Abiodun Onafuye/Abeokuta

Daniel: hits Amosun again

For the umpteenth time, former governor of Ogun State,Otunba Gbenga Daniel has accused his successor,Ibikunle Amosun of wasting the resources of the state, raising fear of pushing the State into bankruptcy.

Daniel, now a senatorial aspirant in Ogun East, alleged that the present administration has not been fair to the people of the State,adding that Amosun’s style of governance has made people to suffer and live in abject poverty.

The former Labour Party chieftain,who recently defected to PDP described Amosun a reckless spender, who has been wasting the State resources.

He therefore called on the people to vote him out in next February election.

He spoke Wednesday afternoon in a radio programme on Paramount FM, Abeokuta.

Daniel, as he has done in recent months, condemned the infrastructural development being done by the Amosun administration, arguing that the prices for the contracts were inflated. He also criticised Amosun for allowing Africa’s richest man, Aliko Dangote take his $9billion petro-chemical plant out of Ogun state, to Lagos state.

To him, Amosun has done wrong by awarding major contracts in the State to foreign contractors,which according to him,has made the local contractors redundant.

He contrasted this with the agency he set up during his administration, the Ogun State Road Maintainance Agency,OGROMA, which he said was meant to improve the skills of local Engineers.

The experiment, he claimed paid off ” as all the projects we did then were handled by our local Engineers and they are there for everybody to see.”

According to him,”In all of my eight-year administration,I did not award a single contract to a foreign company.Infact,if you are not an indigene of Ogun State,contract will not be awarded to you. For eight years,I did not award a one billion naira contract for any company. We need to look into the issue of awarding contracts by the current administration.

Ibikunle Amosun: fresh diatribe from Daniel

“I wondered how on earth the government will be wasting billions of naira on roads and bridges.Are those bridges needed by those areas they are being constructed. They give us one in my area,Sagamu and I was just coming from Sagamu today,I didn’t see any gridlock around Sabo area where the bridge is being constructed, so what is the need of such bridge there?

“Two of such bridges are constructed in Ijebu Ode,yes,we can say one is necessary,but what is the need of a bridge around Bobasuwa House within Ijebu Ode,it is a waste of resources.

“The government said it had spent billions of naira for the bridges,I am an engineer and I know what I am talking about. Bridges are made up of steel,iron,cement,water and digging. Why spending so much. I can recollect that during my tenure, we awarded a kilometre of road for less than a hundred million naira,now we are hearing N600,N700, even,N800million naira for just a kilometre road. We must wake up.

“The government has tried but there is a misplaced priority. Instead of wasting about N3 or N4 billion naira on bridge in Sagamu,the government should have spent about N200 million to rehabilitate most of the roads constructed by our administration.

“We also constructed bridge during our time,you people don’t know,we constructed the One bridge in Ago Iwoye,on the way to the campus,and we spent just N300million to build it.

“To let you know too,Amosun’s behaviour angered Dangote to move the proposed Ogun refinery to Lagos.It cost us a lot of money. This administration killed a lot of projects initiated by me in this State.Projects like Olokola,Deep seaport,power stations among many others,”Daniel stated.

Daniel is at present facing a graft charge by the EFCC. His senatorial ambition has an obstacle to cross in the finacier of the PDP in the state, Prince Buruji Kashamu, who in turn is being wanted in the United States in connection with some drug offences.