Enugu: The Gains
Of Hardwork
By
Maureen Chigbo
culled from NEWSWATCH, October 16,
2006
Chimaroke Nnamani,
Enugu State Governor, chides critics of his administration and says his hardwork
has made the State a better place.
As a scientist, Chimaroke Nnamani,
Governor of Enugu State, is a very analytical person. He is capable of
discerning the good and the bad sides of an issue, no matter how minute the
details are. And it was with the same attitude that he views the recent report
of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, on Enugu State. He
believes that in every such report there are truths embedded in it. That is
what, he said, the EFCC’s report on his state has revealed. For example, even
though the EFCC report did not identify specific projects executed by the
governments, it confirmed that those projects were indeed executed.
The projects include construction of Federal Government roads, which had
hitherto, been denied by the opposition. There is the permanent site of the
Enugu State University of Science and Technology, ESUT, with 165 buildings built
on 600 hectares of land donated by six communities, the ESUT Teaching Hospital,
Parklane, GRA, Enugu and College of Medicine, including three hostels, each of
them built with en-suite facilities.
The fully completed and equipped dual complexes have a clinical laboratory, a
pharmacy block, 1,200-seater lecture auditorium and administrative blocks. There
is the Ebeano Tunnel Crossing, which is the first of its kind in Nigeria. There
is provision for a standby power generating set. For the security of the tunnel,
a police post is sited beside its entrance. Nnamani also completed road network
Enugu and the state-of-the-art Enugu State Judiciary Headquarters, which
has 18 computerized court chambers and a library, cafeteria and a small social
centre where conferences can be held.
Another project is the international conference centre, where Nnamani plans to
hold pre-inauguration banquet and post-inauguration luncheon for his successor.
Apart from the completed projects, the Loma Linda Housing Estate, another
brainchild of Nnamani, is gradually taking shape with the extent of work done
outweighing the work left. It is designed to provide 324 flats to Enugu
residents.
The summary of the findings said that EFCC “considers road projects reasonably
managed, though huge variations in project work were observed.” The commission
said it engaged the services of two very versatile professional engineers and
included them in the team of detectives for a three-day project verification
exercise. All the projects inspected and evaluated were handled by Marlum
Construction Company Limited, Olyton Nigeria Limited and Tramie Nigeria Limited
from 2003 to date. The projects of the last two companies were supervised by the
first. In all, a total of 24 projects were listed for inspection. Fourteen of
these projects were road projects while the remaining 10 were building projects.
The commission said that due to time constraints, absence of necessary contract
documents for some projects and the level of details involved in the inspection
and evaluation exercise, only 20 projects were inspected. Documents of projects
not inspected were evaluated based on standard prices, the commission said. The
experts’ valuations were compared with the values placed on these projects by
the government to determine over or under valuation. Consequently a net
over-valuation of N2.4 billion and N400 million were traced to buildings and
road projects, respectively. Among other things, the EFCC report also said that
five of the 10 road projects inspected had attained between 98 percent and 100
percent completion while the remaining five were at different infancy stages of
between 1 percent and 20 percent. EFCC said that “one of the road projects was
considered reasonably priced while another one was observed to be under priced.”
The remaining 12 projects were adjudged
over valued at both award and certification stages and had, therefore, been
recommended to be appropriately re-valued. Eight of the 10 building projects
were confirmed to have attained between 70 percent and 95 percent stages of
completion while the remaining two were at 28 percent and 31 percent stages of
completion. It said generally, pricing of the building projects and
certification of work done were observed to be on the high side and had,
therefore, been recommended to be specifically revalued downwards. At the same
time, EFCC said the “performance quality of nine building projects and twelve
road projects out of 24 were adjudged satisfactory and the contractors
commended.”
Reacting to the report, Nnamani said: “We support the anti-corruption mechanism,
not just through EFCC but also through ICPC and other modalities that will
increase public enlightenment and sensitization. It’s exactly 10 months since
EFCC came to Enugu State. When they came we did welcome them…We saw the report
they came out with. We maintain after careful study, reading and advice and good
counsel on the report, we felt the report is a complete exoneration of the
government of Enugu State,” Nnamani said.
