By Samuel Oyadongha & Emem Idio

IT was celebration galore today as Bayelsa State governor, Mr Seriake Dickson and other top government functionaries and traditional rulers boarded a flight that landed at the newly constructed Bayelsa International Airport.

Governor Dickson

The commercial Air Peace flight boarded by the governor and his entourage landed at the airport at 2:30 p.m., to the jubilation of a cross section of the people who thronged the airport to witness the maiden landing of the flight.

Governor Dickson on the maiden landing of the airplane, said it marks the commencement of business in the airport, stressing that official commissioning of the project will be done later in the year.

Dickson said,  “We conceived this airport the very first time we took office and in my inaugural address, I said that we were not going to play politics with the development of the state and Ijaw national interest. This is what I had in mind.

“This airport has a 3.5 kilometres run way, there is no airplane that cannot land here, whatever we are doing, we are not doing it just for the moment, we are doing it for the future.

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“This project that you see has not cost us more than N60b. What you see here is of international standard. There is no federal government’s contribution to the airport.

“The Federal Government said they were going to sand fill but they did not do it, they said they would construct the terminal building, we waited and waited they didn’t build it. In January last year, we had to award the contract for the construction of the terminal building. That is how they treat us.”

The event was attended by top government functionaries, traditional rulers, business community and a cross section of the people.