By Mike Odiegwu, Port Harcourt
A leaked telephone conversation between former Bayelsa State Governor Seriake Dickson and his estranged former Commissioner for Land, Furoebi Akene, has been generating ripples in the state.
Akene, a renowned surveyor, resigned his appointment at the build-up to the 2015 governorship election during Dickson’s first term in office and went back to his private practice.
Dickson initiated the heated conversation that lasted about 20 minutes, following an article written by Akene, titled: Bayelsa Rising Debt Burden, which the former governor considered offensive, especially as it suggested that the state’s debt rose astronomically during his administration.
In the conversation, Dickson accused his former aide of writing the article out of bitterness and malice, but Akene insisted that he only published facts from a document released by the Debt Management Office (DMO).
The ex-governor said the debt burden referred to in the document represented the total accumulated liabilities, including money owed to contractors, unpaid salaries and gratuities, and not loans taken by the government, as Akene allegedly implied.
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He said no state could pay gratuities, including Rivers, which he said had become a shining example for “Bayelsa people”.
Dickson said: “States like Lagos that are getting the IGR of N50 billion, that are owing almost a trillion, nobody is even talking (about them). The only debt I incurred is for the airport. So, the airport is not important at all?”
But Akene responded: “The projects in these states cannot be compared to us. I didn’t say the airport is not important. But the projects they have in those states… Bayelsa has only Yenagoa; all these states we are talking about have a lot of major cities that consume projects and they are going on.
“Rivers State is doing four flyovers at the same time. If I tell you the cost of a multiple flyover, like the Etegwe roundabout, is supposed to be a multiple flyover and not a straight flyover that is required. I can tell you the real cost of things. I am a consultant. In this Abuja, I consult for some agencies and some companies.”
Dickson expressed surprise that Akene used “your village” to refer to Bayelsa and “your forest capital” to refer to Yenagoa.
He also accused the former aide of using “a virgin place that they went to put a state and a capital with the terrain we have” to refer to Bayelsa and its capital.
Dickson said: “If you write about indebtedness or liabilities of a state, you don’t know that it is all these gratuity things that they will put. No state can pay gratuity; even the Rivers State that is a shining example for you Bayelsa people. Bayelsa people, you don’t know what that state is doing to us and everything they are doing against us. To you people, four flyovers are big to you now.”
