A former managing director of the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC), Mrs Ibim Semenitari, has revealed that the thanksgiving programme being organised by a political pressure group, the Simplified Movement, across the 23 local government areas of Rivers State, is not funded by the state government.
The caretaker committee chairman of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in the state, Chief Tony Okocha, had on several fora, accused the state government of sponsoring the thanksgiving programme.
But Semenitari told newsmen at Okrika in Okrika local government area of the state that funding for the programme comes from individuals from all the LGAs in the state.
She said, “I find it very interesting because the funding is coming from the people of the various local government areas. It is each person bringing what they have. It is not funded by the government of Rivers State. I challenge him (Tony Okocha) to bring out evidence that the Rivers State government is funding the thanksgiving.
“The Rivers State government is not spending a dime for any of these. It is the people in each local government that are determined to say ‘thank you’ to God. That is why you see the way it is. It is simply funded by individuals; each person bringing what they have, committed to what they want.”
Also, the state commissioner for information and communications, Warisenibo Joe Johnson, said the programme would be better than it is if Governor Siminalayi Fubara is funding it.
Johnson said, “We would have wished that it is the governor that is funding it, it would have been better than what you are seeing. The gatherings you find across the length and breadth of the state are true expression of the organic love they have for the governor.
“Originally, quite a number of persons who are here and everywhere today never believed that there could be any good thing that will come out of Nazareth. I am sure that overtime they have discovered that Sim Fubara was the best thing to happen to Rivers State.”
