As his adminstration puts finishing touches to its handover notes and transition documents, indications have emerged, revealing that Imo State Governor, Owelle Rochas Anayo Okorocha is claiming to have built the Imo International Conference Centre, IICC, with a whooping sum of N5.9bn.
Nigeria Newspoint learnt that the latest figure being claimed by the government is contained in the document submitted to both the Economic and Financial Commission, EFCC and the Transition Technical Committee.
According to sources close to the seat of power the governor allegedly upped the contract to evade the prying eyes of the anti graft agencies which we reliably gathered has been around the state sniffing around for financial infractions of the outgoing adminstration.
It was also learnt that the new figure being claimed contradicted the sum the governor had earlier claimed his adminstration used in building the Centre which was then put at a dazzling sum of N1.9billion.
In a related development, the Governor’s touted legendary greed and rapacity seems to be increasing with each passing day, especially since his succession plot kissed the dust, as findings also indicates that he has converted the Odenigbo Lodge to part of his Willow Wood Hotel, renamed from Lamonde hotel, adjacent AIvan Ikoku College.
According to findings the governor who had earlier built the Odenigbo Lodge eventually ended up converting it into his hotel annex, shutting down its original entrance close to the Deputy Governor’s office near the Court premises.
A visit to the place revealed that you can now only gain access to the Lodge through the entrance of the hotel even as it was observed that the buildings have already been converted to hotel rooms.
Before this conversion the Lodge used to serve as Guest Houses to high profile guests of the State government who came to the state for one business or the other and who don’t like staying in public hotels and guest houses with in the city.
It was also gathered that it his plan to annex the lodge that motivated him to erect same, a few years ago, a project showcased on several occassions as part of his achievements in his eight years in office.
But, just like in numerous cases of surreptitious acquisition of publicly owned assets, Gov Okorocha has also ended up grabbing the Odenigbo historic edifice which was built with public funds.