According to him, “Enugu State has gone through that process which we regard and
describe as a self cleansing or process of critical consciousness. The EFCC sent
experts here, who spent about three fleeting days and looked at about 70 percent
of the entire project and came out with numbers, what I describe as a price
variance between the price of their experts an that of our contractors”. He said
that these contracts were awarded after due process, which included advertising
for the bidding process, going through the bidding process, award and
publication of award. “There are various variables that could determine the
contract price. One, cost of energy. Two, the site itself – how close is it to
materials like laterite and chippings? The cost of labour and even weather and
climatic changes. Even factors such as soil testing, geodetic survey can affect
the price,” he said, adding that “based on that, I do not think that a price
variance of N2.8 billion of an over 30
billion contract is statistically significant, especially when it is still
unconfirmed.” This is because the valuations were done by EFCC experts. The
variation could differ if the experts are to be government expert or that of the
contractors. “In a system where people are inflating contracts by 50 percent,
100 – 200 percent and you have unconfirmed price variance of less than 10
percent, I am not worried about it. They talked about a price variance. That is
still subject to confirmation,” Nnamani said. He said that his interest is that
the contract went through due process, noting that “the contractors are
contesting the price variance. The consultants are contesting it. Government is
contesting it based on the information we have on the ground.”
Nnamani described as ridiculous EFCC’s notion that he is worth N50 billion. “The
issue of the net worth of a governor is completely wrong. It’s something you
don’t even give a second thought. It’s ridiculous. I can’t even imagine a
situation where an official of government of any state in this country, much
less Enugu, will be worth US$400 million,” he said.
On the issue of his relations in business, Nnamani said: “We made it clear that
relatives who are adults under a democratic setting can engage in whichever
business they choose. The bottom line is to make sure that government money is
not involved in these businesses.” He said such businesses were welcomed in
Enugu State as they contribute to the economy. “We would rather have it here
than have them in other states of Nigeria or have them in America or in the UK.
The bottom line is that there is no evidence whatsoever that there is government
money in these businesses. I know there is no government money in these
businesses”, he said.
Nnamani also reacted to the issue of local governments and said, based on the
constitution and also based on the Supreme Court’s ruling, that local government
issues are purely state issues. “Local government funds distributed through
state or local government joint accounts are supervised by the House of Assembly
through its committee on local government,” he said.
The EFCC also touched on the recovery of funds refunded to the state government
for implementing federal government projects. On this Nnamani has this to say:
“It’s also exoneration because remember they said we didn’t do any federal
projects – that was what the opposition was saying. So for you to agree that we
were refunded and that there are federal projects indeed, that is a compliment
to the government of Enugu State.” He said that the funds, just like the
allocations, went into accounts and were disbursed and spent based on budgetary
appropriations. “Then, of course, I said it’s exoneration. Remember that the
case of opposition is that these contracting companies are owned by the governor
of the state. But you can see that it is not the case,” Nnamani pointed out.
The report did not identify the governor as the owner of these contracting
companies. In addition, the report said the jobs were well done in terms of
performance, that the contractors did well. “They even went further to say that
some of the contracts were under priced. But while they went to details on
overpricing, they did not go to any detail in under-pricing. Maybe if they had
got the details of under-pricing, they would have come out with a net,” the
governor said. “Go read it. Re-read it. Study it. Interpret it. Those who are
concerned are more likely to comb it, to look at it. We have done that, we have
consulted and as far as we are concerned, the report is an exoneration of the
Enugu State Government,” he said.
Perhaps what gives Nnamani confidence is the benchmark of performance of states
against international best practices by National Planning Commission, NPC, and
supported by World bank, European Commission Delegation to Nigeria, British
Department of International development, DFID, United Nations Development
Programme, UNDP and United States Agency for International Development, USAID.
Of the 36 states assessed, Enugu State came first with a total score of 56.12
percent in 2005. A breakdown of the figure saw the state scoring 16 percent on
policy, 18.45 percent for fiscal management, service delivery, 11.75 percent
while it got 9.92 percent on communication and transparency. Federal Capital
territory came second with 46.10 while Osun came third with 44.85 percent.
Nnamani’s aides also came out strongly to defend him. Dan Shere, secretary to
the state government, in a three-paged statement published in advertorial said
it was important to point out to Nigerians that the wild claim that the governor
had netted for himself over N50 billion “suspected” to be taken from state
coffers between 1999 and 2003, failed to take into account the actual, overall
earnings of Enugu State, which stand from June 1999 to the end of 2005 at
N70,696,694,334.64. “It is within this figure that the salaries of civil
servants averaging N500 million per month; subvention to public parastatals over
N300 million per month; payment for general administration and, of course the
gargantuan projects with which the Nnamani administration has now been known,
are undertaken,” Shere said.
