A financial expert and Head of Economics Department in the University of Uyo, Prof Emmanuel Onwioduokit has attacked Governor Udom Emmanuel over his explanation that the controversial N150b was not a loan but Strategy to create money..
Residents and indegenes had expressed displeasure when the Governor sought for an approval from the State Assembly for a N150b loan facility a forth night ago, one week after he also sought for another approval for a N45b loan.
Matters came to a head when House Leader and member representing Oruk Anam State Constituency, Mr Udo Akpan while defending the Emmanuel claimed that the Governor was using his banking experience to create money from the money market.
But Onwuodiokit told correspondents in Uyo on Wednesday that Emmanuel should be open to Akwa Ibom people to enable them understand his direction and be properly positioned to support government activities and programmes.
According to him, “no state government can create money through instrument. Any form of instrument that a state issue is a debt because it would involve a payback with interest, to that extent, it is a loan. Only the private sector can issue equity and shares, that makes you an owner with the company.”
Onwioduokit who blamed the number of abandoned road projects on the mode of contract awards and government’s alleged inability to open up to the people, said it was impossible to prosecute defaulting contractors who were not subjected to proper processes of bidding before being awarded contracts.
“Why are the roads not being bidded for? why do they sit down and allocate contract to their friends? Even the procurement law requires bidding and competition before contract award. The state is further deprived by the shoddy approach to contract award because even the bidding process would have attracted some revenue to the state.
“The likelihood now is that when you friend whom you awarded the contract without due process defaults, you cannot prosecute them. Are there ongoing court cases to recover funds from defaulting contractors? We do not even know how much was unvolved in all the projects across the state.”
He decried the state’s N400b debt profile and challenged the Governor to defend the N18b borrowed for installation of CTVV cameras in the state.
“This same government borrowed the sum of N18b for installation of CTVV Cameras across the state to help in the fight against criminality. Where are the cameras? where were they installed? what happened to the money?” He queried
