By Lucky Uto
A pressure group, Isoko Monitoring Group (IMG), has raised the alarm concerning the poorly executed N1.5 billion Ikpide-Irri riverine community road project in Isoko South Local Government Area of Delta State by a Lagos-based marine company, Portplus Nigeria limited.
To address the failure and refusal of the company to maintain standards and quality in the job, the group petitioned the firm to the Delta State government for appropriate action to be taken against the contractor who is an indigene of the community.
The strongly worded petition entitled: “Ikpide-Irri Internal Road: The Need To Properly Monitor The Contractor and Stop The Ongoing Shoddy Job,” addressed to the State Government through the office of the Special Adviser to the governor, on Project Monitoring and Evaluation, lamented the refusal of the contractor to adhere strictly to standards and quality.
The group, which has been in the forefront agitating against the poor execution of the ongoing internal road works in Ikpide-Irri town, admonished that Portplus be stopped immediately or the efforts and resources of the state government will be a waste.
The petition, which was signed by the groups’ spokesman, Dr. Kingsley Oroh, lamented that “we have been able to establish before now that the contractor, Portplus Limited that is handling the project has done jobs which fell below the generally accepted standard and that of the Bill of Quantity (BOQ) of the project. The Contractor needs to be cautioned and made to follow the BOQ of the project to avoid giving the Delta State government a very bad image.
“We want to believe that your office as the Special Adviser is designed to unearth projects that are being executed poorly across the state and hold such erring contractors accountable in order to avoid deliberate attempts to discredit the government of the day and paint it in bad light before the general public.
“While we are happy that the second approved drainage system is now being constructed, we want to state categorically that the job being done is way below average and needs to be discontinued.”
Following IMG’s petition, the State government on Thursday paid an unscheduled visit to the site, and expressed disappointment and declared the multi-billion naira road project by Portplus firm as nothing but substandard.
Speaking during the unscheduled visit, Special Adviser to the state governor on Project Implementation, Evaluation and Monitoring, Johnson Erijo, accompanied by a team of engineers and government officials, frowned at the low quality of job by Portplus firm, describing the substandard job as unfortunate and wastage of state government resources.
Erijo, while disclosing that the unscheduled visit to the site was as a result of the petition written by the Isoko Monitoring Group, condemned in its entirety the job done so far by the firm, adding that what is on the ground cannot stand the test of time.
“This is unacceptable; Governor Ifeanyi Okowa will not accept this poor quality of the job. The governor is very unhappy with the huge resources he has put so far into this project. Just recently the contract gained upward review and there is nothing on ground to show good quality of job and value for money. The government must get value for funds released for projects.”
Recall that Governor Ifeanyi Okowa had in 2017 awarded the first phase of the contract to Portplus at N736, 404,555.60 and in 2019 was reviewed upward to over a billion naira.
