The Bauchi State government has stated that its plan to remodel and reconstruct the Goverment House in the state and the Governor’s Lodge in Abuja at the cost of N6.4 billion was not a misplacement of priority but a necessity.
The goverment which said that the despite the reactions that have trailed the plan by the government, the expansion and reconfiguration of the Goverment House is no different from similar projects undertaken by Governors Ahmed Mu’azu on Ramat House (Presidential Lodge), VIP 9 and the newly constructed VIP 5, Guest Houses by the immediate past administration.
According to the government, the VIP 10 Lodge in the state, was purchased and renovated by Governor Isa Yuguda, while Governor Mohammed Abubakar did a facelift of the Governor’s Residence yet, “no one cared or dared to speak.”
Recall that the Commissioner of Environment and Housing, Hamisu Shira, on Tuesday while briefing journalists on the outcome of the State Executive Council Meeting, said that the state government planned to spend N6.1 billion to remodel and reconstruct the Goverment House in the state, adding that an additional N300 million would be used to renovate the Bauchi State Governor’s Lodge in Asokoro in Abuja because it is one of the worst and most dilapidated.
The State Government’s reaction was contained in a media statement signed and made available to journalists by the Commissioner of Information, Dahiru Garba, on Saturday.
Garba, in the statement entitled: Re: Misleading reports on the reconstruction of the Government House, stressed that the project will not be financed through FAC proceeds, but from performance-based, World Bank grants and recovery funds adding that “the N6 Billion project is among the least projects of its kind in the country.”
He said that the “misleading report” was based on the press briefing by the Commissioner for Housing and Environment, which was substantially accurate, but questioning the proprietary of such a project amidst the COVID-19 pandemic and the inflation that the country is experiencing, made it incumbent on the Government to make the clarifications.
“For a start, the present Government House was built, at the creation of the state, in 1976, the expanded nature of government business demands a physical expansion and reconfiguration, to inject the required physical synergy that even the digital age, has not completely rendered redundant.
“It is an irony that in Bauchi State, we have an APC opposition that has allergy to progress and development. The previous Government conceived a project-basket of more than 40 roads without executing one. Billions of Naira were spent on mobilization without any trace of execution.
“The story conveys the impression of immediate wholesale appropriation of the funds for the project, without consideration for other priority projects. This is completely untenable.
“Granted that the amount has been budgeted, it is still subject to the strictures of funds availability. What is important is that such a desirable project kicks off, with the state government applying the rigorous and prudent management of resources, a practice of this administration that accounts for the sustained delivery of the dividends of democracy by way of infrastructural projects, people empowerment and security of lives and property.
“Thus, to imagine that the overdue reconstruction of the Government House will scuttle other priority projects is only a figment of the imagination of those who cannot come to terms with the resolve of the Bala Mohammed’s administration to leave an indelible footprint on the sands of Bauchi’s development,” he stated.
The Commissioner added that: “To suggest, as the story does, that the project could lead to the misplacement of priorities flies in the face of the unprecedented infrastructural and people-oriented projects that the Bauchi State Government has undertaken in less than two years of the existence of the Bala Mohammed administration.”
According to him, the Mohammed-led administration has sunk in over N28 billion for various developmental projects in the state which the critics fail to see and commend.
He said: “For anyone to suggest, let alone claim, that a government that has sunk over N14 billion in the provision and rehabilitation of roads alone, is misplacing priorities, is the height of misplaced judgement and outright hypocrisy.
“In less than two years, the Bala Mohammed administration has also sunk more than N14 Billion into rebuilding schools, provision of electricity and water as well as other infrastructural amenities, in a paradigm shift that has taken the dividends of democracy to the nooks and crannies of Bauchi State.
“For the doubting Thomases and naysayers whose stock-in-trade is to dampen the morale of the people, we want to assure them that the Bala Mohammed Administration will never sacrifice the welfare of the people or the rapid transformation of Bauchi State on the altar of self-serving ostentatious projects,”
Garba said that contrary to the misleading impression being created by some unrepentant traducers of the Bala Mohammed administration, the reconstruction of the Government House would be executed in phases; in such a way that no other important Government project will suffer.
He also said that was important to clarify that prioritization does not imply that capital projects, that advance the image of government and the convenience and comfort of its principal functionaries, should be allowed to suffer exclusion or atrophy simply because some naysays have mastered the ignoble art of blackmail.
He reiterated that the reconstruction of the Government House is an integral part of the urban renewal initiative of the Bala Mohammed administration that has so far witnessed extensive environmental rehabilitation, reconstruction and rehabilitation of intra-city roads in the state capital, land reforms and provision of potable water.
“It is ironical that critics of the Government House project,” he said, “have conveniently turned a blind eye to another component of the urban renewal programme, that is, the ambitious new Bauchi City development programme of the administration.
“By peremptorily dismissing the project as uneconomic, those baying for political blood forget that every such capital development effort, stimulates the construction industry whose huge multiplier effect can also reflate the economy. Government is confident that as construction and reconstruction work progress, the multiplier effect on the economy of Bauchi State will be huge.”
The Information Commissioner said that for Nigerians who are familiar with Bauchi Government House, it is nowhere near the ones in Zamfara Kaduna, Katsina, Adamawa, Plateau, among others pointing out that: “Our Government House is out of sync with modernity, it simply cannot guarantee a conducive and habitable atmosphere for a serious conduct of government business.”
According to him, the Bala Mohammed administration is on solid grounds when it prides itself as being in the forefront of the country’s economic recovery effort.
He said that as evidence of this, only recently, the government acquired and distributed 1,000 tricycles and 154 transport vehicles to the youth of Bauchi State adding that the government trained thousands of youths in agriculture and rehabilitation of Agro-allied industries.
“No Government that is so focused can and should be described as one that will misplace its priorities or betray the confidence of the electorate.
“It goes without saying that the state government workers have never had it so good, in a very long time. It is therefore, preposterous, capricious, mischievous and indeed arrogant for anybody, under whatever guise, to pretend to hold a higher moral compass than the reasoned endorsement of the people of Bauchi State, of the policies, programmes and performance of the administration of His Excellency, Governor Bala Mohammed.
“Neither will the well-deserved reconstruction of the Bauchi State Government House nor the malevolent attacks of Bala Mohammed’s traducers, change this hard-earned respect and support,” he stated.