Uduaghan and his Pet White Elephants

Uduaghan is building a portfolio of Africa’s most notorious white elephant projects

Last week the World Bank warned several resource rich African countries about allowing their governments embark on White Elephant projects.
Obviously Governor Emmanuel Uduaghan of Delta State was not listening. He’s the sort of man that seems to enjoy throwing the people of Delta’s money away on overbloated projects that offer nothing in terms of practicality but everything in terms of treasury looting.
His administration only recently announced the upgrading of the Osubi airport in Warri to international airport standards. This project is slated to cost an outrageous N37.5 billion.
Meanwhile Warri is one of the most dangerous cities in Africa with kidnappings, armed robberies and other forms of thuggery and violent crimes being the norm. The roads are virtually umotorable with crater-sized potholes littering the landscape. Even Governor Uduaghan has once had to personally leave the comfort of his bullet proof jeep to direct and ease the traffic snarl on the road.
A responsible government would focus on giving the people motorable roads, jobs and adequate security. But in this era of Animal Farm democracy, Uduaghan has seen it fit to domesticate white elephants andchannel the resources of the people into his favorite past-times.
Considering the actual upgrades, that are envisioned by the administration, a sum of N5 billion would probably be enough to tackle the project, but in this period of peppersoup politics, so many cronies, thugs, godfathers and party insiders must chop. The victims are undoubtedly the people of Warri and to a larger extent, the Niger Delta region.
This same governor expended N7.4 billion to demolish a hill so larger planes could land in Asaba airport. Undoubtedly we see the handiwork of the pet white elephant at work in that project as well.
The governor, not a man given to statesman-like confidence, said himself that he was certain none of these “projects” would be completed by the time he leaves office.
BusinessNews