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Tuesday, October 15, 2024

How Okorocha Siphoned N9.3 billion Hotel Contract Fund

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*as group wants EFCC To Investigate failed contract

Indications have emerged that Governor Rochas Okorocha of Imo has completed the payment of N9.3billion for the abandoned Akachi Hotel.

According to our investigation, the hotel located near Ahiajioku Centre is supposed to be five-storey building because of the soil textures which cannot support anything more. But Governor Okorocha, it was learnt insisted the structure be raised to 18 storeys.

It was gathered that this was done so in order to increase the contractual amount to N9.3 billion.

It has also been gathered that the governor also paid the in full to the contractor before the commencement of the job while the project has since been abandoned..

It will be recalled that Governor Okorocha had also done similar thing in the past where he awarded the contract for the construction of a three-kilometer Sam Mbakwe road and paid N1.4 billion upfront before the job was commenced.

The project was abandoned.

Meanwhile, the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) may soon swoop on Imo State if it heeds the call made by the Concerned Imo Citizens (CIC)
to probe the abandoned 18-storey hotel complex in Owerri.
Chairman of the group, Chief Henry Ceejay Ezebuiro who made the call stated that there was something untidy about the contract.
He revealed that the Bill of Quantity for the contract was written in Korean Language which made it
impossible for the engineers in the State Ministry of Works to decipher.
Also, he stated, that the contract worth $52million had been abandoned
after N1billion had been paid to the contracting firm, Hanjin Nig
Limited even as he disclosed that the Koreans partners of the company
had since been deported.
Amazingly, he disclosed, that the Korean
partners and staff members entered Nigeria with a visiting visa as
against a work permit. He equally disclosed that a soil test revealed
that the land where the hotel is to be built could only support a
5-storey building as against the proposed 18-storeys.
Chief Ezebuiro
enjoined the anti-graft agency to quiz the Nigerian shareholder of the
firm, Chief Anyim Nyerere with a view to unravelling the mystery
surrounding the abandonment of the contract.
If Chief Macdonald
Akano was quizzed in connection with the controversial Sam Mbakwe Avenue
contract, Chief Ezebuiro queried whether Chief Nyerere is untouchable.
The CIC boss also wants the EFCC to unravel why a sole proprietorship,
Optimum General Services is being used to either execute or sublet
contracts running into billions of Naira in the state.
Chief
Ezebuiro submitted that a sole proprietorship cannot execute a contract
worth more than N10million going by the act establishing it.
He
equally requested the anti-graft agency to unravel how Chief Nyerere is
the signatory to the account of Optimum General Services whose
proprietor is Anyim Chinenye Robinson.
All efforts made to get the
Chairman of the State House of Assembly Committee, Hon. Simeon Iwunze
comment on the issue proved abortive.
His committee displayed a STOP-WORK order at the site.

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