Abia State chapter of Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, has asked Governor Alex Otti to set up an independent technical verification panel that will thoroughly investigate his allegation that former Governor Okezie Ikpeazu spent N10 billion on Port Harcourt Road without working on it.

PDP said such a statement represented a new low in the execution of Otti’s agenda of running his government via propaganda and demanded that the panel should include engineers from the federal ministry of works, Otti and Ikpeazu’s administrations as well as certified projects.

Abia PDP Vice Chairman/Acting State Publicity Secretary, Elder Abraham Amah, said Otti’s statement during last night’s media hangout didn’t present any fact regarding the Port Harcourt-Aba  road project that was started by Ikpeazu’s administration.

The PDP said the role of the verification panel would include:  “That the Port Harcourt Road was awarded to HARTLAND NIG LTD, at the cost of #9,882,752,246.4 only.

“That the total length of the road awarded for dualization in 2017 is 5.9km and that the Ikpeazu administration implemented a total of 13.5km of drains (representing both sides of the road) along the road through Hartland Construction Company that was awarded the original contract.

“Review and verify documents showing how much the Ikpeazu administration paid so far to Hartland Construction Company in lieu of the project and ascertain if the dredged Umuagbai and Uratta ponds to receive stormwater from Port Harcourt Road is still standing or not.”

The party said the panel should equally try to “ascertain and publish the scope of the current more than N30bn work awarded to Julius Berger without due process and competitive bidding as well as budgetary approval by the State House of Assembly if any.

“Ascertain and publish the relevant designs and cost of the contract awarded by the Ikpeazu administration as well as work already done and the design and scope of the over N30bn project awarded to Julius Berger by Alex Otti; and measure and confirm the total length of the road from Ngwa Road junction to Asa Nnentu Junction.”

The opposition party said Ikpeazu’s administration never spent anything near the Otti propaganda sum of N10bn on the 5.9km Port Harcourt Road, Aba and challenged Governor Otti to publish documentary proof of his claims or forever hide his face in shame for consistently trying to deceive the people of the state and country with false claims.

The PDP said it continued to wonder why a government would prefer to embark on constant falsehood with so much audacity, rather than focus on delivering dividends of democracy to the people as it promised during election campaigns.

“The good people of Abia are at liberty to go to the site and see the drainage or check the Umuagbai and Uratta works and also confirm the earthworks done from Uratta Junction to No. 1 Port Harcourt Road section of the road.

“Even videos produced by the propaganda team of Alex Otti when they visited the road in April 2023 showed the drains and other works done, yet the Governor was not restrained by these facts to tell such brazen lies before journalists that have also visited the place at different times,” the PDP said.

The party also challenge Otti to make available the humongous “compensation” purportedly set aside in the Julius Berger version of the project to the affected people.

“If Otti does not accept our challenge of setting up an independent technical panel to ascertain the state of the project, let it be known that every word uttered by the governor and his team should never be believed by any reasonable person who is interested in facts and not farce.

“We call on the good people of Abia to disregard to tissues of lies bandied around by Alex Otti and his media team concerning the Port Harcourt Road project and understand that the project had been 40 per cent delivered by the Ikpeazu administration.”