The Mayor of Urhoboland and notable ex-militant leader, His Excellency Eshanekpe Israel a.k.a Akpodoro has called on the FG to make its directive on the pricing of cement by the manufacturers simple and more specific on how much bag of cement should be sold across the country.

The Mayor stated this in his Ughelli, Delta State country home, maintaining that the Presidential order lacks specifics, which he said should not be the case because manufacturers and distributors of building materials in the country are wicked and are bereft of good conscience wondering why the price of cement that limestone is its major raw material and it is wholly sourced locally in the country will rise to as much as fifteen thousand naira per bag noting that the President should mention specifically what should be the cost of a bag of the product everywhere in Nigeria.

Previously, according to Akpodoro, a bag of cement was sold at various times at N500, N1,500, N2,500, N3,200, N4,500, N7,000, N9000, and now between N10,000 and N15,000, noting that the directive of the president should point how much precisely that a bag of cement should be sold in the Nigerian market.

The Mayor called on the President to establish a National Taskforce for price control on building materials to be headed by him (Akpodoro) stating that an average Nigerian buyer and seller is wicked and greedy maintaining that prices of goods and commodities are driven mostly by greed, selfishness, wickedness, lack of patriotism and good conscience by citizens to whom honesty in business is alien.

The Gbaregolor, Ughelli South Local Government Area-born Mayor noted that the price control of cement in the country is the simplest thing President Bola Ahmed Tinubu-led administration can successfully do adding that should the producers of cement chose to be adamant, the President should open the floodgate for the importation of cement to preponderate the market.

He stressed that the monopoly of cement manufacturers is creating bad image for the administration and that shouldn’t be allowed to persist adding that, “this is when the government should muster the political will to break the jinx deliberately created by the cement racketeers, profiteers, price speculators who have constituted themselves as enemies of the Nigerian state.

“Alternatively, the President should establish a taskforce on the pricing and sales of cement in the market. I surrender myself to head such Committee that will nip the wickedness against the Nigerian people in the board. Nigeria is an exclusive preserve of cement manufacturers. It is time to issue a license for cement importation into the country and allow our local product healthily compete in space in the market. Surrendering a population of 250 million people to the whims and caprices of few gullible businessmen should be discouraged,” Akpodoro stated.