Return Anambra’s N43bn, Obiano Tells Buhari

• Return Anambra’s N43bn, Obiano Tells Buhari

The Anambra State Governor, Chief Willie Obiano, on Tuesday, urged the President Muhammadu Buhari-led Federal Government to refund the N43bn the state spent on the rehabilitation of federal roads.

The governor said the reimbursement was necessary to facilitate the rehabilitation of more federal roads in the state, which were in deplorable conditions.

The governor, who spoke through his Commissioner for Information and Communication Strategy, Mr. Tony Nnacheta, after an executive council meeting, said withholding the money had incapacitated the state from rehabilitating more federal roads.

He said, “The total sum we expended on federal roads in the state was N48bn. But on their own, the Federal Government worked it out and arrived at N43bn.

“We agreed and asked them to pay us but nothing has come from them. This has made us to stop the rehabilitation of federal roads in the state.

“We need this money to enable us to do more federal roads in the state because our people are suffering because of the state of federal roads in the state.”

He said the stretch of the Onitsha-Enugu Expressway along Umunya community had remained a deathtrap because the state could not repair it on behalf of the federal government.

The governor, who described the Onitsha-Enugu Road as strategic, maintained that the volume of traffic on the road from other parts of the country reflected its socio economic importance.

He said the government would commence on the construction of streetlights in the cities of the state in order to give them a befitting look.