved for Abia State by the African Development Bank, AfDB and which process was initiated by the administration of Governor T. A Orji and pursued vigorously by the Governor Okezie Ikpeazu and worked assiduously for it to be finally approved a month after he left office.
The said $115m is part of a total of $263m which was initiated by the two previous administrations with AfDB as the lead of a consortium of lenders for the construction of Port Harcourt Road Aba, other roads within the State and the control of erosion in parts of the State. Of the $115m, the AfDB approved $100m while a Canadian lending agency approved $15m which the Federal Government just approved about six weeks ago as the obligor.
As part of the conditions for the approval of the loan for the construction of Port Harcourt Road, the AfDB insisted that the Dr. Okezie Ikpeazu administration should show a certain level of commitment as counterpart funding to the project and this it did by recovering perimeters of road which had been taken over by developers after negotiated settlements, building standard sized drainages on both sides of the 5.6km long road and doing the earthworks from No, 1 Port Harcourt Road to Uratta Junction.
Unfortunately, since the money was approved by both the AfDB and the Federal Government of Nigeria, Alex Otti has remained mute and refused to disclose to Abians that he has received a certain amount of money for the construction of roads and other projects in Abia State even as he went on to re-award the 5.6km road that suddenly turned to 6.3km at a whooping cost of N30.5b without following the Abia State Public Procurement Act in awarding the contract.
For Alex Otti and his hirelings to turn around to misinform Abians that he has attracted $150.9m as FDI to Abia State in just nine months is quite incredible, unsettling, disappointing and embarrassing not just to himself but to Abians in general. Such a boldfaced lie should be retracted immediately because it only makes Abia a laughing stock among the comity of States.
Alex Otti and Labour Party need to be reminded that the $115m is not a windfall or free lunch which is at their disposal to fund their extravagant and spendthrift lifestyles but a loan which future generation of Abians would repay at a certain date and soon too.
Abia PDP challenges Alex Otti and his Labour Party to release a record of foreigners even if they are from Benin Republic or Cameroon that have come to set up shops or industries in any part of Abia to deserve a wishful third position in the list of States in Nigeria that attracted FDI in 2023.
Abia PDP calls on Abians to disregard such blatant, unpardonable lies and misinformation which are aimed at nothing but to create the impression that Alex Otti is working when in actual fact he is taking Abia backwards when measured against the accolades received by Abia State during the Dr. Okezie Ikpeazu administration as the SME center of Nigeria and one of the best five State in Nigeria and the best in South East as revealed by the National Bureau of Statistics, NBS in its 2022 Multidimensional Poverty Index which used the four sectoral indices of education, health, security and standard of living as a standard of measurement.
Abians certainly deserve a better deal and not a potpourri of lies meant to garnish incompetence and deodorise the putrid smell of non-performance.
*PDP – Power to the People!*
Signed
*Hon. Elder Abraham Amah*
*Abia PDP Vice Chairman/Acting State Publicity Secretary*