Shere said it was worthy to state that Enugu State started the glorious
democratic season in 1999 with about one hundred million naira monthly
allocation, then progressed to about N400 million, later N800 million, in
subsequent months before we arrived this stage when Enugu graduated into about
one and half billion Naira monthly. He said: “We have, about this day, done over
seven years in the democratic governance of Enugu State and by experience, we
cannot but laugh at the preposterous pretension of sweeping assumptions, powered
by personal indignation and total disregard for simple standards of evaluation.
We, therefore, feel compelled to point out that if at any point, this EFCC claim
is to be considered – that is aside the injury of pre-judicial publicity that
comes in its wake, the point must be made that it eroded every possibility of
any credibility by the confessed style, mode and tactics of investigation.” “For
the avoidance of doubt, we want to state quite
categorically that the EFCC report, as presented on the floor of the Senate of
the Federal Republic, September 27, 2006 and promoted in the scarcely disguised
media launch, could not have been the report of the investigation which were
conducted in Enugu State,” he said.
Stating that the EFCC report established the trend of deliberate but selective
exposure, Shere gave kudos to the commission in such areas it owned up to the
facts on the ground. One such instance, he said was the admission that in
investigating Enugu State government, it observed price variances of N2. billion
in building construction projects and N400 million in road projects. Strangely,
though, the commission’s “versatile professional engineers” refused to add up to
make the fact that these could come directly from the equally admitted gap of 30
percent of the projects which, for time constraint, they could not investigate.”
Shere expressed surprise that the commission deliberately missed regional, space
and time factors in cost variances, especially when such whistle-stop visits
would naturally miss the schedule of the basic rates of construction materials
in 2002 compared to August 2006, when they visited Enugu. According to him, “it
is against this background of lack of any kernel of indictment or evidence of
malfeasance that we view the overall report on Enugu as a confirmatory
declaration which is yet to be picked in-between lines of what promoters of
celebrated exposure clip on their chest as the prize of the century,” he said.
He said the fact should not be lost on Nigerians that in hastily storming the
public arena to yell at Enugu State government and others, EFCC is refusing to
accept that it has no case against those investigated, since this pre-judicial,
pre-trial publicity, has knocked off the commission’s chances of pursuing strong
prosecution in the courts of the land.
Igbonekwu Ogazimorah, Commissioner of Information, said that the ECCC report is
a confirmation that Enugu is working. “The aim of the whole thing is to use
falsehood to rubbish the governor. It has not affected the image of the
governor. The report itself is vacuous,” Ogazimorah said, adding that “the
investigation is amateurish. What EFCC did is guesswork and political hack job.”
According to him, “The EFCC report is a confirmation that the government is
doing very, very well. It shows there is nothing against us because there is
nothing.”
Luke Mammel, an engineer and special adviser to Nnamani on Project Development
and Implementation, pointed out the discrepancy in the EFCC’s report, which, he
said, had no full application of standards and control of solid professionals.
Mammel questioned EFCC’s engagement of “versatile professional engineers”,
saying that one might wish to know the background of the engineers. “As
professional engineers,” do they have cognate training and experience in the
construction cost consultancy? One wonders how these “versatile professional
engineers” could come to such conclusions as they reached in a whistle-stop
three-day visit.”
On the allegation of lack of co-operation from the commissioner and staff of the
ministry of works as alleged by the EFCC, Mammel said it was obvious the experts
lacked what to report because the inspections were jointly carried out, as the
contractors were represented along side the client’s representatives and all the
documents tendered by contracting firms were the same documents issued by the
Ministry of Works or its consultants on the projects; which in any case applied
in all the projects.
The question is, were there prior notification for such exercise either through
the commissioner for works or the contracting companies before the visiting team
came calling? “It still remains a surprise to us that the same commission which
expressed satisfaction and commended the activities of the contracting
companies, still considered it proper and in fashion, to freeze the contractor’s
project accounts since June, 2006, without minding if the jobs are frustrated or
not. It is more curious that working with “versatile professional engineers” as
the commission did, it ignored the implication in a contractor leaving site and
mobilizing again, which every experienced builder knows can be very, very
disruptive in cost, execution and eventual delivery.”
In his first four years in office, Nnamani concentrated his attention on
providing roads, water electricity and health facilities for his people. The
state now has 56 rural health centres and 24 cottage hospitals. In his current
and final term, he is concentrating on legacies – building and completing most
gigantic projects he embarked upon. And the projects have endeared him to his
people who could not care less about the EFCC’s report.
