All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA) candidate in Imo East, Mr Chyma Anthony, has tackled the federal government and National Assembly for maintaining obvious official indifference without any reason over the abandonment of the Inyishi mega Dam project in Ikeduru local government area of the state.
He said yesterday in Owerri at a campaign rally that the Inyishi Dam project would bounce back, as work would recommence there within the first one year of his inauguration as senator.
He said the abandonment of the huge irrigation project was largely behind the shortage of food in Imo and other neighbouring states.
“This Inyishi Dam project was started decades ago, it was contracted to Anambra/Imo River Basin Development Authority which later sub-let it to Umez Engineering Company Ltd.
“The dam is to serve over 18 communities, and specifically designed for the mass production of foods/agro productions year in, year out using irrigation from the dam. “Somewhere along the line, the project was abandoned for yet to be explained reason. Inyishi community with their revered monarch cried out some time ago, that wild animals have taken over the project site.
They submitted that farming activities in the community was actually under threat and hunger pummelling them as a result of the abandoned project, yet the federal government and National Assembly members from Imo State maintained indifference about that. In 2016 and 2021 according to Anthony, President Muhammadu Buhari’s government completed, commissioned and handed over to communities over 30 dams and hydro projects mainly in the north, but mention wasn’t made about Inyishi Dam.
He said he would liaise with the
Federal Ministry of Water Resources, Senate Committee on Water
Resources and Agriculture alongside Anambra-Imo River Basin
Development Authority that is saddled with handling of the project
with Umez Engineering Company Ltd which is an indegenous company to
ascertain what actually led to the abandonment with a view to
mobilising men and resources back to Inyishi Dam site.
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