Ondo Varsity project a ploy by Agagu to siphon money -LP

Olusegun Agagu, the embattled Governor of Ondo State, was on Wednesday lambasted by the State Chapter of the Labour Party (LP) over a whopping N3billion already expended on the State University of Science and Technology saying that there was nothing on ground to show that any money had been expended on the site by Agagu contrary to his claim.

Agagu, who is currently battling to upset the judgement of the Election Petitions Tribunal which nullified his purported victory at the vexed April 14, 2007 elections and the subsequent declaration of the LP’s Flag bearer, Dr Olusegun Mimiko as the duly elected Governor at the Appeal Court, last weekend amid fanfare flagged off the commencement of the varsity project.

Specifically, LP, in a release issued by its Director of Press, Research and Strategy, Mr. Kolawole Olabisi in Akure said that the development was another grand ploy by Agagu to siphon the State resources. It stated that the varsity project would, like other projects carried out by Agagu in the past, be abandoned.

According to LP, what Agagu described as the commencement of construction of infrastructure at the proposed State University of Science and Technology, Okitipupa was indeed, the second time this year such event was taking place at the varsity site with nothing to show for the over N3bn said to have been expended thus far.

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 “For those unfamiliar with the true position of the deceit and cheap propaganda in the mass media which has become the very soul of Agagu’s administration, anybody who see the plethora of sponsored advertisements in the media last weekend congratulating Agagu on the said feat and the beautiful computer impression of the said University in those newspaper advertorials, they are likely to be fooled. But the real situation on ground is that aside from the N2bn budgeted for the Varsity in the 2008 Budget, Agagu took an additional Supplementary Budget of N36bn for the Education and other sectors, yet, up till today, beside the few blocks that were placed on each other during the turning of the sod and the imposing signboard announcing the name of the institution, nothing has been done on the site,” Olabisi said.

Further, the LP spokesman reminded Nigerians that about three months ago, Agagu placed similar congratulatory advertisements in the national dailies with beautiful computer graphic impressions of six so-called luxury hotels he was building in different zones of the State, but up till today, work is yet to commence on a single one of the so-called hotels, yet millions of naira had already been spend on the phantom projects.

His words: “Agagu is ever wont to tell the world that 44 % of the people of Ondo State now have drinking water running in their homes and on taps along the streets of the State, a feat which he said he performed by bringing water production up from the paltry 4.4 % he met in 2003. But the truth is that water is being drunk in percentages in Ondo State only on the screens of television sets and in media advertorials as there are no potable water in Ondo State despite over 25 billion Agagu claimed to have expended to bring about this “feat’ of his. Indeed, the Government House where Agagu resides has no running water. He gets water for his domestic use via tankers owned by the State Water Board! Thus, the varsity project would end up being like the case of water, the non-existent so-called beautiful road networks he claimed to have done and, of course, the luxury hotels which are only built on the pages of newspapers.”

LP however warned Agagu against this spate of systematic plundering of the people’s commonwealth saying that in the fullness of time, the people will be intimated with the details of how their money was spent under Agagu’s regime.