NDDC SUMMONS CONTRACTORS OVER POOR PERFORMANCE

The contractor handling the 25-kilometre Ikom-Agbokim Waterfall Road in Ikom-Etung Local Government Area of Cross River State has been summoned by the Niger Delta Development Commission, NDDC, to report at the Commission’s Headquarters to explain why work on the project was stalled. 

Similarly, the firm constructing the 522-bed space prototype hostel at the Cross

River University of Technology, CRUTECH, Calabar, was asked to proceed to Port Harcourt to give explanations for the undue delay in completing  the project.

The NDDC Managing Director, Sir (Barr) Bassey Dan-Abia, handed down the order on Saturday during an inspection visit to the projects. He said that the defaulting contractors would be given an opportunity to defend their actions or lack of it, after which appropriate sanctions may be considered. He stated that the NDDC would not allow contractors to work against its interests and that of the people of the Niger Delta.

“We must continue to monitor their performances on a regular basis to ensure that they fit into the concept of the New NDDC, where constant supervision is the watchword,” Dan-Abia said. He, therefore, charged contractors working for the NDDC to get their acts together as the new board would not entertain excuses for non-performance.

At CRUTECH hostel, both the Chairman of the NDDC Board, Senator Bassey Ewa-Henshaw and the MD expressed displeasure with the progress of work in the students’ hall of residence. Dan-Abia said: “We are here in line with our resolve to put emphasis on project monitoring. That is why both the Chairman and I have come out today to supervise this project. This is clearly below the standard we have set for our contractors.”

Giving his own impression, Senator Ewa-Henshaw said: “I am disappointed with what I have seen here today. We were here about a year ago and what we saw then gave us hope. But today, it would appear that nothing much has been done since then. The students need the hostel and the NDDC is eager to have it completed and handed over because the hostel projects are meant to alleviate the accommodation problems of our students, which is in line with the transformation agenda of President Goodluck Jonathan,” he said.

The Vice Chancellor of CRUTECH, Prof. Anthony Enoh, said that the university community would continue to cooperate with the contractor by providing a peaceful working environment. “Indeed, we are excited by this project and we are hopeful that in no distant time it would be ready for the use of our students,” he said.

The NDDC team had earlier inspected the same type of hostel at the University of Calabar where work had been stalled for some years. Here, Senator Ewa-Henshaw charged the Cross River State office of the Commission to prepare a report on the current state of the structures already built to enable the board review the entire project.

It would be recalled that the NDDC had embarked on the construction of 19 prototype hostels in universities and polytechnics in the nine Niger Delta states. So far, 4 of such hostels have been completed and commissioned, while many others are read for commissioning.

Sir Innocent Nwaigwe

Deputy Director, Corporate Affairs Dept

MARCH 9^TH 2015.