By Johnbosco Agbakwuru

Last week, former Governor of Cross River State, Mr. Donald Duke was reported to have expressed sadness that his successor Senator Liyel Imoke has allegedly abandoned some of the projects his administration started and bequeathed to Imoke, but his comments have sparked off another controversy in the state.

In an interview with Vanguard, Imoke’s Commissioner for Information and Orientation, Mr. Patrick Ugbe said Duke lacks moral justification to critize the government claiming that Duke’s projects were pro-elites and white elephant projects.

Excerpts.

Recently, the former Governor Mr. Donald Duke allegedly accused Governor Liyel Imoke of abandoning some of the projects bequeathed to his administration like the Tinapa Business Resort and Leisure and Monorail projects, what is your take on that?

Well, I will say that is very unfortunate. The allegation is false, it is baseless. It is very unfortunate coming from the kind of person who said it, who himself is the former governor of this state, who himself should know the true status of these projects. It is very unfortunate.

Tinapa is on course. Tinapa as was structured and executed by the previous administration wouldn’t have taken us anywhere. Most of those projects were more like elephant projects, they were taking us no where, and you could not really see a direct benefit to the lives of the common and average Cross Riverian.

It is rather this administration that came and took a look at it now. When they worked on Tinapa at that time, they never saw the end from the beginning. They just saw such a huge project that was being put in place and wanted Calabar to be the Dubai of West Africa without really seeing the work ability and seeing the end from the beginning; how workable was it, what is the size of the population of Calabar, what is the habit of Nigerians, why did they travel?

Gov. Imoke and Duke

If you say they go to Dubai, why do they travel, they don’t think of all these things and what was the regulatory framework in place to ensure that Tinapa would even take off. They just believed that if they build it, it will start working but things don’t work that way, so this administration came in, took a critical look of Tinapa and started looking at the function ability at the end and worked towards ensuring that it takes off.

What of the Monorail project?

Monorail as we speak is on course. That is another one that I will say is unfortunate that comments like that would come out. It is better we keep quiet. Monorail as was designed by the previous administration was so elitist and was meant to pick passengers from the airport (Magaret Ekpo International Airport) straight to Tinapa without any stop.

So the common man the average Cross Riverian was not meant to benefit from the monorail they will see daily pass through and carry people through the city. The only way that they could have benefitted from it was if they wanted go to Tinapa they now take a trip to the airport and join the monorail that will take them to Tinapa, how feasible will that be and how plausible is that.

So this administration carried out studies and saw that the monorail as it was designed, was going to fail, it wasn’t going to work, it was a white elephant, what is the population of people who arrive daily by flight and what is the percentage of that population that will be heading to Tinapa, that you will sink billions just to build a monorail that will carry them from the airport to Tinapa. So this government has to take a study on this because as you know Calabar is growing very fast and is becoming a mega city and the road network in Calabar is getting stretched and challenged.

So this government took a study of that project and redesigned it with partners from Canada, who actually did a study and redesigned it and saw a viability in creating a route that goes round the city with different stops so that the average man can join it so that the stress on the road will reduce with different stop, starting from the airport going through the city centre through the market area right to Tinapa where we have the terminal and back. That way every one will be able to benefit from this monorail and modernity that it will bring to the city.

There is allegation that the Imoke led administration has been docile and not done much compared to previous administration in the state.

Well it is very unfortunate for people to say that, I think we have the problem of the elites. The majority of Cross Riverians don’t think that way, the majority of Cross Riverians reside in the rural area, the majority of Cross Riverians feel this government but it is the problem of the elites and that elite is the vocal elite and His Excellency has said and I wish people understood him clearly when he set out in 2007, he said his government is going to serve those who need government the most and who are these people, they are not the elites who have access to him, but the common man in the village who doesn’t have access to him, who does not have hope and that his government was going to give those ones hope because they have been long neglected for several years.

Let’s look at the projects. Which projects by the previous administration that people are talking about, that this administration hasn’t matched, what are those projects, Tinapa, a project that wasn’t set up properly, that was of no benefit to people, and look at it critically, apart from building on those projects people must understand that government is a continuum, government is not Donald Duke and Liyel Imoke, so who ever is on the seat must realize the fact that things are being done or things had been started that must be built upon and this government has done that.

Do you think that Imoke deserves a second tenure, why and how?

I want to ask the question, why doesn’t he deserve a second tenure? Senator Liyel Imoke has done very well excellently well for Cross River. People do not understand the challenges that are going on. Midway through his tenure, the state almost went bankrupt when we lost 76 oil wells and we lost half of the revenues that went with it, yet the state stayed afloat, yet the state is seen as a model state, yet the state is seen as a destination, how possible is that because of one man, because of his creative and ingenious way of handling the affairs of the state of managing the meager resources within his control to ensure that the state stays afloat.