No sooner Gov Nyesom Wike was sworn in as governor of Rivers State
than he embarked on indiscriminate borrowing at cut-throat interest
rate from Nigerian commercial banks.
The borrowing spree was carried out irrespective of the fact that the
matter of the All Progressives Congress, APC, Governorship Candidate,
Dr. Dakuku Peterside contesting the emergence of Gov. Wike was still
subsisting in court.
Gov. Wike’s borrowing extravaganza acquired a frightening dimension
as soon as he got a favourable Supreme Court judgment affirming his
emergence. While Gov. Wike engaged in his borrowing bonanza, the
Rivers State Chapter of All Progressives Congress, APC, consistently
raised the alarm that the governor was borrowing away and mortgaging
the future of Rivers people cautioning him to have a rethink.
However, all our advice was brushed aside by the governor. Exactly on
the 1st of July, 2015 The APC uncovered and raised the alarm that
there was a strategic plan by Governor Nyesom Wike to obtain loans
totaling N100b in the few months he was expected to be in power (in
case he lost at the courts as the governor of Rivers State) thereby
plunging the state into an abyss of debt and economic servitude.
APC warned that the good people of Rivers State had ended up in the
notorious Lagos buses used in robbing unsuspecting citizens popularly
called ‘one chance.’ On each occasion, the governor offered future
state monthly allocations from the federal government as collateral
security spread against less than 40 months of his 48 months tenure.
When the governor exhausted the federal allocation window, he was
forced to use future dividend earnings to the state from Indorama
Petrochemical Company, Eleme as yet another collateral security.
The governor only stopped after borrowing over N100b and could not
find any more collateral security to obtain further loans. Instead of
keeping it honest with Rivers people by acknowledging that he has
borrowed away the peoples’ future, the governor, looked into the eyes
of men of God that surrounded him at the Synod of Anglican Diocese of
Etche on Sunday and told them what can pass as the most daring white
lie of the century when he accused the Buhari administration of
reducing his government’s monthly federal allocation in order to
undermine his administration.
We ask: Is it that Gov Wike forgot what happened? Did he think we
have all become so foolish that we have forgotten that he actually
borrowed away Rivers State monthly allocations in advance? The APC
cautions Gov. Nyesom Wike to be careful where he takes his dishonest
campaigns to especially the house of God. He should apologise to
Rivers people especially the youths who he has spent their future
despite repeated warnings from the APC.