Al-Makura stated this yesterday during an exclusive interview with LEADERSHIP in Lafia, Nasarawa State capital. “I have said so before now, and hereby repeat, that the possibility of my defecting from the CPC to the PDP is as false as the sun rising from the north and setting in the south,” he said.
“The time critics could have spread the rumour that I would defect and it would sound acceptable to those who would have chosen to listen to them was when we were still struggling to entrench CPC in Nasarawa State, not now that the people are benefitting from a CPC government which is not only grassroots-friendly but also very accessible.”
Al-Makura, who was reacting to renewed speculations of his purported plans to defect to the PDP, said, “I am not given to double-speak or frivolities. I will not betray Buhari or CPC. My job is to attract more people to the CPC by providing good governance and qualitative leadership.”
Commenting on the Farin Ruwa hydroelectricity project, the governor said after a thorough evaluation of the project he discovered that the cost of completion was too high for the state’s lean resources to take care of and recalled that, in spite of the huge amount of over N6bn it had gulped during the last administration, there was nothing impressive to show and some of the work done had given way.
Al-Makura said, in the next two years, Nasarawa State will generate electricity and distribute from the project based on the concessioning arrangement his government has signed with a private-sector investor who will use their funds to complete and operate the power plant and also build hotels and provide other tourism-related content.
Nasarawa State will repossess the entire project after 25 years but, within this period, the operators will pay taxes and other charges as revenue to Nasarawa State, he disclosed.
On the congestion of traffic and the poor infrastructural development in the Karu - Mararaba axis of the state, Al-Makura said his administration spent nine months on the collation of the problems of the area and had now secured the cooperation of the federal government, through Vice President Namadi Sambo and the FCT administration, to jointly develop the roads network, sanitation, provision of potable water and electricity management of the area.
“We have employed traffic wardens to ensure that taxis and buses comply with the use of dedicated parks and the BRT lane.
The change we are introducing will cause a lot of inconveniences but we crave the understanding of the residents and people.”
He also said the Karu International Market will be sanitised and rehabilitated very soon, ascribing the delay to the recently concluded digitalisation of land reforms, introduction of satellite imagery in urban development and other modern approaches to governance being introduced by his administration.
SOURCE: 27 July 2012.
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