Lucky Obukohwo, Reporting
The people of Utoka Community in Ovia North East Local Government Area of Edo State, have threatened to petition the Economic and Financial Crime Commission (EFCC), the Independent Corrupt Practices and other related offenses Commission (ICPC) and the Inspector General of Police (IGP) over abandoned primary healthcare centre renovation project.
The contract was awarded to the tune of N35 million through the Ministry of Health and Social Welfare, which claimed the peoject have been completed and paid for but abandoned.
This is coming after an Action for Socio-political and Economic Change coordinator, Comrade Osaze Edigin drew the attention of the community to the project which was listed among several others completed projects across the country.
The secretary, Mr. Famous Emovon who spoke for the community, said that they were very surprised when the civil rights group brought to their notice that the healthcare centre that was awarded in 2024 to the tune of N35 million has been completed and paid for whereas nothing has been done.
Mr. Emovon said that the healthcare centre was built over 10 years ago and ever since then, no renovation work has been carried out on it.
The community secretary narrated that when the ceilings of the healthcare centre was badly destroyed by bats, they were replaced through self-help and not the federal government.
“There was a time bats invaded the facility and the ceilings got burst. It was the community efforts and some other individuals that put their resources together to fix it and ever since, we have not gotten any help from anywhere and now that we are aware that N35 million has been budgeted for it, up till now, we expected that the project would have gone far and now, we don’t know why the project has not kicked off”, Emovon said.
He noted that the community is aware that the project has been listed among ones completed and paid for, saying they are ready to use the instrumentality of the law and the help of the civil rights groups to ensure that the project is investigated.
“Now that our attention has been drawn to it, we are going to draw the attention of the appropriate quarters to it using the civil society groups”, Emovon said.
Earlier, the Action for Socio-political and Economic Change coordinator, Comrade Osaze Edigin, said as a group saddled with the responsibility of tracking down government projects with the view of holding government accountable to the people and also know how tax payers money is being used, they discovered that the Utoka community primary healthcare centre was listed among the projects already completed and the sum of N35 million for which the contract was awarded has allegedly been paid to the contractor in full.
He said when the civil rights group visited the site of the project in the community, there was no single work done at the facility.
Comrade Edigin further called on the authorities concerned to carry out an investigation and bring the contractor to book.