September 05, (THEWILL) – The Ebonyi State Commissioner for Housing and Urban Development, Engineer Francis Ori, has threatened court action against contractors handling the one hundred and forty (140) housing units by the State Government for the displaced people of Amanze and Izzo autonomous communities in Ishielu Local Government Area of the state.
Ori, who spoke in Abakaliki during a joint briefing with the State Commissioner for Information, Hon. Chikadibia Nwokpor, disclosed that for the first time, contractors handling projects in the state were mobilised 50% of the contract sum.
According to him, the contract for the housing units was awarded on September 22, 2023, and was expected to be completed by December 2023, but regretted that the contractors had failed to honour the contractual agreement.
He said, “You will recall that on 22nd September 2023, Ebonyi State Government awarded contracts to various contractors for the construction of 140 units of three-bedroom bungalows for Izzo and Amanze autonomous communities. These one hundred and forty bedrooms were shared evenly 70/70 per autonomous community.
“These contractors signed a contract agreement with the Ministry and mobilised 50%, first in the history and they commenced construction. Along the line, they started making some requests from the Ministry, which we considered.
“We deemed it necessary to convey a meeting with the contractors. We had a meeting with the contractors on the 22nd of January, 2024 when the contractors had stayed up to the required time at the site. They came complaining that they needed a variation of the job and we said no, we paid you people 50% of the mobilisation upon which you are expected to have completed the sub-structural and super-structural works.
“It was a very long argument and after that day, I briefed my boss who, out of grace, said we should give them up till April and the contractors were mobilised back to site and if you have any certificate outstanding, you should indicate and some of the contractors applied and we paid them and they returned to site. Little did we know that some of them did not complete the project.
“When we now convened another meeting of the contractors in June, the contractors started giving excuses and we told them to go back to site and complete the job. Some of these contractors were still waiting to see what we would do up till a few days ago when during the Ojiji festival, the Governor directed that any contractor who fails to finish his job on or before the 25th of September shall be arrested and prosecuted according to the law of the contract agreement.
“Yesterday, I was at the site for inspection, I saw some of the contractors coming back to site and I do hope they are coming back to site to complete the work. Immediately after the contract was awarded, the contractors signed a contract agreement with the Ministry. That agreement was drafted by the Ministry of Justice of the Ebonyi State Government.
“The contractors were given to go through it before signing, which they did. There is a very important section of the contractual agreement, ie, article 5 subsection (g) that states that contractors have no reason to stop that work except if the certificate generated is delayed on payment and they have a minimum of three months to stay in that site.
“These contractors have spent close to a year in that site and some of them are not ready to finish this job if we allow them to go the way they are going about it. They are also aware that this is a contract and I do not see reasons contractors should default. There are ways we are going to go with them as contained in that agreement. Each of the contractors has a cheque or a guarantor deposited in the Ministry that if you fail to do this work, deposit your cheque in a bank and we will get our money. It was written in the agreement and they all signed.
“So, it is one of the measures we are going to take against them. We will arrest the contractor if he fails to complete the job on or before September 25th and we will take that contractor to court for the court to compel him to adhere to the contract agreement.
“I am not aware of any Governor’s kinsmen or stakeholders handling any project there and they are not those I am having problems with, but the contractors. The law is there and it is a respecter of nobody. You cannot just wake up in the middle of the night and decide to change the goalpost. It is not possible,” he said.
Speaking, the Commissioner for Information and State Orientation, Hon. Chikadibia Nwokpor, said that Governor Nwifuru accommodated local content to encourage Ebonyi people to make conscious efforts to stimulate the economy of the state.
His words: “If the Governor’s well thought out intentions to accommodate local contents in the execution of contracts in the State is referred to as kinsmen, I do not understand. But the truth remains that Ebonyi is an economy all of us must make a conscious effort to stimulate. If the resources of the state are given access to participate in the execution of contracts, it will go a long way to stimulate the economy of the state.
“These people are going to buy materials from people of the state and invariably it will help them to pay their taxes and other obligations to the state. So, no matter who is involved, as His Excellency said, the law will take its course at the end of the expiration of the time that has been set by the State Government because nobody is going to drag the State Government out because of its magnanimity to patronise local content.”
Sunday Ogbu is a professional journalist with eight - twelve years experience that had worked with various print and online media. Sunday specializes in news reporting with the aim of educating his readers on current social, political and economic occurences within his area of coverage. Sunday is a strong force to work with in the media industry and uses his positive attitude and tireless energy to encourage others to work hard and succeed. Sunday is inspired daily by his wife and their four children. In his free time, Sunday likes sight-seeing, reading and discussing issues of societal interest.
