Karibi Whyte Hospital: Rivers Govt lied – PDP

The Rivers State chapter of Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, has expressed shock that Governor Rotimi Amaechi’s Health Commissioner, Dr Sampson Parker was still deceiving Rivers people over the precarious issue of the proposed Karibi Whyte Mega Hospital, which does not exist anywhere.

Reacting to Dr Parker’s alleged false claim that the Hospital project is on course following the startling disclosure of the sharp practices surrounding the botched hospital project by the Minister of State for Education, Chief Nyesom Wike, PDP in a statement by Jerry Needam, Special Adviser on Media to the state Chairman, Prince Felix Obuah in Port Harcourt on Thursday,  insisted on the minister’s allegation that the hospital project was a big fraud.

The party challenges Dr Parker to summon the courage to make public the site of the hospital, the name of the contractor, the cost of the project, the extent of work and how much has so far been paid to disprove the minister’s weighty allegation.

“Dr Parker should also explain why the initial arrangement of a Private Public Partnership, PPP, was secretly changed to a private contractor arrangement and the whopping sum of N7.5billion committed to the Canadian Company with some close relations of a top state government official as local negotiators and why no job has been done wherever the site may be, apart from the destruction of the structures at the temporary site of the University of Port Harcourt Teaching Hospital, UPTH, the PDP demands.

“We insist that besides the absconding of the contractor with the huge sum of money paid him, there is much more about the mega hospital project that meets the eye.

One of such according to the Party is the flimsy excuse that the first choice of site (old UPTH, failed soil test after millions of naira had been wasted on demolishing the structures, with the additional implication of overstretching the Braithwait Memorial Hospital, BMH, which now services all the inhabitants and residents of Borokiri, Creek Road, Aggrey, Station and Hospital Roads etc.

“Suffering the same is the proposed project of disinfecting the state of mosquitoes with use of insecticides which we likens to the monorail project as poorly thought out and intended to loot state treasury.

“The mere admission by Dr Parker that the cost of transporting the chemical (biolarvicites) is too high is further evidence that the whole idea was anchored on fraud as such experiment had never worked in any environment similar to ours in the Niger Delta.”

On the undeserving horde of insults on the state PDP leader, Chied Wike by Dr Parker, the PDP said it cannot join issues with a mere neophyte, reminding Parker that it was not yet uhuru  as his case with the Independent Corrupt Practices Commission, ICPC, still subsists.