JUST IN: Over 200 Buildings Blocking Drainage In Onitsha Marked For Demolition– Soludo

The Governor of Anambra State, Charles Chukwuma Soludo, has said that about 200 buildings in Onitsha blocking the drainage inking the River Niger have been marked for demolition.

Soludo disclosed the development while speaking on Anambra Governance and the Soludo Solution Masterplan on Channels Tv’s Sunday Politics.

Soludo was sworn in as Anambra State Governor on March 17, inheriting debts estimated to be over N100bn.

The former Central Bank Governor during his inauguration promised to reshape the economy of the state through the ‘Soludo Solution Master Plan.’

But Soludo said the rate of the challenges he met on ground was beyond his estimate adding, “You may expect that the depth is ten metres deep, but you may get there and it’s a thousand feet deep and you still have to survive.”

He said, “Let me say this, we have had a chance now to see what’s on ground and applied for these jobs. For better and for worse, we are going to try as much as we can to give it our all and deliver to the people of Anambra State. No excuses.”

Soludo is also targeting to creatively generate revenue for the state. The state government is targeting N50bn Internally Generated Revenue

Part of the governor’s master plan is to change the look of the state by cleaning up the entire state, opening up the drains and proper planning of the state.

Soludo said, “In my agenda you can put them in four big buckets. We have the economic agenda, we have the social agenda, we have the governance, rule of law and values and environment.

The governor said the environmental agenda is geared towards green, planned cities, markets and communities.

“To have all of this work, you need a financing plan. So, that the cleaning up of Onitsha, it is not just the cleaning up of Onitsha, it is the cleaning up of the entire state.

“We are cleaning up, opening up the streets again. People cannot exist in this kind of environment, that is not the Onitsha that was the biggest market in West Africa. It cannot operate this way.

“We are starting with four local governments that happen to be the greater Onitsha metropolis. Onitsha North, Onitsha South, Idemili North and Ogbaru Local Governments.

“Now in Onitsha several people have blocked the drains to the River Niger, we marked over 200 buildings that will have to give way, because every year during the rainy season, dozens of people die, taking up by flood.”

The governor’s comment on compensation to the owners of the property suggest that the state government has no such plan.

He said, “We need to see who authorised somebody to go and build a drainage way and who gets orders and who gave the approval for somebody to go and block the drainage way that was actually dug and it was operating before and all of a sudden people began to encroach and build across the entire thing.

“The first thing is the rule of law question and people get into all kinds of impunity and you go and block drainage.”

The governor; likened the decision to the “old Abuja before El-Rufai when people built on the drainage and sewage lines. We will get to those and examine them.”

He insisted that the action by developers are some of the impunity frustrating development in the state.