Nigerian Concord Newspaper
An advocacy group, Benue for Good Governance has alleged that the Governor of Benue State, Reverend Father Hyacinth wasted a whooping N4billion on a mere charade when he invited about eighty journalists from Abuja to inspect his projects last week.
According to the coalition group in a statement signed by its Director of Press, Anthony Oche, Esq, the Abuja media team led by the Special Advisor to President Tinubu on Media, Mr. Bayo Onanuga were paid N4billion for the one day inspection
The group disclosed that Onanuga had two weeks ago sent a proposal of N6billion to the Governor. He claimed the money would cover the transportation, accommodation, feeding and other logistics for members of the team.
However, the proposal was cut down to N4billion which was immediately made available to the president’s Adviser.
According to Benue for Good Governance, some aggrieved members of the Governor’s local media team have taken to the social media to condemn the act of bringing Abuja journalists with tax payers money to do the job which they can do freely.
Recall that the same team of journalists led by Onanuga was in Benue three months ago to inspect the same projects of the Benue state government, and they were paid a sum of N3.5billion as their professional fee.
Speaking further on the development, the advocacy group condemned the administration of Governor Hyacinth Alia for always wasting public funds on charade which has nothing meaningful to offer the people of the State.
The group pressed further that instead of Governor Alia to spend the several hundreds of billion of Naira he has got from multiple sources judiciously on meaningful projects, he has rather embarked on wasting funds on mere media charade.
The group stated that the administration of Governor Hyacinth Alia has not achieved anything meaningful since inception despite huge allocations.
The group however urged the governor to make public his score cards and also explain why his administration has spent a whooping N7.5billion to bring Abuja-based journalists to inspect his projects in the last three months.