ICPC Scrutinizes Constituency Projects Of Lawmakers

By Ayodele Oni

As part of its over sight functions, the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC), has kicked off tracking of 33 constituency projects execution in Ondo state.

The projects, under scrutiny are those facilitated by some of the Senators and House of Representatives members from the State.

The exercise, which started on Tuesday at Ile-Oluji, Ikare-Akoko and Oka-Akoko in the South and North Senatorial Districts of Ondo state, aims to investigate fraudulent procurement practices in the award of contracts for the selected projects.

Mr. Osove Andrew, the Assistant Chief Superintendent Investigation, ICPC, who led the team to Ondo state, explained that the exercise was to ensure that all government funded projects are executed fully to their specifications and to make recoveries where the project costs are inflated by contractors or are poorly executed.

“The first project we visited at Ile-Oluji was an empowerment project that are already done. So to capture that kind of the project is not that very easy, but from the list, people that took the motorcycles were 124 and we can actually call them to ascertain, to make sure that they actually took the delivery of the motorcycles.

“Also the second project we visited which was the construction of fence of Muslim Primary School Ilepa, Ikare-Akoko, we can see that the fencing is good. But the gate has two bridges which need to be addressed.

“While the third project, road work  in Oka-Akoko is still under construction. One of the things that is of concern is that the contractor has over short his expected date of completion.

“But from the information we’ve gotten from the agency supervising the project, they told us that he has re mobilized to site last month and we are hoping that they will continue and complete the job.

“Above all, the essence of this exercise is basically to ensure that federal government projects assigned to communities have value for money.

“Value for money in the sense that, when project are signed they are done to specification and they are beneficial to community as expected at the point of allotment of those projects.

“So when projects are not done, when they are done, but not to specifications, those are the issue we are here to address.”

Clement Akerele, Chairman, Owese Community Development Committee, who spoke with journalists on behalf of the Oka-Akoko community said “actually this road project started  long time ago and we have been expecting its completion.

“The road leads to the Federal Medical Centre Annex in Oka. The condition of the road is too bad, we do find it difficult to transport patient to the hospital.

“We are appealing to the contractor handling the road project to gear up to complete the road for us, the road is giving us difficulties, we cannot transport patient from our community here to the FMC Annex in Oka.”