Governor Rotimi Amaechi
By Ernest Chinwo
Rivers State Governor, ChibuikeAmaechi, has described the prevailing peace in the state as what sustains its economy.
Amaechi spoke during a town hall meeting with the people of Okrika at
the Okrika Local Government Council headquarters on Thursday.
He recalled that when he became governor, the state economy was at its
lowest as companies and expatriates relocated to other parts of the
country on account of insecurity in the state.
He said with steady efforts to tackle insecurity, his administration
was able to restore peace to the state and the economy also bounced
back. He assured the people that he would continue to maintain the
peace in the state.
His words: “I will discuss security in line with what I consider my
contribution to the growth of the state. When I became governor of
Rivers State, you all know how Rivers State was. You know that it was
bad.
“I hardly had time to sleep because if one group is not attacking here,
another group is attacking there. They were all everywhere and it was
like a war zone. And it occurred to me that as a young man if you don’t
confront these young boys or young men, we would not have a state
called Rivers State.
“Our economy was crashing, people had left the city, companies had
folded up, whitemen had gone, we had no business again. When I took
over, they used to pay them to come and bury somebody in either Okrika
or Buguma or Abonnema. You must pay money. They will give you one or
two hours to come and bury and go.
So the micro-economy was going, that economy had crashed in the
riverine areas. We sat back, we discussed with the military, we
discussed with the police, we argued and argued and at the end of the
day we took one decision – we will not pay anybody anymore. From today
henceforth no more payment, because before I became governor, government
was paying kidnappers N250million, N500million, so people were even
arranging kidnapping.
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