The All Progressives Congress (APC) in Enugu State on Tuesday raised an alarm over the ongoing massive demolition by the state government and called on the House of Representatives to set up a national public inquiry to stop the demolition and ensure that commensurate compensation is paid to all those whose property and businesses were destroyed.
“It is important that a national public inquiry be set by the House of reps to stop the impunity going on in Enugu and make sure that the governor is held responsible for desecrating the constitutional rights of the citizens to own property and carry on their lawful businesses. We also call on those whose businesses were destroyed to seek redress and make sure they get commensurate compensation for their destroyed businesses and we pledge to fully support them. Enugu citizens should not tolerate this show of unbridled dictatorship, impunity and wickedness,” the party stated.
The state government had in the last three weeks embarked on the demolition of the Holy Ghost parks, which house a school, banks, residential facilities of the railway and other businesses; Gariki, Abakpa, and Ogige markets to enable it to set up modern bus terminals as part of its urban renewal efforts in the state.
State Commissioner of Transport, Obi Ozor, stated that the government had paid adequate compensation to all legal occupants, assuring that the projects would come on stream in the next 12 months.
Addressing reporters at the site of the demolitions at the Holy Ghost parks on Tuesday, the state Chairman of the APC, Ugochukwu Agballah, stated that the demolitions have led to untold financial and psychological hardship on affected families.
“Nowhere in the world do you carry out such projects without implementing the principles of (T.O.D) otherwise called Transit-oriented development which is aimed at bringing all commercial activities, buildings, public space together and connecting them to a near excellent transit service to every part of the city? If the principles of T.O.D had been implemented the government would not even think of building the biggest transportation hub opposite the biggest market in the city. This will lead to congestion and a calamitous traffic bottleneck.
“The intellectual emptiness of the Peter Mbah-led government is reflected in this ill-conceived project that seeks to impishly imitate other landmark projects by other governments and in this instance, the Lagos state government.
“The Lagos state government transport hubs are well thought out projects that conform to all the principles of Transit Oriented Development (T.O.D). How can you destroy entire markets at Ogige in Nsukka, Gariki and Abakpa without first providing relief markets? It is akin to sentencing the citizens to sudden death.
“How can citing a motor park and destruction of livelihood of the tens of thousands of your citizens be for the greater good? When has the business of parks become the business of the government, in this modern time governments are running away from running transport companies. This government is planning to set up a transportation hub, is it his business?
“Transport hubs have been organised by private people since the end of the civil war and they have been doing better than the ones the government set up. The people of Enugu State must condemn these nefarious acts and use constituted means to stop the perennial grabbing of people’s land by the present government,” Agballah said.
Flanked by numerous members of the party in the state, Agballah said that the party had watched the administration in the state in the last year and was perturbed that with over N470 billion that had come into the coffers, not much had been achieved to justify the manifesto put up by the governor during his campaign.
“It is an empirical fact that from May 29th 2023 to May 29th 2024, Peter Mbah’s government has received not less than N 475,963,652,019 only. The breakdown is as follows; Federal allocation to the State is 147,778,456,610.09, Local Government Allocation: 64,185,195,409.01, Infrastructure allocation: 34,000,000,000,State IGR not less than 60,000,000,000, Loans: 170,000,000,000. Making it a total of N475,963,652,000.19.
“ We felt that we should not heat up the system because with the humongous allocation which is almost three times what the previous governments received we felt that any serious government with such a bumper revenue will surely succeed. With this revenue we expected that Gov. Peter Mbah should have built at least 2,500 kilometres of roads having covenanted in his manifesto that he will construct 10,000 kilometres of road in Enugu State within four years. 2,500 kilometres is 25% of the total road network he covenanted to build and one year is a quarter of his tenure of four years,” he added.
