By Chioma Onuegbu

Uyo—A socio-political group, Akwa Ibom Good Governance Group , has alleged that the former governor of the state, and former Senate Minority Leader, Senator Godswill Akpabio deliberately sabotaged the development of the science park project during his tenure as governor for political reasons.

Akpabio

It will be recalled that the former governor had cited two reasons, mismanagement of funds allocated to the project as well as proximity of its location to erosion prone terrain as reasons for not continuing the project.

But Mr. Anietie Ekong, Media aide to Senator Akpabio, while reacting to the allegation said that the state House of Assembly then  set up a committee over the project which then discovered that N5.3billion was said to have been invested while what was on ground was not compared to that.

Governance and institutional reforms: Nsima Ekere setting the agenda

The group in a statement by its President and Secretary, Ubon Benjamin and Effiom Antai respectively yesterday in Uyo, blamed Akpabio for non realization of the project, stressing that former Governor Victor Attah had conceived the project to act as a springboard for an Information and Communication Technology, and science revolution in the state.

They said, “After thorough investigation, we arrived that former governor, Akpabio deliberately and for political reasons failed to complete the state science park for which the state government had committed much resources and which had the capacity to changed the face of ICT and place the state at the forefront of ICT research and development.

“The former governor, now senator mismanaged science equipment insta-lled by his predecessor, Obong Victor Attah.”

and commissioned by the then President of Nigeria, Olusegun Obasanjo for nine premier schools located in different parts of the state to boost teaching and learning of science education at the secondary level and act as spring board for an ICT and science revolution in Akwa Ibom State.

“Akoabio dismantled the science equipments in those schools after they were commissioned by President Obasanjo in August 2006 and redistributed to schools as if they were newly acquired equipment.

EFCC board appointments, PIB, and other deeds of presidency

“We frowns at such action by the former governor and challenged him to prove to Akwa Ibom people why he should not be blamed for the failure of the state to be pacesetter in ICT development in the country.”

On his part, Ekong said “The project is prone to probing of the EFCC because the total cost of the project was N5.6 billion and the Attah’s administration paid N5.3 billion upfront and the work done is not up to N400million.

“If a project is N5.6 billion and the government paid N5.3 bn upfront you would expect the contractor to move the project to a reasonable level. With N5.6 bn project and N5.3 bn paid upfront, I don’t think I should touch that project. You will not advice me to touch that project unless the contractor can give account of how he utilized the N5.3 bn he collected from Akwa Ibom State Government and why work done on round is not up to N300 m.”