Some stakeholders in the southeast region under the auspices of Southeast Professionals have asked the implementation committee of Orosanye Report to consider the 2014 white paper on merger of some federal establishments.

The group, in a statement, in Enugu, stated that there a plot by some interest groups to emasculate the Projects Development Institute (PRODA), Enugu, under the pretence of implementing the Orosanye Report.

In the statement by its Coordinator, Humphrey Nwodo, the group noted that in the white paper, the Goodluck Jonathan administration clearly mentioned agencies that were recommended for merger.

He insisted that the white paper specifically exempted PRODA from the restructuring and rationalisation in the Ministry of Science and Technology, allowing it to continue to stand alone.

According to Nwodo, then Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF), Anyim Pius Anyim, had written the Ministry of Science and Technology thus: “The government accepts the recommendation that NASENI and NCAM be merged but with the exclusion of FIIRO and PRODA.”

He expressed surprise that a recent report planted by some interests had listed PRODA as one of the agencies of government to be merged or scrapped over pecuniary interests.

“We are of the belief that the reason for allowing PRODA stand alone by the original Orosanye Report may have stemmed from the fact that over the years, it has been consistent with fulfilling its mandate of generating and catalysing industrialisation by carrying out industrial research from the laboratory stage to the pilot plant stage and by rendering consultancy services to the governments, industries and individuals.

“Again, apart from being one of the oldest research institutes under the Federal Ministry of Science and Technology, PRODA is the only research institute the Federal Government has in the entire Southeast and South- South regions, while the North and Southwest have 15 and four respectively.”