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JUNE 11, 2007 VOL. 21, NO. 9

Whither Romix

**Udenwa, former governor of Imo State**

The alleged re-award of the contentious 108-kilometre road project to subcontractors by Romix Nigeria Limited has raised more doubts about the sincerity of Imo State Government, Council Chairmen and Romix in completing the project.
By Eugenia Okpara, Owerri
ith the sack of the chairmen of the 27 local government councils of Imo State involved in the controversial 108 -kilometre road contract awarded to Romix Nigeria
Limited and the winding down of Governor Achike Udenwa’s administration, the completion of the project now hangs in the balance, even as the contract has been re-awarded to sub-contractors.
Information available to The Source reveal that Romix Nigeria Limited reached another agreement with the 27 local government council chairmen to nominate a sub-contractor to handle the project in each council area.
The council chairmen, The Source gathered, did nominate subcontractors to handle the project as
agreed, but what is not clear is whether the chairmen in reaching this latest agreement with Romix, took into consideration the original concept of the project to use treated soil in the construction.
It is also not clear if the sub-contractors have the expertise required for the construction of the rural
roads that is expected to be all-season passages. There is, in fact, doubt if they do because there is virtually
nothing, road construction-wise going on as far as the completion of the project is concerned.
Regrettably, the Council Chairmen did not understand and appreciate the fact that in accepting to nominate a sub-contractor each, the quality of job to be done has
been sacrificed on the altar of satisfying the interest, of a few while the resources and interests of
the indigenes and residents whose funds are being used for the execution of the project suffer.
Apart from the fact that quality has been sacrificed, not much is been done by the sub-contractors to ensure completion of a project earlier billed to be completed in 2005 because the construction of 4-kilometre road par council area was planned to be a yearly affair.
The naked fact, however, is that the 27 local government council chairmen served out their three-year tenure without impacting anything positive on the lives of the people they swore to serve, leaving the rural areas worst than they met them.
Former Governor, Udenwa had in conceiving the paving of 4-kilometre road par year estimated that by the end of the three-year tenure of the council chairmen, each local government would have constructed 12-kilometres of rural roads in order to open up the various communities through a network that would complement the state governent’s road construction projects.
But like most things in Nigeria, the execution of this very important idea of opening up rural communities became a problem, as apart from resulting in the patronising of an unknown construction firm, thereby wasting the peoples’ resources, it was also responsible for the inclusion of the State into the status report of corrupt States by the Economic and Economical Crimes Commission (EFCC).
Another worrisome aspect of the entire project is that with the re-award of the contract to sub-contractors by Romix, not only is the original concept of using treated soil, instead of asphalt in tarring the road lost, the project has joined the league of abandoned projects that litter across the nation.
The annoying aspect of this shameful wastage of the peoples’ resource is that the reasonsed ex-Governor did nothing to arrest the situation and ensure that the rural road projects did not join the cluster of abandoned ones in Nigeria, inspite of the fact that the Senator representing his constituency, Francis Arthur Nzeribe, recently accused his wife of meddling with funds earmarked for the project.
Indeed, many Imo indigenes had that with the allegation against his wife, Udenwa would have pulled every muscle to compel the contracting firm, Romix Nigeria Limited, to complete the job, if not for anything else, at least to erase the impression created on the minds of the citizenry that his wife frustrated the provision of dividends of democracy to the rural people.
It is also on record that Imo State was listed on the EFCC Status Rreport on States to the Senate on September 27, 2006 because of the alleged tinkering of council funds by officials of the State.
The status report on Imo at the time read: Imo State officials accused of diverting N56 million from each of the 27 local governments for an abandoned road project”. Instructively, the 27 council chairmen were guests to EFCC with nine of them arrested before the governor directed the remaining to answer the Ccommission’s summons.
The question on peoples’ lips is whether the new helsman, Chief Ikedi Ohakim, will allow Romix
Nigeria Limited get away with deceit that has become the hallmark of the contentious 108-kilometre
road project.
The controversial deduction of six million naira from the allocation of the councils and the award and execution of the contentious 108- kilometre road contract came to light when the Senator representing Imo West (Orlu zone) in the National Assembly, Nzeribe, raised the issue on the floor of the Upper House in 2006. The Senator had urged his colleagues to, via a motion, inquire about the money deducted from local government funds for the construction of 108- kilometre road network across the 27 council areas of the State. He had alleged that Chief Theresa Udenwa, wife of the former Governor, Udenwa, tinkered with the funds meant for the execution of the project and by so doing frustrated the execution of the contract.
The Senate, in inquiring about the deducted money, ordered the EFCC to investigate the 12 local government councils in Orlu zone, which resulted in the invasion of the Commission on June 2, 2006. Although the chairmen were guests of the Commission for a long time, but that did not achieve the expected goal of completing the project or recovering the money deducted from the councils.
Reacting on the allegation by the Senator, the former Special Adviser, Bureau of Local Government and
Chieftaincy Affairs– the man at the centre of the controversial deductions and award of the contract–
Geoffery Dikeocha, took a swipe at the Senator, saying that he was merely out to create confusion.
He asked why the Senator had never raised a voice on the inability of the Federal Government to complete the Onitsha-Owerri road flagged off by President Olusegun
Obasanjo during his re-election campaign in the South east geo-political zone.
Dikeocha maintained that no indigene of the State is a member of the Board of Romix Nigeria Limited, just as nobody has a share in the company, insisting, “Theresa Udenwa is not involved in the decision to deduct six million naira from local government funds, nor in the award of the contract, and has never tampered with funds earmarked for the project”.