Imo State Commissioner for works, Ralph Nwosu has disclosed that there are a total of 49 ongoing road construction projects in the state. He said the administration inherited 28 of the projects, while it awarded the rest on its own.
The commissioner made this disclosure during a press briefing of newsmen in his office, over the 100 days in office of the present administration. He used the opportunity to highlight some achievements of the ministry.
He recalled that Governor Uzodimma allowed the contractors already handling road projects in the state to continue, but some of them did not show passion to work for the state reason their contracts were terminated.
He said the present government prefers to work with development partners rather than contractors, explaining that while contractors are only interested in making money, development partners have interest of the government and people of the state at heart and are willing to make sacrifices to help the state move forward.
Talking about those whose contracts were revoked, he said, “They are not our development partners. They are just contractors looking for money and that is why we said we are not ready to work with them
“If you are our development partner, you should be ready to work for us and we pay you at the end of the day. We can only owe. Everybody owes. Even America owe, Nigerian government also owes. So if Imo State Government owes you a little money, which you know we will pay, it shouldn’t be a big deal”.
He expressed regret that the state is still talking road construction in the capital city, saying if the right things were done by the immediate past administrations, the present government would have been focusing attention on the rural roads that equally requires urgent attention.
