The Governor of Rivers State, Nyesom Wike, has blamed the delay in the completion of the N120bn Bonny-Bodo Road on failure of the Federal Government to pay N60bn counterpart fund for the project.

He added that the money expended so far on the road project had been provided by the Nigeria Liquefied Natural Gas.

Wike stated this at the send off ceremony for former NLNG managing director, Tony Attah, at the company’s corporate headquarters in Port Harcourt on Saturday.

According to a statement by the Special Assistant to the Governor on Media, Kelvin Ebiri, titled, ‘Gov Wike blames FG for delay in completion of N120bn Bodo-Bonny Road, the governor was accompanied by the Governor of Edo State, Godwin Obaseki.

Wike was quoted to have said, “The Bonny-Bodo Road is not funded by the Federal Government and NLNG. With due respect, it is funded by the NLNG, all the states of the federation and the Federal Government. It will be wrong for the Federal Government to  continue to claim glory for the funding of the project with the NLNG.

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“If this country is a country that all of us mean well for ourselves; that is one project that ought to have been completed by now because of the economic interest that will benefit all of us.”

He lauded Attah for the cordial relationship the NLNG under his watch maintained with the government and people of Rivers State.

The governor said Attah would be remembered for overseeing the commencement and completion of NLNG corporate headquarters building in Port Harcourt and for ensuring that all fabrication works for the company’s $10bn Train 7 were done in Rivers state.

According to him, the 7.5 per cent Value Added Tax from the NLNG Train 7 project, will be used to transform the state.

The governor enjoined the new NLNG managing director, Dr Philip Mshelbila, to sustain the existing cordial relationship with the state government.

The governor used the occasion to reaffirm Rivers State government ownership of OML 11 which was formerly operated by Shell Petroleum Development Company.