The All Progressives Congress (APC), in Rivers State has called on the Governor Nyesome Wike-led state government to immediately dispose of the ‘legacy jet A-600’ aircraft and do well to invest the money into refurbishing all abandoned primary and secondary schools.
The APC said the fund that will be realised could also help in the ‘resuscitation of the moribund primary healthcare system, pay off all outstanding salaries owed teachers of demonstration secondary schools and also wrongfully dismissed lecturers of Ken Saro-Wiwa Polytechnic’.
In a statement by the party’s state Publicity Secretary, Darlington Nwauju, the APC submitted funds from the sale of the aircraft could also be used for the payment of the “five years salaries of RSSDA staff, payment of pensions, and gratuities, student’s bursaries and many more unresolved obligations of the state government”.
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Darlington said there is ‘no economic benefit’ from the private jet to the people of Rivers state when the world is facing an “economic meltdown’.
The statement also questioned where the state government will get fund to pay for ‘the landing cost of the aircraft, daily parking fee, navigational charges per flight, monthly salary for Pilot, engagement of a ground crew, maintenance engineers, cleaners, security, Maintenance, observation and repairs amongst other issues involved’.
Governor Wike had last week returned to the state with a Legacy 600, a Rivers state-owned aircraft allegedly abandoned in Germany under unclear circumstance by the preceding administration has been recovered and flown back to Rivers.
Wike reiterated that it took diligent intelligence gathering by his administration to discover the asset, alleging how the administration of his predecessor and former Transportation Minister, Rotimi Amaechi, flew the aircraft to Germany with no record of the development made available to his administration.
